When I'm writing a song for another artist, I purposefully make it not for me; otherwise, I get too attached.
I love working and writing new songs. But sometimes you need to wait, to have something in your mind, and then you can let yourself play music.
I probably take about a month to write a song, depending on how much time I can dedicate to it, and it depends on how many hours a day there are and how many days in a week and weeks in a month.
But then you have to write a song, so at that point, I picked up the reins and started to write lyrics.
Writing songs is kind of like a wrestling match to me. You have to pin it down and make it do what you want it to do.
I pick up my guitar and play. Something might come, and then the pen comes out. Then an edit, until something comes out that you're actually satisfied with.
It's true when they say songwriting is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. In truth, what happens is... songs comes through you.
I teach songwriting a lot, and I always tell my students, 'You gotta write the little songs sometimes to get to the next big song in the chute.' You gotta write 'em to get to it. You never know what's going to be a little song or a big song.
As a songwriter, you might write every day and throughout the course of a year you might get four songs that are really special.
There's a saying, 'It's easy to write songs, but very difficult to write great songs.' I'm going through that right now.
So, once I get writing I really try and put five to eight hours a day in my room with a guitar to really try and come up with stuff that feels interesting enough to me to keep it.
When talking about writing, I often use the analogy of archaeology. There are these great tunes all around. Your skill as a musician allows you to pick them out without breaking them.
In a certain sense, every time you sit down to write a song, there's a fear that you've forgotten how to do it.
