All the Small Things
Anyone who knows me will echo that it is of little surprise that I would wage a constant internal battle against everything about this journal project: That post was too journal-ish; that post was too boring; that post was not instructive enough. On and on into infinity. Maybe infinity-plus-one.
Such a sentiment is a great illustration of how (creative) work gets done. While you’re sharpening the blades and getting every little thing just right, the real project is happening. While I’m trying to straighten the car on the road, that is where the compelling friction will reside, and from where the essence of what this actually is will manifest. I think John Lennon (or Allen Saunders) might say it like this; “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”
My early approach to songwriting was similar to my approach to this project: I began both believing that each entry needed to be important, needed to transform the reader/listener’s view of the world in order to be effective. Considering that I have long learned how foolish that is for songwriting, it’s surprising to me that I still had such a desire with these journals.
Because here’s the thing: If you play by those rules, you very quickly run out of ideas. After all, how many big, world-shaping ideas can you come up with on a weekly basis? Instead, world-changing ideas are paradoxically buried in the smallest, most mundane places. I found that the more I, and others, zoomed in on an idea, the more compelling that idea often became, and the more it revealed about the wider human condition. Would I care about a song about World War I? Maybe. Would I care about a song concerning how a soldier in World War I feels? Universally more likely.
I think about songs like Mark Knopfler’s “Done with Bonaparte", or Tom Waits’ “Day After Tomorrow”. Both of these tracks discard tired anti-war tropes and instead focus in on the emotions of individuals enduring those wars.
From Knopfler:
I pray for her who prays for me
A safe return to my belle France
We prayed these wars would end all wars
In war, we know, is no romance
And I pray our child will never see
A little Corporal again
Point toward a foreign shore
Captivate the hearts of men
Save my soul from evil, Lord
And heal this soldier's heart
I'll trust in thee to keep me, Lord
I'm done with Bonaparte
From Waits;
It is so hard and it's cold here
And I'm tired of taking orders
And I miss old Rockford town
Up by the Wisconsin border
What I miss, you won't believe
Shoveling snow and raking leaves
And my plane will touch down
On the day after tomorrow
The first song I wrote that started understanding this zoom-in principle was my sixth-ever attempt called “Just the Same.” Released in 2010 on my EP The Part to Play, this song signaled the first real growth step in my songwriting that I can identify.
The musical elements of “Just the Same” are much more compelling than the few songs that came before it, but the lyrics illustrate how concrete details make for good storytelling. The song describes a night at Charter Oak Park in Peoria, IL, where a couple of friends and I sat watching a storm roll in from underneath one of those wooden shelters with picnic tables; the “small space of safety” being the only spot that remained dry as the rain became more violent.
These two verses of Midwestern weather obsession —of which I am gratuitously guilty— are juxtaposed with a scene of one of the many open mics I was attending in those days; its own kind of “storm.” I believe the one being written about here was at Panache —a cool, jazzy cafe in central Peoria at the time that had good mashed potatoes and just okay hummus. The best detail in this song sits in that third verse describing the open mic:
Not everybody knows your name, just by the songs that you play
That’s a viable lyric. It’s highly specific, both to the scene its describing, but also to the wider spirit of open mic culture. That kind of inside-out principle feels like one of the key tenants of songwriting: Keep looking at a small, quiet moment until a wider truth is revealed through it. Allow the smallness of an event to be a megaphone to what it’s revealing about the wider world, and, boom, you’ve succeeded at what you initially thought you were supposed to be doing: Change someone’s perception about the world.
The history books will tell us about the war. Let your songs tell us what it felt like to be in the war. Now, I'm off to see how many times I've actually listened to my own advice. Stand by.