Quantity vs. Quality?

Photo by phil sheldon ABIPP on Unsplash

​To play an open mic you can start with one song, but two is preferable. To play an opening set for a headliner, you’ll need 25-30 minutes of material. To headline, you need at least one 50 minute set. To secure a restaurant spot, you’ll need at least 2 x 45/50 minute sets.
 
A single is just one song. There is no ‘B’ side in the digital world – it just becomes your second single. An EP (20th century definition Extended Play Record) is a collection (or medium length album) of 4-6 songs while an LP (20th century Long Playing Record) is usually considered an album of collection of 7 or more songs – more commonly 8-12. And then there’s the ‘difficult’ second album to consider.
 
To be a working songwriter, you can see you need a bunch of songs once you poke your head above the parapet. You can also see there’s a pattern of releasable songs – multiple singles, a stepping stone EP and an album you can consider manufacturing to merch at your shows, where you need to be able to play a set or two live.
 
You also need some sort of process to generate enough material to fill sets and release schedules once you ‘play out’ . Being able to write a number of songs reasonably regularly is mandatory. And then there’s making sure that the songs you (or you and your collaborators) write is of sufficient quality to release or perform to an audience.
 
Once the ball gets rolling with your fledging career, it can be very challenging to lock in writing time when the posters need to get printed, the venues need booking (and in COVID life, re- and re-booking!) plus all those coveted carefully lined up interviews and live to air performances need to happen plus the many routine tasks associated with promoting and producing indie music.
 
While there are lot of ‘shoulds’ and ‘got to be dones’ in this flurry, it’s important to stick to your knitting and write songs! No songs, no gigs. No good songs, no repeat gigs. No new songs, no audience or catalogue development. 
 
Quantity is hugely important because the number of finished songs you write allows you to begin connecting with an audience – live or broadcast. Quality is equally, but differently important because some of your songs will be of better quality than others. Pay careful attention to those.
 
Better quality songs attracts larger audiences and more discerning audiences. They start to garner the attention of music business folks from studio operators to music media, producers to playlist curators.
 
Better quality songs lift you up the hierarchy allowing your career opportunities to compound as doors start to open for you.
 
Quality is also relevant in the level of performance you offer, the way you interact with which media, and the support contractors you use from audio engineers to promoters to advisors. You start to build a reputation as a quality act. You can progress.
 
To create Michael Jackson’s Thriller, producer Quincy Jones auditioned 600 songs to get to the final 12 tracks. That 's a lot of song sifting to get quality material to create a hit record!
 
But improving the quality of your songs can start with one word. Here’s the multi-award winning genre-crossing producer Rick Rubin (Beastie Boys, Dixie Chicks, System of A Down, Johnny Cash) in an interview with the slightly odd Tim Ferriss.
 
Tim Ferriss: When you’re working with an artist who believes they can’t do something, or is just hitting that wall, what are some of the ways that you help them get past that?
 
Rick Rubin: Usually, I’ll give them homework, a small, doable task. I’ll give you an example. There was an artist I was working with recently, who hadn’t made an album in a long time, and was struggling with finishing anything. And, just had this – it was a version of a writer’s block …. But, I would give him very doable homework assignments that almost seemed like a joke. “Tonight, I want you to write one word, in this song that needs five lines, that you can’t finish, I just want one word that you like, by tomorrow, do you think that you could come up with one word? “ And, usually, he’d be like yeah, I think I can do one word. And, just very quickly, by breaking it down into pieces, … and chipping away, one step at a time, you can really get through anything.
 
Note - quantity and quality aren’t at odds with the approach taken by top-level artists. Quantity and quality are intertwined, hand in helping hand. Not a bad idea to have at the forefront of your songwriting journey.
 
Best wishes
Charlotte ​