Q: hey, just curious if you remember what it was like transitioning into writing the roadmap for songs before you record them, assuming you did it a different way before. like how did you learn?
A: not really a transition.... i've tried both, and when i don't write it first, it just doesn't have the freedom to go where it wants to go. As i'm saying this now, i can see that it appears backwards, but the reason is because when you're recording a song there are lot of instruments and parts to deal with, so you can't very easily change the way the song goes, on a whim. I've found that it's a much greater advantage when you write the song before anything is recorded, because you can make the song go anywhere, on a whim. you just write it there and it goes there. in other words, writing is not like writing multiple instruments. i don't write the instruments, i write the *song*. which consists of melody+lyric+chords, all the way through, and knowing the exact tempo. The process of translating that into instruments only happens once the song is written. it's probably a lot like animating a cartoon. it's pretty hard to improvise a cartoon. you kind of have to know how it goes before you do it. you CAN however, improvise a cartoon by acting it out, improvised. then based on the recorded improv, make the cartoon. similarly, a song could be made by improvising it using 1 instrument and voice, and then constructing the arrangement based on that recording. i forgot the question