Have you written songs you really dislike ?

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grimtraveller

grimtraveller

If only for a moment.....
When I first came across people that claimed they didn't like some of the songs they'd written, I was quite surprized.
30 years on, that's no longer the case !
Do you like all the songs you've written or are there any you just can't stand ?
 
I'd say that I like probably 75% of what I finish. I might not like the leftover 25% all the way, but there will be something about it that I do like - be it drumming, guitar sound, whatever. Most often though I can tell that something's not going well and I just scrap it or leave it unfinished.
 
I have way more songs that are a "work in progress", than songs that I have spent the time to try and finish(but never been good enough,or satisfied enough to say any of them are finished). What seemed like a cool tune, really wasn't, the deeper I got into it. Actually, can't say that I have ever been happy enough with any of them, weather it be the writing or the performance, to like them.:facepalm:
 
Over the years, I've learned to walk away from a song if it does not really inspire me. I try to have a well written song (solid lyrics which tell an effective story and a stong melody) before I hit the record button - and if I feel the song is not strong, I abandon it (although I may keep some lyrics or a chord progression to utilize at a later date).

When I was a less seasoned writer - I often accepted if a song was not strong and tried to improve it through a better arrangement, etc. - and when I now listen back, some of those songs no longer measure up to my current standards.

Out of the perhaps 250 songs I've written (and the 100 or so I've recorded) I think I would consider at least 40% weak - and almost all of those are 10 year old or more ...... thankfully, in the last 10 years (and certainly in the last 5 years) I simply do not allow myself to waste precious time trying to make a weak song better.

I think what forced me to be more selective is working with publishers who accepted some of my better stuff - but were brutally candid when I sibmitted crap - it forced me to be much more honest and brutal when assessing my own material.
 
I like every new song I start to work on...but I've managed to ruin a bunch of them during the writing/recording process. :)
 
I write for musical theater. It's not so much a question of whether I like the songs that I write, but whether they work for the project. For my current project, we're about 35 minutes in, a little under 1/2 of the first act. However, that doesn't include at least 20 minutes, perhaps more, of music that we've dropped from the show because they don't work -- don't move the action along, break the rhythm of the act, etc.
 
My songs are hit and miss. I'm stubborn and will usually fight against a bad song until it's finished, then I'll listen to it a week after and ask myself what the fuck I was thinking. But I've learned a lot from doing that. I'm learning to stop trying to mimick other artists. My songs usually start going in the wrong direction when I start thinking "What would (insert artist name here) do here". My best songs are songs that I write with my mind on what I would like to hear if I wasn't me.

But, either way, it usually takes about 1-3 months for me to hate anything I've done. I cringe at the thought of listening to any of my old songs, with a few exceptions.
 
PTravel said:
I write for musical theater. It's not so much a question of whether I like the songs that I write, but whether they work for the project.
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I understand that, but do you actually dislike stuff you've written ?
 
I find the hardest part of songwriting, and subsequently recording the song, to objectively listen to the piece. I guess I'm a bit of a narcissist, because I like every song that I've written.

With that in mind, every song that I write isn't very good. I'll put something together, and be like "Man, that's cool!" and then listen to a group/musician I admire and think "Man, my song blows". Fortunately, no delusions of grandeur. Unfortunately, silly songs about smoking cigarettes and how the government screws us.

I'm looking forward to the day where I write a song that can hold up with what I think a song should be.

D
 
grimtraveller said:
I understand that, but do you actually dislike stuff you've written ?
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I have a weird theory about writing music. To me, there is "right music," and "wrong music." "Right music" feels right -- it comes out of my head, unforced, it's fresh, it's "honest" and the "math" of it is there. When I'm in that space where this happens, it's almost as if I'm not writing it -- it just happens. I know this isn't a really clear explanation, but it's the best I've ever been able to come up with. As a lot of other on this board do, I compose in my head -- keyboards, sequencers and scoring programs are for setting down what I've already composed, not for the actual process of creation. Sometimes I'll wake up in the middle of the night with "right music" in my head (my wife hates that). Also like RAMI, I'll sometimes get stuck and fight through a song at the keyboard but it's usually pretty apparent to me that it's "wrong music" and, when that happens, I'll go out, smoke a cigarette and search for the "right music" solution in my head. In a worst-case scenario, I'll leave in a phrase or chord progression that I know is "wrong music" as a place-holder, but I'll always go back and fix it before I consider a song finished. With all of that said, I suppose I like everything that I finish. However, also like RAMI, sometimes a song will bother me for months and it will take me a while to realize what is wrong with it. I won't exactly dislike the song, but I'll know that it's still not finished. Most recently, I wrote a song in an ABABAB form. I liked the As and and I liked the Bs, and I liked the modulations from one AB group to the next. However, the song, as a whole, just didn't do it for me and it bothered me for at least a month. It was only after listening to it repeatedly that I realized what was wrong -- I needed a bridge, so that the song looked like this: ABABCCAB. Once I wrote the bridge and my writing partner and I re-recorded it, the song became "right music" and it no longer bothered me. :)

I guess I have trouble imagining writing music that I didn't like. Consciously writing "wrong music" seems like a cheat. Then again, because I don't have to earn a living doing it, I don't have to worry about deadlines, pleasing clients, or being commercial.

