I wanted to talk to all of you who have ambitions of becoming a “songwriter”, i.e. a professional. What is your job as a songwriter?
A. “To entertain people”
B. “To let out my creativity”
C. “To sell records”
D. “To speak about the things important to me”
All of these answers could be correct - but only one is more right than the others.
Your “job” is to sell records. That’s it. Your job is to write songs that reflect what the record buying public wants to buy. No more, no less.
“Honky Tonk Badonkadonk” (Dallas Davidson, Randy Houser, Jamie Johnson) by Trace Adkins, we’ve spoke about before. The most impressive thing about that song is how many records it sold. It literally took an all but dead album and raised into the multi-platinum range.
“I Hope You Dance”(Tia Sellers, Mark D. Sanders) by LeeAnn Womak made the cross-over and sold a ton of records.
“I Will Always Love You” is a Dolly Parton standard but it sold 14 million records for Whitney Houston. You can probably think of a lot more.
The singles on the radio are only released for one reason - to capture people’s attention and hopefully, get them to go out and spend their money. In that sense, songs are nothing more than 3 minute mini-commercials. Most of these commercials are terrible in that they might be creative and they might be fun to watch (listen to), but they don’t sell much product. That’s the difference in the real world between a “hit” and a “HIT”.
Artist Dierks Bentley has recently run into this problem with his new release ‘Long Road Alone’. His first single, usually the one that sets the tone for the record, has done very well on radio - climbing to the top of the charts. But his highly hyped album sits at #9 on the album chart.
Even Dierks realizes his problem:
“For the first single, you want to pick a song that’s honest and reflects how you were feeling, but you also want it do well on the charts, and more importantly, to sell some records when the record comes out,” Bentley explained. “‘Every Mile a Memory’ (Bentley, Beavers, Bogard) is a great song, and radio loved it. It’s a huge song, audience-wise, but I think the next song, ‘Long Trip Alone,’ will probably be more of a song that gets more people out there to go pick up the record.”
Remember your job as a songwriter - it’s not to entertain. It’s not to let out your creativity. It’s not to speak about the things that matters to you. It’s to sell records.
15 Comments until now.
Tough words, but fairly true. If you want to make any money, absolutely true.
What I worry about is falling into the Simon Cowell trap–that a song, artist, and music product has to absolutely fit the mold of what is commerical now. If we all do nothing but write commercially safe music, it is going to be a very boring world. Of course the challenge is to write those great commericial hit songs that still manage to stretch the envelope. It’s a fine line.
Yeah, that’s always a trap. But even Simon has been proved wrong a time or two (Taylor Hicks, et. al.).
What I get tired of hearing about is these people that think they are great songwriters and they go to Nashville and then go back to wherever they came from and complain about how it’s “all about money” in Nashville or that it’s “too commercial”. To me that is something you should recognize going into it. But I still believe the record industry heads want great songs and appreciate great music.
Give em what they want (to quote a 10000 Manics song) and you’ll enjoy alot of freedom to do whatever the hell you want later on.
I always tell my wife I would have pranced around onstage with N’Sync and sang “Bye Bye Bye” for 10 years in order to have the financial and creative freedoms they all enjoy now.
Nothing’s free and nothing’s easy.
You know I wonder if this is a short term view, with the industry going, willingly or not, digital - is there still room for an albums market? It seems to me that in the next few years we’re going to see less and less of this model. My own humble prediction is that as songwriters we’ll have to be even more ruthlessly commercially oriented and foccussed on writing stand alone hit singles. How many people nowadays bother buying albums but instead wait for the greatest hits CD to come out? I think that’s an indicator of what the audience really wants. Granted there are people who can compose albums but there are a lot more artists who only put together a fairly random collection of songs and call it an album.
It’s gonna be back to 60’s and the single, keep your pencils sharp folks…
I think human nature is cyclical and we are all fascinated with all things conceptual and themes. People will gravitate back to full albums - if works of music will still be in album form by then - who knows. People always rebel against the accepted norm. That’s what makes music great. -dm
I’m with you Paul H. The 60’s are on their way and you can see it in the form of MySpace ‘hits’, Ipods, etc.
