American Songwriter » Opinion

STREET SMARTS: A Better Day is Coming…It Had Better

Michael Kosser — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:19:01 +0000

...A model emerged in America that allowed Broadway songwriters, movie songwriters, and even the wretches of Tin Pan Alley, the Brill Building, Nashville, L.A., Detroit and elsewhere across this great land, to forge a living hammering together tunes and lyrics...

"You dummy, you are teaching a history course! The writer of that statement was a self-critiquing journalism professor at Arizona State University. He was being quoted in a New York Times article and the theme of the piece might have been, "has the Internet turned the journalism business so upside down that universities might be teaching students a skill for which there is no profession?" The same question might well be asked of professors who are teaching songwriting at universities around the country, and I find the question unpleasantly relevant to me, because I have joined the faculty at Cumberland University in Lebanon, Tennessee, and this fall I will be teaching about songwriting. Any and all of you who read this column more than once a decade know that I never try to tell anybody how to write a song. I talk about the business, the heart, the inspiration, the art of survival, but not all that much about the nuts and bolts of the song-I talk about the profession of songwriting. Given the huge changes in the industry over the past few years, do I have anything to teach? Well, yes, or I wouldn't be teaching. In fact, what I have to teach is more important than ever because the changes are going to come so fast that nobody really knows what's going to happen. Ten, twenty years ago any publisher could have taught you what you needed to know: "Ya write songs for the market. Play ‘em for me, if I like ‘em, I'll pitch ‘em and get some songs cut and we'll all make a lot of money!" There's still some of that going on, especially here in Nashville, but if this way of doing business isn't dying, it certainly looks like it's in shrink mode. Every year it seems harder to feed your song into the moneymaking machine, collecting mechanicals from the millions of records sold and those beautiful performance royalties from getting your song played on radio stations all over the country-or the world. For you, the rookie non-performing songwriter, the money machine has become a long, drawn-out process, writing songs with new artists or pitching to an unknown act without a record deal, watching them put out their own records, looking for evidence that the record exists on YouTube, CDBaby and any number of other internet exposure-sites, hoping against hope that somehow your song will surface among the thousands and thousands of songs making their way onto the world wide web every week, and dreaming that a miracle will happen that will lead you to the ever-shrinking mainstream before it disappears altogether. Is this real, or is it pure desperation? I'm sure that the handful of non-performing songwriters who are still doing well on the old model would mostly scoff-or cringe-at the thought of depending on an independent artist to break their next big hit. So what will I be teaching this fall? The darn industry is like a kaleidoscope. Turn it a bit and it reconfigures itself. It seems like it's in such shambles that nobody has a clue what the next working model is gonna be, or even if there's gonna be a next working model. Don't get me wrong. As long as there is still a mainstream radio and record industry, I'll still hope that I can beat the odds with a song I love, and find myself a half-million dollar payday. I am, after all-on good days-a professional songwriter. So again, what am I going to teach? That's simple. The subject is a moving target. I will be teaching that moving target, trying to digest all sorts of input and spit it out in a way that makes sense. We are in survival mode right now, living on the hope that out of this chaos will emerge order and we will once more understand how to make a living in the industry. All this has happened before. In the early 1700s, George Friedrich Handel made a living writing Italian opera for the English. Decades later, Mozart augmented his commissions from emperors and bishops by writing light opera. Decades after that Stephen Foster died penniless, either because he couldn't handle his money or because the songwriting model in America during his time worked a lot better for publishers than it did for songwriters. In the 20th century, a model emerged in America that allowed Broadway songwriters, movie songwriters, and even the wretches of Tin Pan Alley, the Brill Building, Nashville, L.A., Detroit and elsewhere across this great land, to forge a living hammering together tunes and lyrics for America to hum and whistle. This model did not emerge overnight. ASCAP began in 1914 and has battled successfully for its songwriters ever since. The Broadway musical evolved throughout the first half of the century. Radio and records grew in pulses for many decades; movies, TV and other technological advances brought more income streams to songwriters. For almost a century, the model for successful songwriters seem safe for the foreseeable future. Today, that model looks more than a bit peaked-that's "weary" in country lingo. The record industry, which for many years was an essential part of this model, is fighting for its life. Just as the Internet has made people feel that they no longer have to pay for the news, the Internet has made people feel entitled to get their music for free. The star-making part of the industry has gone through a huge contraction, and that has been a catastrophe. Much of the music industry is frightened for its future. But tomorrow always begins with a sunrise. People still love to listen to music. They still love to watch it being performed on TV. They still like to hear a new tune and sing a line or two as they go about their daily chores. Some things don't change. I'm going to teach my students that, if they prepare for the long haul and keep their eye out for all the changes, they'll be present and accounted for when the new models coalesce into a real industry revival. I'm saying that to you, our readers, and heaven knows I'm saying it to myself.

