Unless you’re writing for your own band, or collaborating with other writers, song- writing can be a solitary endeavor. You’re left alone in your writing room day after day, night after day, fighting the twin demons of indecision and procrastination.
As Steve Forbert once put it: “The most annoying thing about songwriting is that you just have to put in the solitude and the time it takes to get it done. It requires a lot of alone time.”
That’s why it can be very useful to have a songwriting buddy.
Your buddy could be a musician friend or a fellow songwriter you respect and trust—someone who will give you a chance to think out loud and be a sounding board for your new ideas. Ideally, your buddy should be someone who under- stands songwriting and whose encouragement, experience and insight will help you gain momentum and confidence in your own writing.
Writers are often not the best judges of their own material, regardless of their level of experience or success. They often get so close to a song that it is hard for them to tell if it is truly finished or still has some weaknesses.
At the crucial re-writing stage, your songwriting buddy can provide unbiased feed- back before you start spending hard-earned cash on a demo, or putting in the hours in your home recording studio. He or she can give you valuable criticism or informed praise from an outside perspective, and point out what still isn’t working in your song.
If you don’t know any experienced songwriters, your buddy could always be a special person that you trust—such as your girlfriend, boyfriend, best friend, husband or wife. Someone you can take your stripped down ‘memo’ demo to—without feeling embarrassed or self-conscious—and ask for an honest opinion of the song.
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