20 songs enough?

[Progbusters]

If you wrote 20 songs and the band only picked 4 so far, do you get rid of the band or they get rid of you?

i swear, i'm getting po'd haha

[Kamanda~SD]

Re: 20 songs enough?

Depends, maybe 16 of the songs aren't that good. On the other hand, maybe they are and just not gellin' with the others. Get some more info, some 'why's' would certainly help.

[Clint 55]

Re: 20 songs enough?

If you're the main songwriter and they're ki-boshing everything I guess then that's annoying. But if there are other people coming up with material, I'd be happy with the band working on 4 of my songs. Why don't you work on the other songs by yourself if you think they're good? You can play the guitar and bass, and use ezdrummer for the drums if you're not a drummer.

[Wattage]

Re: 20 songs enough?

4 out of 20 isn't too bad a ratio IMO. If 20% of what you write is good enough to perform you're writing at a pretty high level.

[Thundermtn]

Re: 20 songs enough?

+1

All that stuff can't be bad. Chop them up and keep the good riffs.

[TwilightOdyssey]

Re: 20 songs enough?

Depends. If the stuff you have written is not in the style of the band or outside of their comfort zone, and the band is democratic, then I can see it getting shot down. If the band was established prior to your arrival there may be other issues involved with the new guy taking over.

There are a million band scenarios out there. My live band is purely the 'marketing arm' for my studio albums. They are all fine musicians but understand that their 'job' is to play the music as it was written/recorded. For recording, I have a stable of studio musicians that I use to cover the things I cannot do (like play drums).

This dual setup of musicians allows me to write/record with very quickly but also scratches the gigging itch and gets gets the music to a new audience, which purchases the music, which feeds the recording budget, ad infinitum.

The downside is that this method is not cheap and is not good if you like things such as 'down time' and 'sleep'.

[Mincer]

Re: 20 songs enough?

Solo project!!

What's the rest of the band's songwriting output like? Are they writing that many songs, or are they waiting for you to come up with stuff, then saying 'no'. If that is the case, get another band.

[Progbusters]

Re: 20 songs enough?

yeah i'm the main songwriter. the drummer is the leader and he provides drumming creativity. the singers is a slacker but has talent when needed. Well now you know we're are a bass-less band I make riffs that fill out the spectrum - maybe they just need to get used to this style of music because they're coming from listening to mainstream 90s stuff.

i think there is a creative difference and they don't just flat out say no to my stuff. or even yes. they're so passive. more songs for me then!

[DeadandBuried]

Re: 20 songs enough?

Quality over quantity, better to have 4 banging tunes than 20 half-assed mediocre songs, you can still keep good bits from the others, I've used scraps of scrapped songs for new ideas and it works better. Record everything and keep it for future use.

[Thundermtn]

Re: 20 songs enough?

I'm really lucky. My guys can take my stuff that's not quite up to snuff and arraign it or alter it enough that my almost good enough stuff ends up with a lot of it working. We have a pretty pleasant conversation, riff out the changes and roll on without drama. It's awesome, been in spots where that couldn't happen and would rather go solo than go back that way.

[2ndhandband]

Re: 20 songs enough?

If nobody else is coming up with stuff I'd tell them to either start writing or suck it. When I was the primary songwriter I didn't mind the guys telling me something was a turkey... but they weren't shooting down 75% of what I came in with either. If they had I would have been pissed, because I was self-editing pretty hard. I was bringing in fully demoed, fully formed arrangements of stuff I had already vetted out of a much larger pool of ideas. I never brought in a riff and said let's turn this into something; I brought in finished product. Is that what you're doing?

[Progbusters]

Re: 20 songs enough?

If nobody else is coming up with stuff I'd tell them to either start writing or suck it. When I was the primary songwriter I didn't mind the guys telling me something was a turkey... but they weren't shooting down 75% of what I came in with either. If they had I would have been pissed, because I was self-editing pretty hard. I was bringing in fully demoed, fully formed arrangements of stuff I had already vetted out of a much larger pool of ideas. I never brought in a riff and said let's turn this into something; I brought in finished product. Is that what you're doing?

i like how you think man. I'm a graphic designer in my 9-5 job and ****ing graphic design is customer service. In a band I'm not here to make stuff for my band mates as if they are my clients, This is art coming out not customer service kinko's special order. They can suck it if they don't like it. suck it or leave or they start contributing. Yeah, I edit over the songs over and over and come up with something that's like 70% polished already when i present a demo.

[Demanic]

Re: 20 songs enough?

Customer service is all well and good.
You need a bassist.

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[TwilightOdyssey]

Re: 20 songs enough?

I'm really lucky. My guys can take my stuff that's not quite up to snuff and arraign it or alter it enough that my almost good enough stuff ends up with a lot of it working. We have a pretty pleasant conversation, riff out the changes and roll on without drama. It's awesome, been in spots where that couldn't happen and would rather go solo than go back that way.

That really is a great way to work.

[2ndhandband]

Re: 20 songs enough?

That really is a great way to work.

That never worked for me. I haven't been in a band like that in a long time... I play covers these days because I like money and my touring days are over. But I was in an original metal band around the turn of the century that almost got signed to a major, and I was doing about 85% of the writing. I never, ever brought in a half-baked idea. I brought in a full demo. I was going on the principle of nobody likes extra work; if I bring in something with parts arranged for everybody that means they don't have to sweat over what they're going to play and they're much more likely to go along with what I've got because I made it easy for them. It usually worked, too...