An Interview With Jonathan Coulton On Songwriting

Remember Jonathan Coulton, the Song-A-Week machine?  There’s a really good interview with him at CecilVortex about songwriting, its challenges, and how Jonathan dealt with them.  I last posted about inspiration for new songs.  Here’s an interesting, related exchange from the interview:

CV: How did you stay focused and productive, particularly on those days when you were feeling a little less inspired?

JC: Solitude and boredom. If I ever found myself stuck, that was usually a good time to take a long walk or a bike ride. There was something about separating myself from all the instruments and gear in the studio that made things move forward — I think it’s easy to get bogged down in a particular detail when what you really need to do is brush lightly over the surface of the whole thing. And I have so many patterns that I rely on when I’m actually playing the guitar that it can sometimes be a hindrance to write with it in my hands — my brain makes different choices when it’s by itself.

That’s similar to my own experience of being most creative when noone and nothing is around me in the wee hours of the morning.  All very true. ]]>