This is an interesting topic, and I'm enjoying reading what others think about it.
 
Wonderlick said:
I find the hardest part of songwriting, and subsequently recording the song, to objectively listen to the piece.
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That's interesting because, for me, it's not hard to listen objectively. When I wrote in my post that a song would bother me, it's because I'd literally cringe -- a physical visceral reaction to it -- if it had "wrong music" in it.

With that in mind, every song that I write isn't very good. I'll put something together, and be like "Man, that's cool!" and then listen to a group/musician I admire and think "Man, my song blows".
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Ah, one thing I learned a long time ago: you can't compare what you write to anyone else. If I thought everything I wrote had to stack up against the greats who I admire, I'd never write anything. I seem to be quoting RAMI a lot in this thread, but I do the same thing he does: I write what I want to hear. All I aspire to is that I like what I write.

I'm looking forward to the day where I write a song that can hold up with what I think a song should be.
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If your music is honest and comes from you, as opposed to trying to sound like someone else, it will be a good song. We all have our favorite composers and our specific musical tastes, but there really is no objective measure for "good" music. Quick, who is better: Joe Cocker or Beethoven? (I know, I'm dating myself here). Good music is good music. Write what you want (not what you think you should write), be honest in what you write, and please yourself -- you'll write good music and, I guarantee, there will be an audience out there who will like it.
 
I've only really written 2 complete songs but yeh I hate the first one pretty bad already and the second is going the same way I think. :D
 
Good thoughts PTravel. And I think I write honestly - I have my influences, no doubt, but I write what I like, and how I want it to be arranged, but maybe I'm so new to the entire process that I look upon my work as childlike in some ways. After I arrange a song and record it and listen to it, aside from the inherent issues with musicianship and recording inexperience, I just think of it as a school project my 8 year old would show me. I'd tell him/her "Good job!", even though I know the kid ain't Van Gogh. But the child's painting doesn't make me cringe - in fact, I'd be happy the kid did something creative. I personally don't strive for greatness (in the sense of being a rock star), just the joy of the song, but, now that I type this, maybe I do have a bit too much ego. I think I just had an epiphany.

But don't get me wrong, I don't plan on making a living out of my music, just the joy of it. I guess because music is so subjective the objectivity of my own can escape me sometimes.

D
 
Yes.

In retrospect I really dislike the majority of songs I've written. I'm pretty sure at the time I thought each one was at least pretty good, but time and perspective seem to change my perception of the material. There are maybe a few songs from the last few years that I still like, but mainly because of the overall production or arrngement, not the song itself.

Personally, I get off more on the playing and hearing things come together in the phones while tracking. That's the closest rush I can get these days to playing with other people.

I think the songwriting part for me is just an excuse to experience that rush.
 
I think I still like pretty much all the songs I've written - I can usually hear a ton of flaws in either the performance or mixing when I come back to something, but I still generally like the song itself.

I guess part of it comes down to writing the kind of music you'd want to hear yourself if you were the listener, but the biggest part is probably because my songs tend to have quite a long gestation period. I play around with ideas in my head for a long time and let them develop organically before I record them. I'll often have a pretty clear picture of what I want to do/where to go in my head by then and the challenge is to overcome my (fairly considerable) technical limitations to translate them into a cohesive song. The advantage of my slowness is that I tend to eventually iron out what I think are the parts that would otherwise cause me to be unsatisfied with the song afterwards.
 
Greg_L said:
I dislike stuff other people write.
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Word!

Naw, I've written quite a bit that after all was said and done, the results were not what I expected. Mostly the monster rears its head in the studio, however, and I can't get the proper 'feel' out of my processes.
 
I think of my songs like spawn. they start as little eggs (the basic idea), I fertilize them, then coax them to grow and grow, then they 'hatch' and I feed them, record them as they grow into full-fledged songs. Once I'm done mixing, I kick them out the door, tell them to get a job, and start on the next one. If I didn't do it this way, I'd still be working on the zillionth version of song #5.
Ask me to play one of them again (I've recently been doing some of them live) and I have to listen to them and relearn the parts!
 
I still remember parts of the first song I ever wrote (or at least wrote down). It's embarrassing, and I hate it. Glad I never recorded it.

Otherwise, after I write a song, if I don't particularly like it, I'll probably just forget it and let it languish in a notebook somewhere.
 
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