The problem began a few years ago when, in a bid to stem the tide of filesharing, the labels determined to withhold from the market what it wanted - singles. The singles market tanked in a retail environment but flourished online because of this dumb decision.
I think for songwriters it really IS a singles market - and not only for the obvious reasons, but for this reason…
You typically only get ONE song on an album. Make sense?
It’s a rare thing for a songwriter to have 3, 4, or 5 songs on any one album - extremely rare.
In the 50’s - 60’s there was an “A” side and a “B” side - concerts weren’t a full hour of one band, they were your A and B sides and you left the stage, where another group would come and play their A and B sides. If the group had two hit singles, they’s play their A and A. A catalogue for an album was built in this way - as well as a solid foundation of fans by touring.
If ego wasn’t what it was, that model could work today with great effect. Leave the drums, everyone else plug and play - in and out and noone gets bored.
One more thing about singles. Even as the age of albums began, it wasn’t rare to find the same ‘hit’ song on a number of albums from the same artists. Maybe one time it was Jazz, the next, big band, the time after, just sparce. They knew familiarity helped SELL…
I’m on a rant, apologies.
All I can say is, man I’m glad I’m not doing this for money. Writing pablum for the masses is the last thing I think of when I think of “songwriting.” If all those crappy songs that get played a million times on the radio and “move merchandise” are really just advertisements, then I’d much rather work in actual advertising. There’s a lot more creativity and humor in most 30-second TV spots than in your average top-40 hit.
Paul, you’ve touched off one of the best discussion strings I’ve seen in a long time on the subject. Thanks for provoking a lot of thought, and a lot of comments.
An interesting observation, and one that supports your position on how important a song is to advertise the artists albums and other songs:
Derek Sivers of CDBaby noticed a while back that artists who did an intersting cover of a known, but not over-covered, song were selling a LOT more downloads of their whole catalogue…and it did not correspond to the artist’s CD sales. If people had a title exactly like another hit song from the past, or they did a great cover, people were pulled into the rest of the artist’s music.
Here is an interesting thing to look at…I did a search on Rhapsody for “Calling All Angels” and found 13 songs, some of them duplicates from Train. But there was a folk/rock song of the same title by a female singer–Jane Sibery–that absolutely got me. I bought a download of it, and I’m going to go back and look at more of her songs.
So a song, even a single, can absolutely hook people into your other stuff (or the other stuff of the artist who sings your song). Is it the only reason to create a song? Well, not for me. But I do get pretty excited when I come up with a good commercial package.
I have an “indie orientation,” so there is a large part of me that says, “screw the labels and publishing companies.” However, I’ve still found that I reach people best when I have a good hook, a disciplined structure, an interesting story, a melody that the listener “gets” on the first listening, and enough depth that they hear something new when they listen 2, 3 or 4 times. That is often what also makes a song commercial.
I feel that I should be paid for what I am here to do. I see nothing wrong with that. I write music. If I can get paid to fulfill my dream then I will do it. If that means I write Honky Tonk Ba Donk A Donk then more power to me. I happen to feel the guy that wrote that song probably wrote it from the heart. I think John Mayer writes the same kinds of songs he would write even if he wasn’t getting paid. My dad tells me that back in the day Creedence Clearwater Revival was considered bubble gum pop music. Sometimes I think people cry “Sellout” more out of jealousy and envy than because a person actually sold out.
Only my opinion though.
DM
Don–great point about John Mayer writing what he would anyway.
To explore that point some–I think its more like 80% what they’d write anyway and 20% commercial considerations. The problem I’ve seen is folks who are so desperate for money/recognition that they give 70+% to commercial considerations and come off as fakers. Of course the other side is just as dangerous–being a self-indulgent “Artist” with a capital “A” who refuses to make even a small edit for commerce.
With the 80% heart and 20% head rule I think you get a nice balanced work. That, of course, has no correlation to the cycles of the market or your networking skills, or having an uncle who played bass for Jesus, etc.
Didn’t Sting claim one time that he did the usual pop album every few years in order to have the freedom to pursue jazz and other music genres? Couldn’t find it on Google but I remember seeing it somewhere.
