Step 1: Sketching

Step 2: Developing Your Ideas

Step 3: Arrangement

Step 4: Editing

The last, and most important step in the songwriting process is realisation.

Why do I say it’s the most important? Because this is the end of the process. This is where it pays off, where you can say you’ve finished a song. This is the achievement stage. And it feels great! If you don’t get this far you won’t experience the satisfaction and fulfillment that this art form offers us.

You realisation will probably take the form of a live version or a recording.

Live version

Live versions change – the song might not find it’s final form in the first, or even fiftieth performance. But nevertheless this is where you’ll realise the song. Thrashing it out in the rehearsal studio, teaching the parts to the band, and finally playing it at a gig makes the song real.

Recording

For me this is the place a song really becomes finished. I’ve been slowly developing my recording skills for about 15 years, ever since I borrowed a tascam 4 track recorder from my secondary school. I’d advise any songwriter to start developing their recording skills sooner rather than later. You might not ever get to professional standard, but getting things down even in a rough way let’s you finalise your ideas and set things in stone.

It’s during the recording you finally hear the entire arrangement for the first time. It’s here you might realise that the first verse is too long, the last chorus really needs extra vocal ad-libs, or the second guitar part just doesn’t need to be there at all.

Tips to make realising your song successful

1. Listen back. Whether it’s when recording a demo or during rehearsals, stopping and listening really matters. These days everyone’s got some sort of recording technology, even if it’s a very low quality audio or video recorder on your phone. That’s all you need to let you listen back and make decisions.

2. Cut. The most important thing here, particularly if you’re thinking about live performance, is groove and pace. Does any section go on too long? Cut it!

3. Change. Does anything repeat exactly? Change it! Every repeat should be slightly different, even if it’s something subtle like adding a vocal harmony in the second verse.

4. Extend. Just as bad as something going on too long is a section being too short. Make sure the audience gets the emotional journey they deserve.

The most important tip for realising a song is the point I made at the beginning – Make sure you do it. Every song needs to get to this stage if at all possible. This is where you finish and oh my it feels good.

You’ve finished a song, you get to call yourself a songwriter!

What now? Two things

1. Share the song with the world. 

2. Start on the next song!

And here it is:

It’s called Three Rows of Teeth. You can buy a CD, stream for free, download, and even get the first two tracks free if you head over to the bandcamp page

Here’s a video my brother shot. He doesn’t take it seriously. I should probably stop working with him.

2013 is going to start with me expressing an opinion – Hit songs Deconstructed is a pointless waste of webspace.

Not because the song analysis on the site is inaccurate;  not because they say anything that isn’t true; not because they give bad advice. I dislike the site because it’s geared towards writing top 40 pop songs.

And is there anything more worthless in music than top 40 pop songs?

Mark Night from Hit Songs Deconstructed, over on Music Think Tank, spoke about the most common technical similarities between ‘hit’ songs:

A short, effective intro that instantly hooks the listener into the song, a first chorus that hits early, infectious and simplistic melodies, fluctuations in MTI levels (momentum, tension, intensity), frequent sectional turn-over, universal yet clever lyrics, and the A-B-A-B-C-B form (verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus) to name just a few.

He’s right of course, these are common technical elements, and you should be aware of them.

But only so you don’t make too frequent use of them.

With the exception of his comment about pacing and momentum, I’d advise avoiding the ideas in that quote.

Write songs with long intros if you want. Write songs with obscure lyrics. Write songs that don’t use that Verse Chorus structure, that have no traditional melody at all.

You won’t write a hit, because as I say, Hit Songs Deconstructed do their job very well.

I just think the world would be a better place with fewer top 40 hits.

Step 1: Sketching

Step 2: Developing Your Ideas

Step 3: Arrangement

Now we’ll look at Step 4, Editing.

Once you’ve sorted out a rough arrangement for your song, I’d definitely advise you let it rest for a day or two so that you can listen to it fresh.

Once you do, you’ll discover it needs editing – there’ll be things you need to cut, areas you need to tidy up.

How do you tell what needs editing?

Listen critically

Listen to the song, trying to imagine yourself as the listener. Is there any point where the pace of the song drags, where we’re just vamping on a chord uneccessarily? Cut there – you don’t need that bit.

Is there any section that’s an exact repeat of another? You might need to change it. The chorus needs to repeat of course, but does it need to be exactly the same? Why not an extra harmony line, a counter melody, an interesting drum fill? Make it different on every repeat and the song will feel like it’s going somewhere.

