Who are You to Change Your Song?
Sometime in the early teens, I went to this lunch that was for a guy that was the head of a summer camp I used to go to, and I bumped into a couple people. You know, when you're at one of these things where people have common interests, and you kind of gravitate to people that seem like you'd be friends with.
One of these guys, he's just randomly like, “Hey, I'm in this songwriting group. You should do it.”
And my response was, “OK.”
And that's the moment I got seriously into writing.
And it's so funny that a songwriting kind of—not journey, that makes it sound more important than it is—but, like, my writing started really with that.
And in the same token with writing, I think you do have to be open to what the world is putting out there.
I heard the guy from the La's talking about it the other day. He was saying that he's a transmitter, and he just puts down what he gets, and he doesn't even edit it, which is super ballsy and cool.
And I would say that it's a game of luck and showing up.
I'm back in writing mode now, but I'm only doing it once a week, so I'm not open enough to get too big of a variety of good stuff, if that makes sense. So I'm kind of stuck with what I've got.
Like, what I got this week isn't that great, but I'm gonna finish it.
And then try to write more frequently.
It is a matter of reception and luck. But you create your own luck through repetition and frequency, and just like anything else, the more you show up, the more choices you have.
And then you've got to decide what's good and bad, and what to change and what not to change.
But these days, I'm kind of more of the opinion of what's-his-face from the La's, that you just kind of—why not just put out what's given to you?
In a sense, like, who are you to change it?
Which I love the spirit of.
I'm just not sure that I'm ballsy enough to do that.