Who are your favorite songwriters?

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triquee

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I'm just getting started on songwriting and I've been thinking about some of my favorite song writers and what it is that I really love about their work. I'd love to hear your favorites too. Maybe turn me on to some good stuff that I haven't heard before.

A few of my faves:

Peter Gabriel
Jason Mraz
Eminem
Sia
Amy Winehouse
The Civil Wars
Elliott Smith
Fink
Jack Johnson
Shannon Hoon
Ani Difranco

A bunch of others that I can't think of at the moment...
 
I like a song or I don't and I generally don't care who wrote it.
 
Greg_L said:
I like a song or I don't and I generally don't care who wrote it.
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I'm a bit like that except that there have been so many songs that it turns out were written by the same person or persons that it turns out that there are lots of writers that I do like.
That said, I like writers in particular periods of their lives. For example, I like Bob Dylan's stuff of 1965/66 and '79~83 but not the rest. I love the stuff Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ray Davies, Lennon, McCartney and Harrison came up with at various points in the 60s. I like Bob Marley's stuff circa '77~80 and Stevie Wonder's writing in that '72/73 period. I thought the stuff Syd Barrett wrote in 1967 was marvelous. But not much else he did after.
But there's lots more. I don't really have 'favourite' writers.
 
Jellyfish (specifically Andy Sturmer), Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, and Alanis M. Though this goes into more of the fact that Glenn Ballard co wrote Alanis's stuff on her first productive album.

So where do we draw the line at who wrote the songs. I'm not sure it really matters, when it comes to creating.

I have a childhood friend that has co-written a Billboard top 10 hit just recently. It has nothing to do with writing in genre. Nor does songwriting equate to being a hit.

Ok, wait. I just strayed completely from your topic Triquee.

Sorry, I digressed.....

I would probably go with Eminem as my favorite writer, if their were some type of poll here.
 
jimmys69 said:
Jellyfish (specifically Andy Sturmer), Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, and Alanis M. Though this goes into more of the fact that Glenn Ballard co wrote Alanis's stuff on her first productive album.

So where do we draw the line at who wrote the songs. I'm not sure it really matters, when it comes to creating.

I have a childhood friend that has co-written a Billboard top 10 hit just recently. It has nothing to do with writing in genre. Nor does songwriting equate to being a hit.

Ok, wait. I just strayed completely from your topic Triquee.

Sorry, I digressed.....

I would probably go with Eminem as my favorite writer, if their were some type of poll here.
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Fiona Apple!! *swoon* She's such a poetic songwriter. I always feel like I'm hearing a work of prose from her.

Tori Amos, I love. Fell in knock down drag out love with Tori Amos when I was 15 or 16. Sometimes her lyrical choices are a liiiiiittle out there for me, but her composition is always, always, always compelling.

Alanis strikes me as very stream of consciousness and confessional in a way. I wore out both Jagged Little Pill and Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie.

Good Stuff!

And Eminem...I've never heard anyone else turn a phrase like him. The way he pulls social commentary and pop culture references into his lyrics is masterful.
 
Well, you left out my fav, Andy Sturmer. lol!

It's all good. I just loved the timeless devotion to children's songs, that all of Jellyfish tunes seemed to be. Even if they spoke of defying religion, fame and masturbation guidelines. lol!

I'm just a glutton for punishment anyway. If any of my metalhead friends were here on this forum, I would surely be moshed in a bad way.

I really don't care. I like emotion in music. Tragic experiences that move me.


That is what music should be IMO
 
jimmys69 said:
Well, you left out my fav, Andy Sturmer. lol!

It's all good. I just loved the timeless devotion to children's songs, that all of Jellyfish tunes seemed to be. Even if they spoke of defying religion, fame and masturbation guidelines. lol!

I'm just a glutton for punishment anyway. If any of my metalhead friends were here on this forum, I would surely be moshed in a bad way.

I really don't care. I like emotion in music. Tragic experiences that move me.


That is what music should be IMO
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Werd.

Metal is expressive too....
 
Yes, just in a different way. More anger sometimes. Usually in a ridiculously overbearing way.

