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Best American Songwriter?

Asithappens

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Rimbo

Rimbo 25941

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On 2/2/2019 at 2:21 PM, jimmyjazz said:

Aimee Mann

So, I hated "Voices Carry" when I first heard it, because Aimee's singing ain't what you'd call pleasing to the ear (or even in tune) on it, and New Wave was gettin'old by then.

But years later it's still in my regular 80s rotation, because it is actually a really well written song.

Only this past week I finally l looked at the lyrics and saw what they were about, and realized they weren't what I thought they were about at all. Swap genders and it's suddenly very relatable. (Hey Erin, if you're out there, fuck yourself with a rusty machete, kay?)

 

also: to me, "good songwriting" also includes melody and chords

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TexPx

TexPx 2323

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Best? I dunno, but what about Gary Louris? Collaborated with Mark Olson on most songs on The Jayhawks first four albums, and wrote most of them on the last seven.

Wrote songs for Nickel Creek, Dixie Chicks and, I think Golden Smog.

Extra points for being a great singer and underrated guitar player.

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Gourmand

Gourmand 7774

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Suicaine Gratification is one of the most underrated albums ever imo and I can't believe it's almost 24 years old. 

 I stood alone on that stage
Just like a stone on a grave
You could be my lover
I'd make you laugh
Or just another epitaph
I'm a bad idea whose time has come
And I'll never forget
Where I started from
I'm the fugitve kind
You better make up your mind
I can't wait
You can run-run-run-run away with me
But never from your fate

 

 

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Al_4_ISU

Al_4_ISU 12464

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Well she's kind of like an artist
Who uses paints no more
You never show me what you're doing
Never show a soul

Well, I saw one of your pictures
There was nothin' that I could see
If no one's on your canvas
Well, I'm achin' to be
 
I'll argue that the alt country scene of the 90's never happens without "Achin' To Be"
 
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Al_4_ISU

Al_4_ISU 12464

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Just now, Napoleon said:

What??

Rhett Miller is better than Ryan Adams.

Yeah, I'd agree.

Ryan Adams wrote some absolutely brilliant songs early in his career, and has been 90% straight dog shit since Cold Roses, which was released in 2005(!).  Rhett Miller's been writing and performing for basically the same period of time (a little longer probably) and continues to write really good songs.  "Most Messed Up" is probably my favorite Old 97's album after "Too Far to Care" and that came out in 2014.  

Plus, Rhett's a pretty good fucking guy, and Adams is a pederast crybaby shithead.

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Rip76

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14 minutes ago, Al_4_ISU said:

Yeah, I'd agree.

Ryan Adams wrote some absolutely brilliant songs early in his career, and has been 90% straight dog shit since Cold Roses, which was released in 2005(!).  Rhett Miller's been writing and performing for basically the same period of time (a little longer probably) and continues to write really good songs.  "Most Messed Up" is probably my favorite Old 97's album after "Too Far to Care" and that came out in 2014.  

Plus, Rhett's a pretty good fucking guy, and Adams is a pederast crybaby shithead.

Easy Tiger was a great album.

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sidis

sidis 9828

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5 hours ago, Gil Bang said:


Joni Mitchell is Canadian.


The answer is Carole King

she's an american citizen so i'm claiming as much of her as i can.

giving further consideration to carole, no doubt she would belong.  natural woman, it's too late, bitter with the sweet, so far away...a little range with locomotion, one fine day, porpoise song (for the monkees), chains (for the beatles)...

and i completely agree with 4th&Five that sam beam is the type of guy who never gets love on these types of lists and threads...but damned if iron and wine doesn't have a metric fuckton of songs that are phenomenal and that i wish i wrote.

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Mole

Mole 4333

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Westerburg was the first name that came to mind, but after thinking about it, my top 3 have to be Townes, Willie, and Stevie.

The second name that came to mind was Victoria Williams. Her voice is an acquired taste — the female Neil Young — but her songs are beautiful.

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WhatTheBuck

WhatTheBuck 28783

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24 minutes ago, Rimbo said:

More of a composer than a songwriter imho

He wrote a shitload of songs. What more do you need?

Sure he was a composer. But isn’t songwriting sort of what what a composer does? He could read and write music, something a lot of the people mentioned here couldn’t do. I don’t think that should be held against him. He could write for and conduct a symphony orchestra. In another time he might have made his living doing that. That’s what he really wanted to do. But that doesn’t pay the bills. So he mostly wrote for and played in an electric rock ‘n’ roll outfit. You could also call him a playwright because in a way he did that too. He was definitely unique.

I’m not sure how you qualify what is a song and what is a composition. It’s a matter of semantics.

What’s this? Song or composition? Or both? It’s not particularly complex musically or lyrically. But it’s smooth and beautiful with Ike Willis crooning soulfully and Frank laying down some tasty licks. I’d say it’s a song. I’d say it’s from an album full of songs, an album that’s also sort of a play with the songs linked together by the spoken word of the Central Scrutinizer. Guitarist, singer, songwriter, composer, conductor, producer, arranger, bandleader, ringleader, philosopher, author...he was all those things.

 

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horn4life

horn4life 3760

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Dylan is King without a doubt.

But one lyric has always struck me as one of the most original and creative ever... "Little old lady got mutilated late last night."  Fucking genius. So a tip of the hat to Warren Zevon.

I think Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen are two sides of the same coin.  With Springsteen focusing on our struggles, hopes and dreams, while Petty painted pictures of the Americana that are etched into all our audio memories. 

John Prine is an elegant writer, and probably as much as anyone, was a nurturer of the craft of writing itself within the music community.