Of course, exactly what kind of editing you need depends on lots of different factors, not least what you’re trying to achieve with a song. If you’re aiming is to write a sprawling epic that keeps the listener entertained for 10-20 minutes, listening with the critical ear of a top 40 pop song fan is going to be counter productive.

When Editing goes Wrong

As an example, I’d like to share something from my favourite prog rock band Dream Theater.

Dream Theater had a lot of disagreements with their record label when writing their fourth album Falling into Infinity. Outside writers and producers were brought in because the label wanted short radio friendly hit singles from this prog metal band (despite their fans wanted huge complicated epics).

In the long run the band stuck to their guns and have become most successful with long ‘non-commercial’ songs. However, very usefully for us they’ve released the demos from the Falling into Infinity sessions so we can compare the songs before and after the producer had edited them into something quite different.

For example the original version of ‘Burning my Soul’ had the middle section completely removed to create a seperate instrumental, turning the song from a long ‘composite’ song that took you on a real journey into an arguably less interesting verse -chorus verse chorus metal song.

Here’s the original demo (Only a demo, not a polished studio recording:

Here’s the finished studio version:

I’d argue that the artistic merits of what was done to that album are subjective, but you can’t dispute that the editing process, in particular the decisions about structure, were vital to the final effect the songs had.

In summary

Editing is where you decide what kind of song you’re trying to create – this is where you make decisions, cut parts out, extend and balance. This is where you pin the song down.

So listen to your song with a critical ear – do you need 16 bars of guitar solo, or will 8 do? Do you need that fifth repeat of the chorus, or would the ending be too abrupt without it?

For the comments: Have you ever had to agonise over editing decisions when finishing your songs?

1. Sketching
2. Developing your ideas

Now it’s time for step 3:

Arrangement

You’ve developed your song to the point of having chords, words and melody.

Now, what instruments will you use? How will you use them?

It used to be the case that we were limited by the instruments and players we had available. That isn’t the case anymore – you might need pros to get a pro recording but when it comes to sketching out an arrangement anyone with a computer has a full band at their fingertips.

Garageband and Reaper are two great examples of cheap music programs you can use to sketch out an arrangement. Using them is a different subject for a different blog post but I’d definitely advise you have a go – just download a program, read a few tutorials and start recording!

What makes a good arrangement?

Groove

For most kinds of popular music you’re going to have a groove of some sort. Plenty of genres are defined by their groove, in paticular what the three main parts of the drum kit – bass, snare and hi-hat – do for most of the song.

Choosing the right groove is vital – is this a rock song? Reggae, jazz, folk? There are grooves that fit with each of those genres so listen and try things out (only the most distinctive unique drum beats would be under copyright – most are standards that you can borrow without fear of come back. – drum beat that is, not recording, using sample is a different issue).

This is where technology can really help. EZdrummer for example, is a great and relatively cheap programme that has a very useful library of common grooves.

Bass Line

You’ll need a bassline too – one that marks out the chords and fits with the groove. Again, this is a matter of genre and feeling – do you need the driving root notes of a rock bass player, or the sparse, tastefully chosen notes of a reggae bassline?

Pad

Which instruments are going to play your chords? How will they play them? Are you going to have a rock organ blaring out powerchords, or lightly played guitar arpeggios? How will this change from verse to chorus?

Lead/melody instruments

Will there be a sax solo? Guitar fills? Apart from the vocal, how will you make sure the listener always has something interesting to keep them engaged?

Development

Perhaps this idea should be first rather than last – Development, change, is the key to a good arrangement.

Your second verse is exactly the same as the first, apart from the words? Then the listener is going to switch off. You need soomething new in every new section. It doesn’t always need to be radically different – an extra drum fill, a countermelody, a flourish from your melody instrument.

There should be something new all the time and you should be aiming to create a sense of increasing interest as the song progresses.

Music that stays the same for extended periods of time becomes background. That might be what you want, but generally speaking popular song shouldn’t be background –  make sure your song develops and they’ll keep listening.

For the comments, what do you think makes a good arrangement? Got any examples for us to listen to?

It’s there to provide a contrast to the rest of the song by giving us a change in mood, tempo, dynamics, rhythm or harmony.

One way to think of it is as a moment of uncertainty – we know the rest of the song is say an uptempo major key rocker, so suddenly having a slow minor bridge makes us uncertain – and gives us a moment of emotional climax as we return to the uptempo rock for the final chorus.

5 tips to make your bridge work:

1. Change Pace – this is simple but can be really effective. Nirvana had several songs for example that had a bridge that was just a third verse – but with the pace much slower and some of the instruments taken out.