Or maybe it was urban legend. -dm
Great discussion with a lot of valid points. Let me try with two analogies.
#1 Some of the greatest scientists’ work is little known because they are only interested in the science, not communicating their results. Some are thought of as experts but are not scientists at all. Scientists that have the greatest impact are both scientists and communicators.
#2 Who would you rather hire, someone who believes in what they do and enjoys doing it or someone who is just looking for a job to pay the bills?
I think that for the best chance of being successful, you need to combine being true to yourself and writing for your audience. Most importantly you must believe, enjoy, and work hard for your success.
Like any generalization, there are the exceptions who have become huge successes by just doing their own thing. There are also people who have won the lottery.
Good points Jeff. Except I don’t think your #2 question only has two options. I don’t really think ANYBODY who is in songwriting as a career is in it simply for the money. I believe they ALL have a passion for songwriting. Even guys like Simon Cowell - the most crass and commercial of them all, practically gets a hard-on when he hears a great classic soul song. Like it or not, he has a passion for good music.
Additionally, there were Motown writers that were in it to “pay the bills”, yet some of the greatest songs in the history of modern music came from those people. Same could be said of many of Elvis’ songwriters.
I think it was Rivers Cuomo of Weezer that said they chose the mainstream pop radio route because that is how the music they wrote sounded. They said they would have loved to go totally independant like “Built To Spill” (he mentioned that band specifically), but Weezer’s sound had mainstream arena-rock mass appeal, so they went for it.
In my opinion it is just too simplistic to put songwriters into two camps - “in it for the money” and “in it for the passion”. Although I am guessing you probably didn’t really mean it that simplistic anyways …
-dm
PS: I’ve been loving your blog entries on JeffSongwriting.com lately!
When I first read the article I thought “bloody hell, thats a bit harsh” but then I thought about it and realised that I was approaching the article from a performing songwriters point of view rather than a non-performing one.
If (being a non-performing songwriter) your only ‘product’ that you are selling are your songs then I totally agree with what Paul is saying.
As a performing songwriter I would like to think that through my live shows I will be able to sell records by a combination of entertaining people, letting out my creativity and speaking up about the things that are important to me.
You know, all of that warm and fuzzy stuff that we know and love.
I personally believe that, if it is in fact the listening public that ultimately decides what song is a ‘hit ‘ and what isn’t, how much control over that process do we, as songwriters really have?
My two cents worth,
Corey
but if a person is entertained by what the songwriter wrote, doesn’t that mean they’re more inclined to buy the record than if the writer wrote the song simply to separate the listener from the money?
“Remember your job as a songwriter - it’s not to entertain. It’s not to let out your creativity. It’s not to speak about the things that matters to you. It’s to sell records.”
What a ridiculous statement! If it were voiced differently, it would be true: “Remember, if you want to be a professional songwriter and make a living from it, your job as a songwriter is not to entertain. It’s not to let out your creativity. It’s not to speak about the things that matters to you. It’s to sell records.” That’s only if your goal is to support yourself (or get rich, or whatever) via songwriting.
But to think that making money is the ~only~ reason to write songs? That’s absurd. Many people feel emotionally fulfilled by expressing themselves by writing songs. They use the medium to convey strong passions, closely-held beliefs, their thoughts… whatever.
“Oh, yeah?” You may protest, “Well, name me one top 10 song that was written by such a person?”
They’re not going to be there on the Top 10 List. Those songs are written by pros, whose criteria are about commercialism, not self-expression. But that is hardly to say that non-commercial songwriting isn’t viable. You don’t hear Ani DiFranco or Dave Matthews Band tunes competing with Avril Lavigne on the Pop Charts, but the music is still widely distributed and widely appreciated. Also, in this modern era, basically any computer can be used as a recording studio, so non-commercially minded songsmiths can often create a really credible recording of their songs. They get passed around by people who simply enjoy them, often outside of the music marketplace.
Most of the “artists” who are widely recognized are more entertainers than artists. They aspire to sell as many records as possible the way Alpo aspires to sell as many cans of dog food as possible. That’s not a bad thing, but it’s not “art.” To make a statement that songwriting is only about commercialism, not about self-expression, is, well, simply an ignorant thing to do.
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