THE SCHLANSKY FILES: Dead Ahead

Evan Schlansky — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:14:42 +0000

The spirit of the missing Jerry is also alive in these songs, and he seems constantly referenced, gone but not forgotten.

I'm a weird sort of Grateful Dead fan. For years, I only really cared for two of their albums, American Beauty and Workingman's Dead, and yet they're two of my all time favorite records. But slowly over time, I've reversed my opinion about the rest of their material, and lately, I've been on a serious Dead kick, where everything sounds sweet to me. I'd only seen them in concert once, back in ‘95, and I didn't particularly enjoy it. So I was pretty curious to hear them again, and find out what the band, now a touch more grey and sadly minus Jerry Garcia, could do in 2009. And so I found myself wandering through the parking lot of Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, to see the latest incarnation of the Dead, featuring Warren Haynes in Garcia's place. They announce their arrival with the anthemic "Jack Straw" ("we can share the women, we can share the wine"). Next, Bob Weir flubs a lyric in "Brown-Eyed Women," prompting cheers from the crowd. They also cheer the song's most resonant lines, like "looks like the old man's getting on." A woman behind me says she's gonna look up the lyrics to the opening tune on her Blackberry. "I have a ton of Grateful Dead songs on my iPod, I know them all. And I never heard that one." "Jack Straw?" her companion asks incredulously. Next to me, a dad who looks like a bit like Robert Redford, with a kid in glasses, whose maybe 12, chats with the father and son in front of them, eating pizza, about all the shows they've taken their kids to. To the right of me, a reporter from Time Out NY. We represent the "press section." In front of me, four guys from the plumber's union. It's a community. But where are all the beach balls? When you're listening to the folk music of the Grateful Dead, you're listening to some of the best lyrics in rock and roll. They play a strong part in the band's tight connection with their audience which can't be underplayed. Grateful Dead lyrics can make you feel alive. It's why Phish, no matter how great musically, will never be the same thing. Also, the Dead's music is American music. They've got one foot in traditionalism, one foot in the 1960s, and a third stuck in the cosmic ether, timelessness. For many of us they represent our favorite decade of being alive. After "Brown-Eyed Women," the Dead launch into "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" a fitting song for their audience, and the Dead themselves. "Take what you have gathered from coincidence," Weir advises from behind his mustache. Then Haynes leads a jammy "Easy Wind" and I'm suddenly very happy. "They're great, they're really great!" a woman enthuses behind me. "The world's greatest GD tribute band is the GD in disguise," I write in my notebook. Haynes really nails it on the next one, the "House of the Rising Sun"-like blues number "Death Don't Have No Mercy," and Weir brings it home in the song's second half. The dudes in front of me leave, and what can only be described as a lesbian hobbit hippie dancer appears to fill the space, right at opening notes of "Don't Ease Me In." Well, at least now I've got an audio visual component. During this song, people start heading up front to get their boogie on. It suddenly occurs to me that it'd be hilarious at this point to shout "Jack Straw!" in between every tune. For the second set, they break out the acoustics, which is, as historians will tell you, "the first acoustic segment since the second show of the tour in DC on 4/14/09." They let loose a soulful, mellow "When I Paint My Masterpiece," the second of three Dylan songs they'll play tonight. At first I wonder why they're doubling up on Dylan, and then Weir sings one line, to a roar, and it all makes sense... "Oh the hours I've spent, inside the Coliseum." Another thing about seeing the Dead live: it's a real concert, because there are long instrumental stretches and you don't know how a song will go at any given moment. I got a little sleepy during Drums/Space (must have been something in the air) but wake up in time for "Knockin' On Heaven's Door," where I realize that these are some of the best harmonies I've heard at a show in a long time. The spirit of the missing Jerry is also alive in these songs, and he seems constantly referenced, gone but not forgotten. In "Looks Like Rain," Weir sings poignantly, "It's just I have gotten used to havin' you around. The landscape would be empty, if you were gone," and "I'll still sing you love songs, written in the letters of your name." The band end with a high octane version of "Goin' Down The Road Feelin' Bad," which has even the ushers dancing in the aisle. The Dead still have it. To quote "Saint of Circumstance," also sung tonight: Got to be heaven, ‘cause here's where the rainbow ends If this ain't the real thing, then it's close enough to pretend.

