Getting It Out

Getting It Out

   Yesterday I met with a producer of music, trying to get a demo made locally instead of sending it off to Nashville or LA.  As a background, I should tell you that I write songs, have a publisher (in Los Angeles) and have been fortunate enough to have had some of my music appear in the background of television.  So it was interesting to hear this local producer offer a different perspective. 

   First off, the idea of a demo was out (at least to this producer).  He wanted me to put down the vocals, no accompaniment, no instruments, just me singing.  And my voice, at least to me, is not that good (in other words, I am not a singer).  But he said that what was important was clearing out the inventory in my head, to put down the songs as I was hearing them.  The rest, he said, is basic add-ons, stuff that can all be "easily" (his words) added later.  But I'm not the one to be singing, I told him, for that wasn't how I was hearing the songs.  I'm not a professional singer with a "voice."  But you are, he said.  Bob Dylan didn't have a voice, Joe Cocker (formerly a truck driver) didn't have a voice, Rod Stewart didn't have a voice.  But imagine if they never got their songs down, never recorded them, and just waited until the right "singer" came along to do some of their material.  And after all was said and down, well, we all came to realize that they did have a voice, their "own" voice, one unique to their material and one expressing how they wanted their song to be sung.

   It was an interesting view, for he was doing what an editor would do, isolating the material.  The vocals, he said, the guts of the thing, would show whether the song was worthwhile.  He told me to bring in a hundred songs (my publisher in LA says the same thing, that every songwriter should have a minimum --yes, minimum-- of a hundred songs written) and we could whittle them down to about thirty, then down to nine, and then, he said, I would find the one song I would want to work on.  But, he said, let's get them down.

   All of us have something to say.  In this case, this producer kept telling me that my songs are all being created from the music I have heard throughout my life.  Which is true for all of us in many aspects.  The stories we tell when we have company for dinner.  The laughs we share during conversation.  The good and the bad memories.  Whether putting those tales into a journal or diary, or making them into a compilation of short stories or having them coalesce into a novel, we have those thoughts and ideas and expressive notes always swirling.  Some of us are shy, unable to burst out the words and feelings, whether in a loud rebuttal or writing it on paper.  Some of us find that building something or painting something proves a release.  And some of us are simply scared, scared to just begin.

   In her recent book, The Illustrated Guide to Becoming One With the Universe, comic illustrator, Yumi Sakugawa, suggests that we are not all light, that the completeness, the yin and yang of it all, includes our darkness.  So as one of her suggestions, she says to invite one of your "demons" over for some cake and tea and to just sit for a bit.  It might feel awkward and uncomfortable at first.  Allow the demon to say what it feels like saying, feel what it feels like feeling, think what it feels like thinking.  Simply observe and listen with a gentle intention to understand where your demon is coming from.  Let the demon say what it wants to say...and then ask your demon to come back another time for more cake and tea.  Schedule regular tea and cake dates with your demons.  Sometimes your demon will give you something in return for your understanding and kindness, something you can only receive for having the courage to face your darkness.  A Jewel, a beautiful idea, a key to a secret place.  And after a while you may realize that for this whole time your demon was afraid of you and was waiting for you this entire time, for your love, compassion, and time.  At the book's end, she acknowledges several people, one of whom inspired her "to manifest my intentions and for giving me the online platform to express my intentions through my art."  She also thanks her "first therapist in college who reminded me again and again to be kinder to myself."  A demon confronted.

   Being scared isn't always a bad thing.  It's all there, the fears and the doubts and the questions, all a part of our own personal history.  But sometimes just starting and just putting it down on paper, or getting it into a song, or being able to mold it from a piece of clay or a block of wood or a canvas frame is all that it takes to clear our minds, to make way for the new, to begin to grow some more.  As with Yumi Sakugawa's suggestion, "it may feel awkward and uncomfortable at first," but as my producer said, the important thing is to just get it out.  Scream, pound, laugh, cry...like giving birth, seeing it actually come out of you and be there right in front of you might prove more illuminating than you had ever imagined.