Recording - October 2016 - 68

Continued from page 67
It used to be you'd go to the ASCAP Awards or BMI
Awards and there'd be one or two songwriters. Now
you go to the awards and there are often six writers up there. Why does it take six people to write a
song?
Marlin: When you collaborate and when you
have a great group of people that can agree on
what's the best idea, you tend to put enough
pressure on the song where it can be so good that
it's hard for it not to be able to compete.
Most of us want to do this for a living. I was
with my publisher the other day, and we were
talking about this exact same thing. And we

"Nine out of the 10 #1 records use the
pronoun you within the first two to
14 seconds."
-Ralph Murphy
were like, "Why are there six people on a song?
Where are there seven people on the song, unless
they are a sample or something?" It's just hard
to make enough money when you have 8%. But I
don't think it's necessary, unless it makes the
song better. If it doesn't make the song better,
don't do it.
Yeah, I'm just astounded that so many people do it,
and they do it successfully. And I think about it
monetarily too. Times are hard anyway, you know?
Writers aren't making much on mechanicals anymore; you're still making performance from radio
and some film and TV stuff. But, wow, splitting it
up four or five, six, seven ways seems like a tough
road to go. But then again, I hear stuff on the radio
today that's really good, and I'm really surprised-
or happy-that these groups of writers are getting
together and cranking out some great music. I just
don't really understand the process, because I
haven't worked on a record in a very long time. I
just can't imagine why it takes like one guy to do
the beat, why it takes another guy to do the chorus, why it takes another guy to do the lyric. You
know, what happened to the people who could
kinda do it all?
Marlin: I'll chime in right there. So for example,
there's an executive who is one of the best in the
business right now for this particular thing. His
name is Mike Caren at Atlantic Records. So what
happens is, Mike Caren ultimately is the songwriter. He's the executive, but he is ultimately the
songwriter. Because what Mike Caren will do is
he will say, "I like this track, and Hookman,
come in Tuesday and write some hooks. Oh, I
love this part." Then he'll say, "Richard, come in
Wednesday, because I don't like this verse." And
he will piece together a chorus and a pre-chorus
68

and put Flo Rida on it and it will go to #1. He's a
genius. He's been doing it forever, and as an
executive he knows how to pull that off. And
there are a few other producers who kinda oversee, almost like Dr. Dre and Dr. Luke, where
they are more the overall visionary of the song,
and they keep putting pieces together until
they're happy. So that's kind of how it can happen.
It's like Frankenstein's lab.
Marlin: It's Frankenstein. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But
it really does work, but, you know, there are people in the business who don't like it.
Richard: There are producers these days that
come in after the fact, you know, because they're
not making money on the production point side
of it anymore, [so] they want a piece of the publishing. I just did a song with this girl-kind of a
Country/Pop artist-and the Jackie Boyz came
in and did production on the record, and they
wanted 10% of the publishing and the writing
for doing the production on it, because they're
just not going to make any money on the backend on the production.
TAXI members ask me this question all the time.
"Can I just be a songwriter, or do I have to be able
to produce great tracks as well?" As a songwriter,
can you make it today if you're not either collaborating with a producer who can make kickass
tracks, or do it yourself? Can you just sit down with
an acoustic and write a hit and get it cut?
Jason: I'll say I don't do tracks, and it depends
on the genre. If I'm writing a Country song or an
acoustic Americana song I'm writing with an
artist, that's fine. I don't need to worry about a
track. I can hire a demo service and they'll do a
track afterwards. But if I'm writing Pop,
Pop/R&B, Pop/Rock I won't do it unless I'm
writing with the track producer. I mean, that's
just my reality. I'm not saying that that's for
everybody else. Now, turning that around, I will
say I had some hits in Europe not that long ago
that I did not write with... Well, one of them I
wrote with the track producer, but the other two
I didn't, where I just pitched the song. It's rare.
Literally, I don't do it. I write to the track
because that producer is working on a project
and brings me in. And that's not the way it
always was, and I would prefer that it not be
that way. But in those genres that's my experience. So, you know what? Instead of that
sounding horrible and daunting, it just means
your job is to find the right co-writer-people
who do amazing tracks.
Marlin: That's what I was about to say. I think
all of us would agree that the job of a songwriter
is to eventually identify their most talented part
of the song. So you may be really good at lyrics,
but you may be amazing at melody. Focus on
melody and find lyric people to help you. You
may have OK melodies, but if you can really

paint a picture with words, you want to collaborate with people that have better melodies.
Because at the end of the day, it's really gonna
be the best of the best of the best that find its
way somewhere important. Does that make
sense? Does everybody do that?
Allan: Also, the other thing is, you have to
remember every time... Listen, pitching is
almost obsolete today. It's very hard to go and
pitch a song like we used to do. When I first got
into this business, if I wrote a great song, I knew
that it might take a little while, but I knew it was
going to get recorded. That are no assurances
like that at all today, I don't feel.
So what has replaced pitching?
Marlin: Collaborating.
Allan: Yes, with a producer or a track person.
Richard: Or having the artist in the room is
probably the best thing you can have right now.
Allan: But that's difficult. Wherever it is you
are, you have to look around to find the best of,
you know, the level that you're at. Because it'll
raise your level, and it'll also-if it's a great
song-eventually, because there's a lot of places
like TAXI and a lot of other places that you can
show your songs. Eventually people are going to
get to know your name if you keep on writing
great songs and you submit them.
Like Debra Grusin... Are you here in the audience? Hi, I didn't know you were here. See, I was
talking about you. Now, Debra and I don't really
know each other that well, but I know her
because she's always winning all these contests
and her name is always... So I know that she's on

"When you collaborate and when you
have a great group of people that can
agree on what's the best idea, you
tend to put enough pressure on the
song where it can be so good that it's
hard for it not to be able to compete."
-Hookman
the right track. Whatever she's doing she's getting attention; people are getting to know her
name; and she's writing high-quality songs. So I
did not know you were here, but I was talking
about you.
So that's what you have to do, and eventually
someone's gonna notice, and then someone's
gonna want to write a song... Eventually someone at a high level is going to say, "Hey, I really
like that song, let's write something together." It
is a journey. It is a journey, and you just have to
be patient. You know, the kids today want to be
Continued on page 71

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