Do American Songwriter Readers Watch American Idol?

americansongwriter — Tue, 26 May 2009 19:41:27 +0000

Time for some true confessions. So, as you are undoubtedly aware, American Idol just wrapped up its 8th season. We're curious. Are you a closet fan? An unabashed supporter? A lapsed fan? Or are you an ardent hater of the TV show that will not die? Tons of people are still talking about the show's season finale and the fate of runner-up Adam Lambert, including Clay Aiken ( “I thought my ears would bleed"), and Kiss frontman Gene Simmons, who feels Lambert has a voice unsuitable for "Louie Louie." “He sounds much more convincing singing ballads and Broadway shows," says Simmons. "His voice doesn’t seem to have a ‘rock quality.’ But, I’m sure he’s going to do just fine.” We want to hear your opinions. Do you dig the show? And if so, how does winner Kris Allen stack up against past winners like Taylor Hicks and Carrie Underwood? Don't be shy.

STREET SMARTS: Can Today’s Songwriters Write Songs?

Michael Kosser — Fri, 01 May 2009 18:57:31 +0000

Fifty to 75 years ago, mainstream American songwriting was an excruciatingly precise profession.

Fifty to 75 years ago, mainstream American songwriting was an excruciatingly precise profession. The pop music industry was dominated by songs from Broadway musical comedies. Now just imagine what that meant! It cost a fortune even back then to mount a musical comedy on Broadway. The composer and lyricist had to deal with a host of associates, including the "book writer" (librettist), producer, director, choreographer, arranger, the cast, maybe the investors-you get the picture. Long before the show actually played in front of people, the songwriters reworked songs, added songs and subtracted songs, often according to the needs of their co-workers. Then the show would open "out of town" in places like New Haven or Boston, and the writers were now at the mercy of new players, such as local newspaper critics and local audiences. So in those days a body of show songs involved months of intense planning, writing and rewriting. Oh, I need to add that the composer and lyricist could be each other's toughest critics. Anyway, most shows were not hits. They never made it through the out-of-town tryout. Or they closed quickly on Broadway because the critics and/or the audiences were unkind. Or they struggled for a few weeks or months, then closed. Or maybe they had a fair enough run to make back the investment, but the national public never heard the songs. There were a hundred ways for a Broadway songwriter to get his or her heart broken. Well, you can imagine what the business must have done to the psyches of Broadway songwriters. Yes, there were a handful who were so successful that they could take the failures in stride, but many of the best went out to Hollywood for the painful alternative experience of writing for the movies. At least the paycheck was steady if they liked you well enough. All you had to do was put up with the abuse of tin-eared Hollywood executives while wondering if they would pick up your option so they could abuse you some more. In either case, but especially on Broadway, composers and lyricists fretted over their creations, obsessed over every rhyme, every critical chord or interval. The stakes were so high. On Broadway, people were watching and judging, especially newspaper critics who knew a thousand ways to slice and dice a songwriter for the entertainment of hundreds of thousands of faithful readers. There was no anonymity for the Broadway songwriter. Even the best could find themselves stripped naked the morning after by the tastemakers and their readers. I might add that there were still a large number of Tin Pan Alley songwriters who were trying to write radio hits instead of show hits, but many of them aspired to Broadway or Hollywood prominence because that's where the big money and prestige lay. When rock and roll and country broke big in the ‘50s and ‘60s, the golden age of the Broadway and Hollywood musicals ended. The world of hit songs came to be dominated by professional one-offers who like their Tin Pan Alley predecessors wrote songs to be hits on radio and records. The pop critic had not yet made his mark, so these songwriters got little recognition but then, the song was here today gone tomorrow, or maybe in four months. They did not expect their songs to be standards but at least they had the opportunity to hear their songs as hits on the radio, and the money could be impressive. I don't think those writers fretted over their songs like the Broadway writers did. It was almost as if they felt that nobody would notice the extra polish, so why bother? I believe their successors today work the same way. Write the song, demo it, pitch it, tomorrow is another day and another song. But what about all the artist/writers who have emerged since Chuck Berry, the Kingston Trio, Bob Dylan and The Beatles forged the modern model? Like the Broadway writers, they can try out their new material on live audiences. And like the Broadway writers their product gets critiqued. Like the Broadway writers, they can watch their career crumble if the audiences don't like their songs. I'm sure that some artist/writers are much more painstaking than others, but today's songwriting tends to come from a different place than the output of the Broadway writer. Perhaps because many modern songs scarcely have an existence outside of the sound created in the studio, I believe that today's writers tend to write on the inspiration that gave them the first draft of the song. Perhaps they feel that tinkering too much deprives the song of the electric spontaneity that gave it its birth. So you might say there are two models of songwriting in our tradition, the inspirational and the perspiration-al. And no, I am not here to judge which is superior; one might as well compare the merits of Charles Schultz to those of Thomas Wolfe. I just wish that the two traditions could exist side by side. Because as rock and roll made its mark, it virtually wiped the pop music slate clean of songs written in the Broadway tradition. We lost a great craft, and I'm not sure we'll ever get it back.