2. Reach a climax/high point – if you’ve got a great singer, here’s where you make them work – give them their highest pitched note in the bridge. Think of all those Mariah Carey songs where the higest note happens in the bridge, before taking us back down to the chorus.

3. Make the rhythm uncertain – by uncertain I just mean different to the main beat of the song. If you’ve a simple 4/4 beat with kick and snare for most of the song, maybe we need something based on the toms for the bridge? If the song is mostly syncopated grooves, maybe some dead simple stabs will make a good bridge? If the the song is mostly swung, maybe the bridge has a straight feel, or maybe there are all sorts of drum fills to take us completely away from a groove at all – only to return to the main groove for the final chorus.

4. Make the harmony uncertain – in the same way you can play with the listener’s expectations of harmony. Go to the relative minor in a major key song for example. Or change key a few times, making us uncertain of what key we’re actually in – this can give you that moment of realise when we hit harmonic certainty when returning to the chorus.

5. Say something different – lyrically the bridge can be the time you give us a new perspective. It’s a break-up song? Tell us how good the relationship could have been. It’s a narrative song? Here’s where the story takes a twist.

One of my favourite bridges ever is ‘Alive’ by Pearl Jam

Despite the uplifting chorus, Alive is a pretty bleak song – It tells the story of a young man who first discovers the man he thought was his father isn’t, before having an incestuous relationshp with his mother. Eddie Vedder has said that the fans’ reaction to the song has turned it into something hopeful nonetheless and it’s become a song about overcoming adversity.

It also has a great bridge just before the last chorus.

It’s quieter than the rest of the song, the lyrics give us a new perspective as the main character tries to figure out how he feels. The verses tell the story, so this bridge is the first time the character asks questions and thinks about the main theme of the song.

My favourite detail is its harmonic ‘uncertain’, changing key by a tone halfway through, ending up on a B, which leads nicely into the last chorus in E.

I am biased – Ten was my favourite album when I was a teenager and I’ll always have a soft spot for it, but I do think this is one of the best bridges in songwriting.

For the comments – what else makes a good bridge? Any examples?

Hi Tom

On those notes in the beginning part, is he really arpeggiating those chords you said? Because I wrote down the notes and it’s either that he would be playing the notes out of sequence, with the root note not coming first or something like that. See if you can do that when you write, arpeggiating but doing the notes in random order, I wouldn’t know. 

The main thing for me is when writing my songs, it seems like there will be a single way of going about it. and that comes from my limited knowledge. a very simplistic way of looking at writing and arranging songs would be, make up a chord progression for the verses and chorus and intro and whatever.

This would work as the harmony of the song, and you play it as rhythm with rhythm guitar underneath. Then you would play a riff or musical phrase based on the key of the song (using a scale) and play a few notes over the top of the rhythm chords. This would be similar to the melody, in that it would be independent of the harmony of the song.

The actual melody would be from whatever you would be singing.

As of right now, that is how I will be going about writing my songs, and it seems fairly limited honestly. but I don’t know how other people go about it. what about the countless bands who only have one guitar player?

I’ve looked at tabs and tried to figure out how one guitar player can do their riff playing single notes, but also cover the chord progression of the song when there is no other guitar playing it underneath. it just doesn’t make sense to me, it puzzles me. that’s why it seems like there would be “implied chords” which is a term I’ve googled a couple times, but I can’t find anything on it.

P.S. I just thought that the chord shape he arpeggiates might be a G barre chord shape, then gsus4 barre chord (which I guess would have a fourth inthe place of the third note somehow) and b barre chord, etc. guys seemingly do that alot. but I wouldn’t know anything more about that than arpeggiating an open shape chord 

Trey

Hi Trey,

Yeah the Radiohead guy is playing barre chords and not always in any particular sequence – you can play an arpeggio in any order you want. A G chord is a G chord no matter what order you put the notes in.

You can think of a chord progression as an ideal – even if you don’t play every single note, you’re still playing those chords.

For example, say you’re playing power chords and you play:

________________
(5)______________
5__7__9_________
5__7__9_________
3__5__7_________
________________

That’s a C power chord, a D power chord and an E power chord – basis of loads of heavy metal songs.

Power chords aren’t major or minor because they miss out the middle note, so there’s no E note there in the C chord (I put it in brackets – you wouldn’t play it in a C power chord).

However – this chord progression is in E minor, the melody might use notes out of that scale, there is an E note in the E power chord, and so the listener is going to think of that C power chord as C major. If you turned it into C minor, it would sound odd (which might make C minor a good choice!).

Hope that’s useful

Tom

If you have any questions about songwriting or music theory feel free to email me at indiesongwriter AT gmail.com