Deadlines inspire creative songs

Article from: The Courier-Mail

Noel Mengel

April 30, 2009 12:00am

THE digital age is all about speed of delivery, instant information, instant shopping, instant entertainment.
The thing that hasn't sped up, on the surface at least, is the act of creativity.

In the '60s and '70s, bands worked fast in the recording studio. Would Lennon and McCartney really have written all those great songs if The Beatles didn't have to deliver those 11 studio albums plus soundtracks and numerous EPs and singles in a recording career that spanned from late 1962 to 1970?

Some might say that good songs will only come at their own speed, but there is no doubt a deadline can inspire creativity. Thus the adage, "Inspiration doesn't lead to work, work leads to inspiration."

Lennon and McCartney and George Harrison were on an incredible hot streak as songwriters and they had every opportunity to get those songs out, sometimes only weeks after recording.

During his golden era, Elton John often released two albums a year (in 1971, two studio sets, a live album and a soundtrack album!). In the same year David Bowie recorded two five-star albums, Hunky Dory and Ziggy Stardust.

It's a pace that seems unimaginable today, when major bands might release an album every three of four years, with no singles-only releases between. The cycle now is blockbuster album, three years flogging it around the world, a long holiday and then back to the studio.

I've often thought how frustrating that must be for modern bands and wondered how many potential great songs just don't get finished or are discarded along the way.

Down at the DIY end of the scale, the internet has been great for artists who find a way to communicate with their audience in a very personal way online. They can connect with fans around the world and release tracks at will. The very day that the song was written and recorded, if they want.

The downside of course is that so many artists are doing that and it's tough to be heard among all the electronic chatter.

Brisbane band 26 has been thinking about this too. Their second album, Births, Deaths and Marriages, was a couple of years in the making before its release last year.

But who says a band has to wait years to release a completed work? Not 26.

Their next album, 26x365, is being released online in quarterly three-song instalments, beginning this month. So fans can buy the songs from iTunes and accumulate the album piece by piece, or wait until next April to get themselves a hard-copy release.

Says the band's Nick O'Donnell: "It's a real challenge but people who like the band feel a part of the process. Plus you can introduce the songs to the live set and people know them rather than having to sit on them for years.

"The deadlines just make us work harder and faster. You have less time to think about the music but that's an interesting approach. It's more honest."

It's also in synch with the way the band write their songs, where the music for the songs is recorded and then O'Donnell digs into the subconscious to find the lyrics that suit.

"We've just finished a new song, World In Miniature, that works that way. We had talked about a few concepts, about how your world gets smaller when someone new comes into it.

"I had a melody and I knew I wanted it to be a loving song, but the lyrics came out in one take when I turned the microphone on. It just flowed."

Still, not everything is instantaneous. You will have to wait until July 1 to hear World in Miniature with the next instalment of 26x365.