THE SCHLANKSY FILES: Bruce Springsteen’s Waking Life

Evan Schlansky — Fri, 01 May 2009 18:57:24 +0000

A few months ago, Bruce Springsteen divided critics with the release of his 16th album, Working On a Dream.

A few months ago, Bruce Springsteen divided critics with the release of his 16th album, Working On a Dream. Points of contention included choice of producer (Brendan O'Brien, Bruce's new right-hand man), cover art (was this a real attempt at making a statement, or a half-hearted Photoshop job?) and the inclusion of two controversial songs: "Outlaw Pete" and "Queen of the Supermarket." The latter even prompted one Bruce-respecting website to ask: is this Bruce Springsteen's worst song ever? Well, that's a question only you can answer (my personal choice has always been "Ramrod," although, in later years, it's grown on me.) For my money, Working On a Dream is a superior album to 2007's Magic. It feels more assured, more comfortable in its own skin. Or maybe that one just broke this one in. This record is like a big valentine to Patti Scialfa, Springsteen's wife and E Street band mate-it deals in a kind of domestic happiness that Tunnel of Love Bruce could not grasp, and what Lucky Town Bruce was just getting a hold on-that "a little of that human touch" goes a long, long way. The song "Working on A Dream" is sloganistic, but effective-a true working song, you can imagine doing whatever it is you do with this in the background, be it swinging a hammer, or grading math tests. It promises that "our love will chase the trouble away." Pete Seeger would approve of its melody and message. It's also one of a number of songs here that musically feel like they'd be at home on both Human Touch and The River. "Kingdom of Days," "What Love Can Do" and "This Life" are peons to commitment and sticking together. "This Life" examines love in the afterlife, and the here and now: "This life and then the next/With you I have been blessed/What more can you expect?" The ultra-produced climax has a Beach Boys, kitchen-sink quality, and features the all-important sax solo. The chorus intimates that Bruce is pretty sure he's getting into heaven. He dirties things up on the next track, "Good Eye," where preacher Bruce "stands by the river where the cold black water runs." It's his first traditional blues, unless I'm missing something, with distorted bullet mic vocals, gritty harp, and a whiff of Tom Waits in subject matter and execution. "Life Itself" is built on a Rosalita groove, but draped in darkness. "I can't make it without you," he pleads, as the song pools drama around him. It's Rosalita and her suitor all grown up, and reminiscent of Paul Simon's haunting meditation on marriage, "Darling Lorraine," in subject and sound. Life itself is the muse here, and it's also the silent enemy-you can't run from it. You've got to face it. Even if you live in the promised land, out on Cadillac ranch, in that mansion on the hill. "The Last Carnival" starts with a bit of organ, then a sigh, before Bruce sings for his late friend, E Street organist Danny Federici. The lyrics directly reference "Wild Billy's Circus Story," 36 years later. ]And then there's "Outlaw Pete." Bruce draws a line in the sand with this one, a song about a bank robber who lands in jail while he's still in diapers. This spaghetti western takes eight minutes to cook, employing strings, harp, and gunslinger guitar in an ever-shifting arrangement, but it's more "57 Channels" than "Jungleland." It's Springsteen having a little bit of fun, yet its driving minor chords pull you along. If you can accept Bruce as the Ghost of Tom Joad, or some migrant worker, then why not as Outlaw Pete? In "Queen of the Supermarket," which some have decried as being a sort of Costco of bad ideas, Bruce pops a boner for the girl in the produce department. Also, Bruce is cursing again, which is kind of like Superman getting high. The heavy-handed strings make it schmaltzy, but they also add to the song's syrupy romanticism. It's not for everybody. Fittingly, it's one of the few Bruce songs you could imagine hearing in a supermarket. With Working On a Dream, it sometimes seems like Bruce could write these songs in his sleep. There will always be stock imagery in Springsteen's work, yet he continues to push himself, while expounding on his core values. It's no Born to Run. It ain't Born in the U.S.A. It's Bruce Springsteen's grown-up dream.