Aw f**k, I'm either getting old, or just wise enough to realize.... lol!

Either way, good is good. Great is unusual. How we find what artists move us, is just relative to how we hear it.

What moves one, may not another. As a musician, it becomes more complicated, as to what moves us. Usually what others would consider obscure, is what it takes to pull at our hear strings. Then, we tend to write for those who don't really listen.....

Like sands through the hourglass....

I still smile everyday tho. :D
 
jimmys69 said:
Yes, just in a different way. More anger sometimes. Usually in a ridiculously overbearing way.

Aw f**k, I'm either getting old, or just wise enough to realize.... lol!

Either way, good is good. Great is unusual. How we find what artists move us, is just relative to how we hear it.

What moves one, may not another. As a musician, it becomes more complicated, as to what moves us. Usually what others would consider obscure, is what it takes to pull at our hear strings. Then, we tend to write for those who don't really listen.....

Like sands through the hourglass....

I still smile everyday tho. :D
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All true....

Hell, sometimes it isn't just how we hear it but WHEN we hear it. Took me a long time to realize what all the Radiohead fuss was about. Didn't really get it the first time I heard them. Then years later I caught a whiff of them and was like, "Who IS that??!!!" Fucking Radiohead. The drums on "Wolf at the Door" make me very, very, very happy.
 
triquee said:
All true....

Hell, sometimes it isn't just how we hear it but WHEN we hear it. Took me a long time to realize what all the Radiohead fuss was about. Didn't really get it the first time I heard them. Then years later I caught a whiff of them and was like, "Who IS that??!!!" Fucking Radiohead. The drums on "Wolf at the Door" make me very, very, very happy.
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LOL! Funny enough, I hear you, in a special way.

I'm just gonna have to rep you now. Like that matters at all. :)
 
Way to many writers to really have "favorites". That being said - many of the collective works of Lennon/McCartney are very good and timeless songs. Many of the collective works of the various writers who contributed to the songs of the Eagles show an effective mastery of the craft. Tom Petty have written some very solid pop songs.

Many of the writers from the days of Tin Pan Alley and the Brill Building created some amazing examples of solid, memorable songs.

I own close to 6,000 CDs and hundreds of albums and cassettes which I am gradually burning to CD/MP3(it's a sickness) - and I could fill pages and pages with names of people who have written outstanding songs ........ although in many cases, no one would know who they are.
 
I'll second Fiona Apple.
I also love the work of Emil Adler and Julie Flanders (October Project)
I don't know off hand who did the songwriting but there was an indy band called Grey Eye Glances that wrote some really good songs
 
John Frusciante (anything between 2001-2009)

George Harrison

I like a little Sinatra here and there.


And the rest would have to be classical composers and flamenco composers.
 
If I had to limit myself to just one it'd be Elvis Costello up until 1990 or there abouts.
I can't get to grips with M&M as a "songwriter" as I still have the idea in my head that it's lyrics, melody & chordal structure and what he usually does don't comprise those elements.
I think it may be my age & the fact that I really can't abide more than a couple of false rhymes in any one text.
 
CrowsofFritz said:
I like a little Sinatra here and there.
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Did Frank do much writing ? Did he do any writing ?

Xdrummer said:
Way to many writers to really have "favorites"

and I could fill pages and pages with names of people who have written outstanding songs ........ although in many cases, no one would know who they are.
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I hope this doesn't happen here, but many of these kind of threads just become boring lists that few would ever want to honestly look at. There's been a couple here over the last two years and too many of the entries are just lists that mean nothing. I couldn't be less interested in "Cabbagepuncher of Minesota" listing 5 songwriters and not saying anything about them. At least tell us something that makes your choices worth knowing about ! Especially the more obscure writers. Sometimes it's good to know about the unknowns rather than the usual suspects.
 
rayc said:
I can't get to grips with M&M as a "songwriter" as I still have the idea in my head that it's lyrics, melody & chordal structure and what he usually does don't comprise those elements.
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Right, Eminem is NOT a songwriter. He's a rapper.
 
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