This series asks songwriters to describe their writing process, and what influences them.
Here, Australian singer-songwriter Henry Wagons:
"People often see songwriting as falling under the same framework as the chicken and egg adage. I'm regularly asked, 'which comes first the music or the lyrics?', as if asking a scientist to outline a step in a classroom science experiment. I wish songwriting were as simple as dropping a Mentos into a bottle of Coke. As much as I hate to sound too mystical, for me, the inspiration for songwriting is frustratingly more ethereal. Sometimes the music is first: I'll be inspired to write a song around a lick I randomly fall upon while playing guitar watching Survivor after a big meal. Other times the lyrics are first, after I'm inspired to write some lines having read a particularly heart-wrenching gun battle in a beaten up ol' Zane Gray Western novel. Ultimately, I'm happy to take whatever comes my way when it comes to the birth of a song. I have to just remind myself to be in a position to take note of the little song embryo so I can remember it later. At this point I usually take out the iPhone and open an app.
play [LISTEN: Wagons, "Willie Nelson"]
'Something that keeps me on my toes when songwriting is the vastly different forms that initial song embryo can take. Whether its a little melody I spat out driving in the car into iPhone Voice Memo, or a concept or thought I thumbed in before entree in iPhone Notes. It’s usually a little something that makes me smile or makes me tear up that makes it slip through the net. There must be something special about a melody or lyrical idea that keeps me motivated to persevere. Once you've realised you've given birth to something half decent, its from there the intellectual exercise of panel beating that tiny burst of inspiration into the shape of a song that is the fascinating, stimulating and often infuriating 'hard work' of songwriting. In fact, I find that though that initial burst of inspiration is the be all and end all for the song's existence, it does not take you very far along the path of finishing the song. It’s for this reason that there are billions of songs lying unfinished around the world. From the glorious moment of inception, a good song can take a lot of brow beating to come to full fruition.
With the delicate embryo cradled in my palms, it’s at this point in the writing process I feel I need to go through a songwriting de-romanticising process. I can no longer pretend to be a bohemian troubadour playing acoustic guitar on a hill, with the wind blowing through my cashmere sweater with complete songs spewing forth like spring water from a magical fountain. I love to think about, and nut out my songs. Not unduly so, to make them laboured, but they mean enough to me to deserve consideration. I sit down with a pen and paper and work. I try to think long and hard, and try to end up with something I like. Going through many phases of self-doubt, facing a harsh self-critic is a thrilling part of the process. If I reach some kind of deadlock, I'll often open the song out to bandmates/friends/trusted loved ones. If everyone is not horrified, we end up with something we can work with."
Related:
How I write: Tim Baker of Hey Rosetta!