Hi friend,
I have given myself a challenge. I was slightly annoyed with myself for not writing more songs and I kept thinking that I’m either not inspired or I’m too tired or something, because nothing was coming up.
But then I remembered that I know how to create my own inspiration.
So I’ve given myself a challenge which is to write a song a week and share it on social media and here.
Phew!
I’m a little nervous.
Will I have the energy for this?
Will my brain be able to handle it?
Will I eventually run out of ideas?
The first week went really well… too well. I LOVE this song and now I’m worried I can’t create anything at this level again.
The song of this first week is called Troubled Mind and is about worrying about the state of the world and where it’s all heading.
As a disabled person I worry about this a lot because I am very dependent on society.
I also started singing lessons! We discovered that my tongue placement is the root of all the evil that has haunted my singing, and I’m hypermobile which means I can go really high in pitch (because high notes require flexibility in the vocal chords), but this comes at the expense of stability — and stability is needed to stay in tune.
My voice coach could hear the hypermobility instantly because I have a tendency to go sharp on the higher pitches, while most non-flexible people tend to go flat.
You can hear me go sharp in the first chorus at the high note. I was about to redo it or fix it in Logic, but I decided to leave it in to show you where I am at with my voice and how the state of my body affects it.
I have always had this issue with tuning — more so after I became sicker — and I always thought I was the problem, or that I couldn’t hear the right note and I was really embarrassed about it, because I thought it made me ‘unmusical’.
But now I know what is causing it! And we are now working towards creating more stability in the voice. I feel so liberated and more confident in my voice now. While it is still far from perfect, at least I know how to move forward.
Ok, back to the song…
I had a few notes in my lyric diary and the first two lines of the song was at the top. I had heard these line in my head one day, it was quite magical.
Since becoming more severely ill my brain has stopped producing sentences like that. I used to be inundated by my brain creating sentences, but these past nine years everything has been quiet inside my brain. So creating a sentence like that out of nowhere made me very happy.
I sat down at the piano, played a Gadd11 chord and the melody came pretty fast from there.
I knew what the song was about immediately.
I also had the words “Like a lifeboat” in my lyric diary and that’s how I created the chorus.
Here are the lyrics:
I’ve seen the lights
I’ve read the new formations
Fearsome clouds
Creating odd constellations
Oh oh oh
Like a lifeboat sinking in the sea
Will you teach me
How to tame my troubled mind
Oh oh
My eyes they strain
To see the birds play on the horizon
They’re unaware
Of battle ships encroaching on them
Oh oh oh
Like a lifeboat sinking in the sea
Will you teach me
How to tame my troubled mind
We sing forgotten songs
About a time when we knew better and were kind
Oh oh oh
For forty years we heard whispers from above
But ignored them
Oh oh
Worn-out shoes
Worn-out hearts
The streets are littered with stuff
When will we reach the edge of defiance
When have we lost enough
Oh oh oh
Like a lifeboat sinking in the sea
Will you teach me
How to tame my troubled mind
Oh oh
Let me know what you think of the song and my challenge!
Tell me…
Do you worry about the state of the world
If you could give yourself a challenge what would it be?
What are your favourite lines from the song?
I’d love to know in the comments!
