Starting With A Title

[fullcirclemusic]

On 1/26/2016 at 5:13 PM, LooknGlass said:

I just got to wondering, how many of you all start with the title of the song and work from there? I kinda realized most of the stuff I came up with lately, started with the title. Was curious if anybody else did that a lot.

This is a great way to start. We keep an apple note ongoing full of different song title ideas for different styles, so then you have something to bring into a session. A cool idea is to have a list of titles that don't mean what the listener expects them to mean... Writing in twists...

 

www.fullcirclemusic.org

 

[LooknGlass]

You're right FullCircle. I try to throw peeps off with the title when I can.
 I have a song called "You Make Me Sick" in the Promo section that goes in a direction peeps don't expect.

 

[Jim of Seattle]

There's a terrific homespun songwriting site called *spamming website* where they supply you with a title and you have about ten days to record a song with that title, then everyone posts their songs and everyone gets to vote on their favorite. It's been around non-stop for 15 YEARS! So anyone who participates in Song Fight by default always has a title first!

[tomcollins]

I've done two titles first.both flopped!!.

Like the thought of it and makes sense but...not for me !!! 

If title has the hook may work better but being an emotional writer and living in that moment is how they come out.and if they take more then 30 min they tend to fizzle away.also really suck at editing or re writes.tho try to now at least give a lyric some life by putting a melody to it before I take it out back for target practice!!!

Funny we moved to kiawah ( island off Carolina coast) and after being on the road for over two years. I have nothing to write about.lol no chaos no lyrics.lines and melodies come to mind but leave as quick. Maybe being an aged toys r us kid has something to do with it ??

So writing from a title would be an awesome thing but feel it will always elude me ...  But worth a shot .lol 

Rock on 

[gradual]

Almost always. That just happens to be what works for me. It takes off the pressure of having to come up with a subject to write about. My life really isn't all that interesting...lol...but a cool title can almost always conjure up some type of story or scenario if I think about it enough, and it's interesting to imagine the possibilities, musically and lyrically. I like figuring out ways of turning it into the hook, and you can get really creative. For a while I was actually collecting lots of pontential titles by opening books to random pages and writing down phrases I found. It's a fun exercise. I save them in a computer file, which is still my go-to source when I need an idea. I think I'm actually starting to get to the point where I've used most of the phrases that strike my fancy, and it may soon be time for a restock.

[Giora Tal]

I usually start with the melody just to get the structure of the singing with the music.

Then the title is taken from the chorus once its written.

[dislocatedlove]

I do this often.
I have a text file with hundreds upon hundreds of titles. From time to time, i'll flick through the list and see if anything feels relevant.
A simple title can be a simple catalyst.