Lack of progress

Something about today just doesn't feel right. Maybe it's hormones. They make a good scapegoat for pretty much everything, so I might blame them. Although more likely is all the hours I've spent outside lately, a lovely thing as summer kicks out, but a horror if you've put on inadequate amounts of sunscreen. My skin is screaming at me. So I'm hibernating, and enjoying the weather through the kitchen door instead.

I've tried getting my music cap on but I'm uninspired all round. I think I'm writing a song about Tasmania but it's hard to be sure. Yet another hidden lesson regarding songwriting, and perhaps a classic truth: I have a certain 'style' in which I write. Of course. Thanks, Captain Obvious. I guess what I mean is that I can say I'm going to write a song about something oblique, like cycling to Wollongong, but I still kind of fill it with metaphors and stuff. Bart left a comment that nicely tied it up: "the more literal you get, the more crazy-deep metaphorical it sounds". That track is probably the most literal I've ever gotten, since it actually has some kind of narrative, but I'm doing it again in this Tasmania song (working title: Lagoon). I'm sort of telling the story, but in a sideways manner. It's not intentional, but all my stuff just kind of comes out like that.

I like people not really knowing what I'm singing about, or getting some kind of alternate meaning, or taking it at face value and not knowing about an emotion watching quietly from beneath. You don't want to get too weird with it though, because there needs to be that point of connection: the something they take away even if it is not what you first intended. It's like with 'Blow On In'. The verses are kind of just random sentiments. In order to make them feel more tangible, more real, I started numbering them. Eleven reminders why we left. Seventeen reasons we couldn't afford. Twenty-three lorikeets colour the sky. Ninety-eight beats of a rapid heart. Now it feels like something.

Then, of course, there are songs that are just written because the words seemed to fit nicely and I couldn't find an appropriate feeling from my repertoire to match. That seems to happen more frequently with the band now, another thing I wasn't paying much attention to, so getting to write on my own is a nice way of reminding myself that it's ok to say whatever you want and I don't have to try so hard all the time.

Anyway, this is sort of bizarrely askew of my regular blogs, but I can only contribute what I have. Today that just happens to be a breakdown of my songwriting patterns. Which reminds me, we're playing at the Excelsior Surry Hills tonight at 9pm - oh I should also probably mention that we came runners up in the band comp, but I won't elaborate for reasons of diplomacy - and that'll be our last show until May.

Also, we went to see Jersey Boys last night and it was fantastic. I may have to work some Four Seasons-esque choreography into our set now.*

*not really.