T.J. Edmond

Well, I didn’t blog all weekend, because Mary’s computer died and she needed to use my laptop for grading papers. So I’ll try to make up for it this week somehow.

On of the things I want to do with this blog is give you a chance to see into the process of writing new songs, talk about how I wrote it, and let you hear a demo recording of it. It’s an uncomfortable thing to do, though, because the initial demos are inevitably quite rough: the recording sounds thin, my voice is pitchy as I feel out a melody, and the lyrics or structure might change altogether. Just like my wife won’t leave the house without her hair and makeup done, these demos were never meant to be heard. They’re unpolished, rough-hewn sketches full of flaws. (Incidentally, my wife is beautiful when she wakes up, even before the makeup! )

All that being said, the demos are like a polaroid snapshot of the moment when a song shows up. And that’s exciting to me.

(click the play button to hear the track)

Never Sure

This is a song that started to form when I was working in a coffee roasting warehouse in Atlanta. I would bag a couple thousand pounds of coffee each day, and would often kick around songs in my head as I worked. The first verse came to me there:

“All my friends have records, we’re all trying to hit the road

But I’ve never really listened, and they haven’t seen our show

We’re just trying to get some traction, we’re all fighting to be heard

Trying to make our contribution to the soundtrack of this world”

When I wrote that, I was thinking about the fact that nearly everyone I knew was a musician, but many of them I hadn’t actually gone to see them play or listened to their music. We were all in Atlanta, hustling, networking, and trying to be heard amidst a sea of other bands. And we’ve sacrificed quite a lot to chase our creative dream.

But in the end, you can’t be sure you’re ever going to accomplish your dream. And even if you reach it, how long will it last?

It was eye-opening, moving to Atlanta, and seeing the fallout of music careers all around: The sound guy at a local club was in a successful band that had major radio play just a year earlier (I had even covered one of their songs!). The guy  packing coffee next to me was the drummer for a successful artist who had toured the world and played on Letterman’s show. All around town I met great musicians who had been very successful, who were now back in the middle of the pack. How would I fare any better?

The first verse is very specifically about being a musician, which is way more narrow and specific than I like to be in a song, because it’s just not very universal. I prefer to be a little more broad, so that more people can connect with the song. However, the concept of trying to achieve your dreams, and the struggle entailed, is understandable to most people. So the verse might change, but that’s where the song came from.

In the second verse, I wanted to tell a similar story but with a different character. This is a guy who wants a wife and family. He got a job, bought a house and has set everything in place to get married but the piece of the puzzle he can’t find is the woman. He’s alone and waiting.

“I saved a little money and I bought myself a home

but in the early morning hours I still find myself alone

We’re all looking for the future, trying to make it through the night

Lately I’ve been wondering if I’ll ever see the light”

The common thread in both of these stories, is the idea that we’re often chasing a future that might not happen. And perhaps we’re missing out on something in the meantime.

This demo has a middle section that’s too long. I was a little self-indulgent with it, but I like the way it builds to the end. I’m not a lead player, so my solo is really elementary, but there are a few moments I like. I recorded this at home with a condenser mic into Garageband. I used my 12-string guitar, which is an old Hohner model I got for a measley $150 and I love the way it sounds. I over dubbed the harmonies and added a lot of reverb to get the haunting sound.

So that’s it.

On Monday, I talked about the Rolling Stones song “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction“. There’s a great story of how that song came to be. Allegedly Keith Richards woke up in the middle of the night with the riff in his head. He grabbed his tape recorder and recorded the riff  and the lyrics, “I Can’t Get no Satisfaction”,  before passing out asleep. The next morning, he had forgotten all about it and, when he pressed the play button, he rediscovered that glorious riff…followed by a long session of snoring. He brought the riff to Mick Jagger, who finished the lyrics in about ten minutes, and it became their first number-one hit single in the U.S..

Implausible? Perhaps. But I have had a similar experience with songwriting.

Late one night, just before bed, I was strumming my guitar and hit on a progression I liked. I grabbed my laptop and recorded it with Garageband, along with some lyrics that came to mind. I went to sleep and forgot about it. Several weeks later, I rediscovered the recording, and thought,“This is good! I’ve got to finish this!” The rest of the lyrics came almost as quickly as I could write them down, and that’s how I wrote “21″, which has gotten probably the strongest listener response of all the songs I’ve written.

There’s something about the time between being awake and asleep that I’ve found to be a fertile ground for creativity. Your mind is not fully engaged with the day-to-day tasks, and the creative part of the brain is able to surface. I’ve written some great songs in the shower, when I’m still waking up in the morning. Late at night, when I’m winding down from the day, bits of song ideas will come to me and sometimes I’ll stay up for hours trying to coax it out.

I’ve found I can also tap into that creative space during the day. When I’m driving, or doing some repetitive task where I don’t have to think too much, I’ll often work on songs in my head, turning them over and over, singing  or humming a melody, feeling for a lyric. When I first moved to Atlanta, I worked in a warehouse, stacking boxes and straightening them on shelves. To pass the time I worked on songs in my head. “Minnesota (Always Leaving)” came from that summer in the warehouse.

It’s always a struggle to block out time to write and create, but by using the small bits of time here and there, I’ve learned that I can keep an idea simmering until I finish it. And I’ve finished a number of songs this way. I try to record any little idea I get, and lately I’ve started keeping a disc of these unfinished song bits in my car to work on during long drives. Some of these fragments probably won’t amount to much. But some of them just might be great.

Remember, Keith Richards didn’t think much of his little riff, either.

How are you finding time to create?

21 Minnesota (Always Leaving)