AMERICAN ICONS: Vincent Youmans

Paul Zollo — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 20:18:56 +0000

A friend and contemporary of George Gershwin, Vincent Youmans had much in common with his famous friend-they both collaborated with George's brother Ira, they both wrote pop songs and serious music, and they both, tragically, died young-George at 39 and Vincent at 47.A friend and contemporary of George Gershwin, Vincent Youmans had much in common with his famous friend-they both collaborated with George's brother Ira, they both wrote pop songs and serious music, and they both, tragically, died young-George at 39 and Vincent at 47. Unlike George, though, Youmans left behind only a handful of songs that are truly famous-most notably "Tea for Two," "I Want To Be Happy," "Too Many Rings Around Rosie," "Hallelujah," and the jazz standard "Sometimes I'm Happy." For decades, a legend circulated that Youmans had left behind a trunk of unpublished songs, all notated in a secret code that only he could decipher. Music historians worked for years to determine if this fable was true, and, in fact, it was. The trunk was discovered, due to the diligence of music historians such as Miles Kreuger and Stanley Green, and, indeed, it contained a profusion of unheard melodies and scores, all rendered in his mysteriously mirrored and intricate Da Vinci-like cipher. Fortunately, many have cracked this code, and a rich trove of musical treasures has been rescued from obscurity. He came from privilege: Born in 1898 in Manhattan, he was raised on Central Park West, and later in posh, suburban Larchmont. His father found his fortune in the hat manufacturing business, and, wanting his son to follow in his affluent footsteps, sent him first to private schools and then to Yale. But Vincent dropped out when World War I called, and it was there-in the Navy-that he fell in love with musical theater. After the war, rather than become the engineer he'd planned on becoming, he went to work as a song-plugger for the prestigious TB Harms Company, publisher of the Gershwins and Jerome Kern. These were the pre-phonograph days when people purchased sheet music in order to sit around the piano at home and sing the hits of the day. It took talented pianists who could put a song over with panache to sell the sheet music songs to music stores. By performing the work of the great Tin Pan Alley songwriters of the day, Youmans grew familiar with the infrastructure of hit songs, and quickly surmised he could create his own. His next job was as a rehearsal pianist for the renowned composer of operettas, Vincent Herbert. But it was work, like his song-plugging, intended only to generate some income while he wrote his own songs. A composer, he turned to other lyricists, and soon collaborated with the greatest ones around, including Oscar Hammerstein II, Irving Caesar, Leo Robin, Billy Rose, Mack Gordon, Buddy De Sylva and Gus Kahn. With Ira Gershwin, he wrote songs for Two Little Girls In Blue, which became an immense Broadway smash in 1921. His next show, with lyrics by Harbach and Hammerstein was Wildflower, a success that he followed in 1925 with the greatest triumph of his life, No, No Nanette. With lyrics by Irving Caesar, it became one of the most successful musicals of all time, with simultaneous productions on Broadway and in London during much of the 1920s. It played for many successive seasons, and has been reinvented several times throughout the years-in the 1940s featuring the beloved tap-dancing Ruby Keeler, at which time it played on Broadway even longer than the original, and again in the 1970s. Subsequent self-produced shows included Hit The Deck, another great success which launched the beautiful "Hallelujah." He wrote songs for movies, most famously for Flying Down To Rio, with Fred Astaire dancing and singing his music. But his heart was on Broadway, and unfortunate failures followed, shows which bombed and closed quickly although the songs he wrote for them were always memorable. In 1932 he took one more chance with a Broadway show, Take A Chance, but it went nowhere. Disheartened, he retired in 1934, after a career of only 13 years, but worked clandestinely for years on the songs and scores in his secret trunk, and returned to Broadway in 1943 with a colossal and ambitious extravaganza called The Vincent Youmans Ballet Revue, which merged classical and Latin-American music. A failure of unprecedented proportions, it lost more than $4 million dollars, and the magnitude of this fiasco might have been the key to his inclination to stash secret songs in his hidden trunk. Irving Caesar remembered Youmans as a tireless worker, one who was inclined to rewrite a song several times to achieve perfection. Unlike his pal George Gershwin, Youmans didn't sing his songs-but he was a great pianist, but only whistled his melodies. "Tea For Two," his most famous song, is an ideal example of his economic use of short melodic phrases. Caesar has said that its opening section was actually a dummy lyric on which Vincent could hang a tune, but it worked so well, they kept it. The song is unusual as a hit in that it's in two keys at once-A flat and C-major-a chromatic fusion that the Beatles and others would use some half a century later, but which was mostly unheard of in the 1920s. It's this kind of modernization of the American pop song that inspired the musicologist Alec Wilder to write that Youmans was "one of the innovators of American popular song, and one of the truest believers in the mew musical world around him."

