Bingo: I am using my free space for this one, in the “TBR” space (I don’t really maintain a TBR list, so this one would have been difficult to complete). That also makes this my second Bingo! Woo!
I am not a Wilco superfan. I’ve listened to and enjoyed their music, but I don’t think I could name a single Wilco song off the top of my head. When I heard about this book though, written by Wilco’s lead singer, the title piqued my interest. I’m a musician, and I’ve dabbled a tiny bit in songwriting, though I’ve never felt very confident in my songwriting skills. I hoped that this book would help me overcome the creative block I have around songwriting.
Jeff Tweedy starts his book by emphasizing that he is teaching us how to write one song, not how to be a songwriter. Tweedy’s thesis is that creative work happens one song (or essay, or painting, or video, or whatever) at a time, and so it’s more useful to cultivate the skills needed to create a single song rather than songs in general. He shares ideas on making time for a creative practice, overcoming insecurity, and recording ideas for later use. He includes some writing exercises to help spark lyrical inspiration. There’s a good balance between philosophical musings and concrete advice. The advice does skew heavily towards the lyrics side of songwriting. As a self-taught musician, Tweedy admits that he doesn’t have the vocabulary to articulate his musical process as well as his lyrical process. This was disappointing for me, since I struggle more with the music part of the songwriting than the lyrics. I guess I can’t blame Tweedy for playing to his strengths, though.
I did not finish this book having written a complete song, but I did end up with several pages of lyrics waiting for some music and a handful of practices to explore moving forward.