Cut-Up Technique

[john]

Hey

 

Out of interest have you tried cut-up technique when writing a song?

 

I have dabbled in before it but no real serious attempt, in part because I am pretty happy with my writing just now, and have been for a while. That said I find it healthy to mix it up. It helps that I am a massive fan of David Bowie and Thom Yorke. Both are fantastic songwriters and both have used cut-up technique, pretty extensively afaik.

 

I included a link to Verbasizer in the article… a software tool designed to aid in the use of cut-up technique.

 

Cheers

 

John

[Mahesh]

1 hour ago, Dan Tyler said:

isn't that just just lazy though, your using already written things and just re-arranging them, pretty sure that's how plagiarism works, lol,  use someone else's lyrics but change just enough to make it different.

 

 

Hey @Dan Tyler, I get where you’re coming from, but I think there’s a bit of a misunderstanding here about the cut-up technique.

 

It’s not about taking full lines or phrases and rearranging them to create something that mimics the original work. The idea is more about taking words out of their usual context, to break through creative blocks and spark new ideas. The randomness of it forces your brain to make connections that it might not have made otherwise.

 

It’s a brainstorming tool, kind of like free-writing or using writing prompts. You’re still creating something original because you’re interpreting the random associations that come up and weaving them into something new. It’s not about copying someone else’s work; it’s about letting randomness inspire your creativity. I haven’t tried it myself yet, but I can see how it would be useful for getting out of a rut. It’s more about the process of discovery than it is about lazily reusing old material. 

Besides, if you think about it, many forms of music, especially in hip-hop, involve sampling existing tracks and incorporating them into new works. That’s widely accepted as a form of creative exploration and experimentation. So, I don’t see how using the cut-up technique for songwriting is any more of plagiarism than that. If it’s okay to sample in hip-hop, why not use this technique to spark fresh ideas and help overcome writer’s block?

[john]

5 hours ago, Mahesh said:

 

Hey @Dan Tyler, I get where you’re coming from, but I think there’s a bit of a misunderstanding here about the cut-up technique.

 

It’s not about taking full lines or phrases and rearranging them to create something that mimics the original work. The idea is more about taking words out of their usual context, to break through creative blocks and spark new ideas. The randomness of it forces your brain to make connections that it might not have made otherwise.

 

It’s a brainstorming tool, kind of like free-writing or using writing prompts. You’re still creating something original because you’re interpreting the random associations that come up and weaving them into something new. It’s not about copying someone else’s work; it’s about letting randomness inspire your creativity. I haven’t tried it myself yet, but I can see how it would be useful for getting out of a rut. It’s more about the process of discovery than it is about lazily reusing old material. 

Besides, if you think about it, many forms of music, especially in hip-hop, involve sampling existing tracks and incorporating them into new works. That’s widely accepted as a form of creative exploration and experimentation. So, I don’t see how using the cut-up technique for songwriting is any more of plagiarism than that. If it’s okay to sample in hip-hop, why not use this technique to spark fresh ideas and help overcome writer’s block?

 

Not only that, so many new styles, genres and concepts in music and in art and design more generally come from the combination of ideas taken out of context and applied to a new area. What you end up with is an original blend.. Very, very few ideas are entirely original. Just think how many ideas incorporate the wheel, or fire, or water…. Wait a wheel in water, you can use that to turn a mill and grind grain to make flour, and on it goes. Music is exactly the same.

 

Do you write lyrics? Do you write sectional music? Do you have verse sections and chorus sections? What about rhymes? Rhyme schemes? Half-rhymes? Ok What about similes and metaphors in songs? These are all someone else’s ideas, and most of them are in themselves derivative.

 

Cut-up is about stimulation intended to take you away from predictable. It helps you break out of ruts, the same old schemes, the same use of language and the same old tropes.

[Mahesh]

22 hours ago, Dan Tyler said:

Hmmm, just not really sure having words jumbled up would make me think of alternate ways of using them, lol.

 

Fair enough, but that's just you I guess  

I've heard songwriting workshops conducted by record labels will have stuff similar to this. You are given a bunch of words as "prompts" & are to write a song using that as inspiration. I'm pretty sure this is a creative writing activity in film schools as well. Some people like the challenge

[john]

On 8/20/2024 at 6:51 PM, Dan Tyler said:

Hmmm, just not really sure having words jumbled up would make me think of alternate ways of using them, lol.

But i do sort of do a similar thing when i write, i write a small story and write to that and sometimes i will flip the meaning, a good example would be a song call " i don't love you like i used too" sounds like he no longer loves her but he actually loves her more than he did so its a twist.

 

if that's not what you mean then gods know what your talking about, lol

 

Any source of random ideas could be classified like this. I don't know what to suggest if you don't think random ideas could be useful in prompting you to think in different directions, help you get out of a rut, or other predictable songwriting issues. Like all ideas, it is how we filter and choose which ideas we will use that matters.

 

Luckily for us both, I am not here to persuade you or to ram it down your throat. It is what it is, and you will try it or not.

 

lol