STREET SMARTS: The Lure of the Songwriter Business

Michael Kosser — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 19:49:20 +0000

I have a friend-a brilliant songwriter with one heck of a Nashville résumé. He decided that if he was going to support his family he'd better not rely on the uncertain income of a songwriter. So he opened a restaurant.I have a friend-a brilliant songwriter with one heck of a Nashville résumé. He decided that if he was going to support his family he'd better not rely on the uncertain income of a songwriter. So he opened a restaurant. Then he opened some more restaurants. Thinking creatively, making decisions a-mile-a-minute, pleasing people, the man is building a fantastic business, and I believe he is having a glorious time doing it. And yet, when we get together, he wants to know: how's Music Row? What's going on with so-and-so? How are the guys at X Publishing Co.? It's still in his system. The songwriting business is addictive and seductive. It gets you in its iron grip and hangs on. You walk into it a stranger, hoping to get people to applaud on writers' nights. Somewhere, somehow you find a publisher that loves your songs, and you respect that publisher, so every time you bring in a song that pleases him/her you feel a rush. The publisher says he/she is gonna pitch the song to George Strait or Martina McBride and you go to bed that night dreaming of a George Strait or Martina McBride cut. Then the cut comes and you watch the CD climb the album chart and pray for a single. Then the single comes, you watch it climb the charts and you realize your lifestyle is about to take a turn for the better. Meanwhile successful writers are seeking you out for co-writing sessions and you're seeking them out, each hoping to grab a little of the success of the other. The camaraderie of professional songwriting is terrific, if you're actually writing rather than just staring at each other (especially when you've got a good start in the morning session). Then you go off for lunch and come back for the afternoon session and finish off the song laughing all the way. At least that's how it may feel, years later, looking back-I'll get to that. If your song hits No. 1, then BMI, or ASCAP, or BOTH, will throw you a No. 1 party. People who don't even like you will say the nicest things about you and you might even get a plaque. Then come the fall you'll rent a tuxedo or buy a fancy dress and collect an award from BMI, ASCAP or SESAC at a glamorous dinner. Lots of people at the labels and other places begin to learn your name and they start being a whole lot nicer to you than when you had started storming the ramparts. There are lots of things to love about the songwriting business. And I think my friend with the restaurants misses it-at least a little. I lecture him about the wondrous things he's doing, and how much more substantial they are than the house of cards that is so often a songwriting career. He hears me and he understands...but he still wants to know. And once in a while he still sneaks off to write a song with one of his songwriter buddies. And that's why successful songwriters who lose the hit-making knack-as almost all of them/us do eventually-have issues. Because when things are going good, then life is very good. Oh, sometimes these old writers forget how very good things were until they've lost their knack. Then they look back on the cuts, the hits, and, I almost forgot, hearing their songs on the radio. Wow. Every songwriter oughta have at least one hit in his/her life. But oh! When it goes away, life gets hard. Even if you have the sense to know when to stop chasing it, pick up the pieces and do something useful, even if what you're doing is really, really satisfying, there is that little part of you that wants another cut, another shot at the airplay, another opportunity to dress fancy for a banquet in honor of your hit song, and another six-figure royalty check. You remember the look on your banker's face the first time your brought one of those checks in-the sudden respect, the realization that you're not just another schleppy wannabe, but a real player. Catch Up Last column I wrote about the band One Flew South and their first single, on Decca, out of New York. I promised to continue their saga the next issue. Well, at this writing, their single "My Kind Of Beautiful" has been hanging around the bottom of the country charts for 14 weeks. Their producer, Marcus Hummon, tells me that about 30 stations love the record and continue to play it in spite of the fact that most country stations have not jumped on it. In this world of consolidated radio, it's great to see that some music directors still program with their ears rather than the charts. Marcus says the band has been out a lot and that the label is planning for a second single, though at this time neither track or release date has been selected.

