Friday, December 13, 2013

The Song Game

Bob Schneider is the artist that I have grown up listening to in my family. My dad introduced him to us at a young age and at first, being musically unintelligent and only wanting to listen to Kelly Clarkson, I didn't like his sound because it wasn't what I called "upbeat." As I grew older and I explored him on my own I fell in love with his music. One of my favorite things about Bob is that he lives in Austin! One song that really confused me was Bicycle vs. Car. I tried analyzing the meaning and just didn't get very far. One thing that is awesome in this song is the piano throughout the beginning and how each instrument adds to the same beat. "head versus heart equals bicycle versus a car" this part STILL confuses me. I came across an article where I discovered the "meaning" of this song title. Basically, Bob started a game called the Song Game where there is no winner or loser but the name of the game is productivity. Every week, the challenge is to write a song. But not just any song. Bob sends the other artists involved (which include Patty Griffin, Jason Mraz, Matt Nathanson etc) an abstract phrase that does not have any literal meaning and challenges the artists to incorporate the phrase in their songs. Bicycle vs. Car was one of the phrases that Bob received and apparently struggled the most with. Jason Mraz describes this game: "But what it does is it takes your ego away for a second and says, 'don't be so precious about this, just write a song.'" Basically, instead of trying to write a song filled with a deeper meaning, just write it and see what happens.


http://www.npr.org/2013/11/24/246755925/for-a-few-musicians-beating-songwriters-block-is-all-in-the-game
Here's one of the many articles on it.

No comments:

Post a Comment