THE SCHLANSKY FILES: All I Want for Christmas Is…

Evan Schlansky — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 19:39:14 +0000

Ho, ho ho, brothers and sisters of the songwriting community! Christmas has arrived-and/or it's already over, depending on when you're reading this. (Are you looking forward to/did you have a nice holiday?) Ho, ho ho, brothers and sisters of the songwriting community! Christmas has arrived-and/or it's already over, depending on when you're reading this. (Are you looking forward to/did you have a nice holiday?) Sometimes when I write these columns, they end up feeling somewhat dated by the time the issue comes out. I blame the time-space continuum. Anyway, in an effort to be timelier, here's a guide to what you might want to get yourself next Christmas, a whole year early. Or, you could return those socks you just got, and get yourself one of the following five super-gifts today. They're more fun than a Red Ryder BB Gun. The Mixtape About Nothing One of hip-hop's crowning achievements, Wale's Mixtape About Nothing came out earlier this year (that's 2008 to me) to less hype than a Kanye West bowel movement. Built around Seinfeld samples and jam-packed with incredible feats of lyrical prowess, it's the album that poses the question, "what's the deal with this rap stuff?" Wale truly "gets" the Tao of Seinfeld, and uses it to examine everything from hip-hop cliches to Michael Richard's racist outbursts. Julia Louis-Dreyfuss even makes a cameo (you go, girl!). I recently downloaded it (it's not available in stores), a painless process that took 10 seconds. In this Internet age, this gift is free. You could give it to yourself right now. The Bootleg Series Vol. 8 If you haven't gotten a copy of Bob Dylan's Tell Tale Signs: The Bootleg Series Vol. 8, do so post-haste. While it's too much for all but the most ardent of Dylan fans to digest in one sitting, it's an extraordinary collection, and makes a strong argument that Dylan's recent output can stand up to that of his ‘60s heyday. One revelation: apparently, Dylan has been quietly releasing some of his best material ("Huck's Tune," "‘Cross the Green Mountain," "Tell Ol' Bill") on movie soundtracks for years now. "Mary and the Soldier" represents Dylan's fertile World Gone Wrong period, the album that answered the question, what if Dylan had remained a singer of traditional folk songs? Elsewhere, songs from Time Out of Mind, Oh Mercy, and Modern Times are presented in their still-gestating forms, with alternate lyrics and melodies. One of the themes that tie all these songs together is that of being haunted by a past relationship. "Tryin' to Get To Heaven," "Red River Shore," etc.-it just goes on and on. With so many songs about lost love, is it possible that Dylan is still pining for ex-wife and Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands Sara Lownds? You heard it (speculated about) here first! Hank Williams: The Unreleased Recordings One guy who gets cited as an influence by just about every cool songwriter ever is Hank Williams. Well, Hank Williams' archive got a whole lot bigger this year, thanks to The Unreleased Recordings, a new collection from Time Life that bundles 143 previously unreleased tracks, culled from William's "Mother's Best" radio series. That's 143 reasons to pick up this box-set. The Dark Side of Oz Got some time on your hands? Do you believe in magic? Then head on over to Syncmovies.com, where the craziest experiment in rock music continues. Here you can pick up your own high-fidelity DVD copy of the Wizard of Oz synced with Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon, as well as 17 others-including The Lord of the Rings synced with Led Zeppelin's IV and Nirvana's Nevermind synced with Memento. Prepare to be amazed. The Memory Master CD Recorder The coolest piece of audio equipment I've encountered this year would be Crosley's Memory Master CD Recorder. This little diddy comes with a turntable and a cassette deck, so you can burn all your old-school media onto CDs (there's also a USB port so you can transfer your music to your computer). All you songwriters who came up in the ‘80s and ‘90s, take note-I got mine so I could transfer my endless boxes of demo tapes (remember those?) to CD. There was a time when owning a CD of your own music was a seemingly impossible dream. Well, those days are over, in more ways than one. The gift of nostalgia is a heady one. The Memory Master has given me so much to chew on, it's inspired a whole other column. Look for it in the coming months, and, oh yeah... Happy New Year! Or something like that.

Best Holiday Wishes!

Matthew Shearon — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 20:56:11 +0000

Thanks for all of your support in 2008. Thanks for all of your support in 2008. We'll be updating the site a few times over the holiday season. We could not have done it without you. Best wishes to all of our readers and supporters! Get rested up for an unforgettable 2009 with American Songwriter magazine!

Our Top 25 Albums of 2008

Matthew Shearon — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 22:50:17 +0000

Here's the American Songwriter Top 25 Albums of 2008 List. There are dozens more incredible albums out there that didn't make it onto our list; our excuse is the standard one, we had to stop somewhere and 25 felt just right. All-in-all, we felt 2008 dished up some jaw-dropping good music and fresh songwriting. We hope you enjoy these albums as much as we do (we enjoy them, obviously, a frickin' lot). We wish all our readers a safe and joyous holiday season and the best of wishes for 2009!

1. Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago
Though probably one of the most buzzed about albums from early 2008, Justin Vernon's album recorded in the icy wilderness of Wisconsin still resonates. For Emma, Forever Ago is nothing short of a masterpiece, a tour de force and a songwriting feat not be to forgotten as the clock strikes 2009; that's why it's our No. 1 album of 2008.

2. MGMT, Oracular Spectacular

3. Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes

4. Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend

5. TV On the Radio, Dear Science

6. Sigur Ros, Með Suð Í Eyrum Við Spilum Endalaust

7. The SteelDrivers, The SteelDrivers

8. My Morning Jacket, Evil Urges

9. Jamey Johnson, That Lonesome Song

10. Coldplay, Viva La Vida

11. Death Cab for Cutie, Narrow Stairs

12. Hayes Carll, Trouble In Mind

13. The Dodos, Visiter

14. Silver Jews, Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea

15. The Walkmen, You & Me

16. She & Him, Volume One

17. Sun Kil Moon, April

18. Damien Jurado, Caught In The Trees

19. Guns N' Roses, Chinese Democracy

20. Lambchop, OH (Ohio)

21. Justin Townes Earle, The Good Life

22. Kings of Leon, Only By the Night

23. The Felice Brothers, The Felice Brothers

24. Dr. Dog, Fate

25. M83, Saturdays = Youth