Lots of other great American writers, but I think these four likely separate themselves above the rest.  (excluding Zevon). 

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Rimbo

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8 hours ago, WhatTheBuck said:

’m not sure how you qualify what is a song and what is a composition. It’s a matter of semantics.

I mean, yeah, of course it's semantics; semantics is the meaning of words.

There's some overlap between composition and songwriting, but the focus is different. The focus of songwriting is on lyrics, melody, and the chords that go with the melody. A well-written song remains a well-written song through many different arrangements, performances. It can be stripped down to one person with or without an accompanying instrument.

Composing, on the other hand, is far less focused on lyrics; they're optional. Instrumentation is more rigid, because you're being more specific about the actual notes being played. It's more complex than mere melody and harmony, most often. And the pieces are not things one person can do solo unless specifically written to be that way.

But mostly I consider Zappa a composer more than a songwriter because he said that about himself; that he only went into pop music because there was no money in classical composing.

You know who else fits into this category? Kip Winger.

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Rimbo

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It's like the difference between being a poet, an author, or putting together a stellar Amicus Curiae brief. You're putting words to paper in all those cases, but the skills demanded differ vastly.

You can be a great composer and a completely substandard songwriter, and vice versa. 

Paul McCartney is one of the greatest songwriters, living or dead, but he needed George Martin to score "Live and Let Die."

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Al_4_ISU

Al_4_ISU 12464

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3 hours ago, Rimbo said:

I mean, yeah, of course it's semantics; semantics is the meaning of words.

There's some overlap between composition and songwriting, but the focus is different. The focus of songwriting is on lyrics, melody, and the chords that go with the melody. A well-written song remains a well-written song through many different arrangements, performances. It can be stripped down to one person with or without an accompanying instrument.

Composing, on the other hand, is far less focused on lyrics; they're optional. Instrumentation is more rigid, because you're being more specific about the actual notes being played. It's more complex than mere melody and harmony, most often. And the pieces are not things one person can do solo unless specifically written to be that way.

But mostly I consider Zappa a composer more than a songwriter because he said that about himself; that he only went into pop music because there was no money in classical composing.

You know who else fits into this category? Kip Winger.

This is exactly how I frame a great song vs a great composition.

If one person and an acoustic guitar make it move you, it's a great song.  If it's musically brilliant, but fails that test, it's a great composition.

There aren't many Zappa tunes that pass that test.  He's still an incredible composer, musician, and performer.

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jimmyjazz

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That and the fact that a song has words, and presumably melody, although that's a gray area.  If the words are spoken or rapped over a musical bed, is it a song?  Maybe.

A "musical composition" need not have words or a sung melody.  Indeed, a large percentage of jazz and classical music doesn't have a lyric at all.

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Gordon Shumway

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For my money its Jason Isbell.  He can tell a great story while using so few words.  Dress Blues is such a well written song.  

I love the Tom T. Hall quote (cant remember who else he was talking about) when he said "We are the only two people in Nashville that can describe Dolly Parton without using our hands."

Prince deserves a mention.  

I really love Lyle Lovett and Robert Earl Keen as well. 

 

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Rimbo

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3 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

That and the fact that a song has words, and presumably melody, although that's a gray area.  If the words are spoken or rapped over a musical bed, is it a song?  Maybe.

A "musical composition" need not have words or a sung melody.  Indeed, a large percentage of jazz and classical music doesn't have a lyric at all.

And there's absolutely overlap there. The chord progression, melody and arrangement of a song are all elements of composition, too.

And there's people who are good at both composition and songwriting. Randy Newman and Trent Reznor come to mind.

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WhatTheBuck

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10 hours ago, Rimbo said:

I mean, yeah, of course it's semantics; semantics is the meaning of words.

There's some overlap between composition and songwriting, but the focus is different. The focus of songwriting is on lyrics, melody, and the chords that go with the melody. A well-written song remains a well-written song through many different arrangements, performances. It can be stripped down to one person with or without an accompanying instrument.

Composing, on the other hand, is far less focused on lyrics; they're optional. Instrumentation is more rigid, because you're being more specific about the actual notes being played. It's more complex than mere melody and harmony, most often. And the pieces are not things one person can do solo unless specifically written to be that way.

But mostly I consider Zappa a composer more than a songwriter because he said that about himself; that he only went into pop music because there was no money in classical composing.

You know who else fits into this category? Kip Winger.

If you don’t want to read my whole post I’ll try to summarize it by saying that just because Frank Zappa was more than a songwriter doesn’t make him any less of a songwriter. By your definition he was a songwriter. And if you think a song has to have lyrics then you’re talking about best lyricists, not best songwriters. Feel free to scroll on by the rest of my post if you like.

Like I said, in Frank’s perfect world he would’ve made a living as a composer writing for orchestras, scribbling little black dots on paper like Stravinsky or Varèse. And it’s true that Frank saw himself as a composer, but in his mind his composition wasn’t limited to musical notes. That’s part of why I referred to him as a philosopher. He had some unique, or at least uncommon, ideas about his art. He had a concept of “Project/Object” wherein everything he did was collectively thought of as the “Project,” and each instance of him doing something, whether it was writing music, performing music, making a film, writing a book, giving an interview, etc., those were each a separate “Object.” They were all individual artifacts, part of the overall project and the project itself was his art.

A significant percentage of those objects were songs and they satisfy your definition that “The focus of songwriting is on lyrics [I disagree, but check], melody [check], and the chords that go with the melody [check]. A well-written song remains a well-written song through many different arrangements [check], performances [check]. It can be stripped down to one person [check] with or without an accompanying instrument [most songwriters don’t perform their songs a capella, Frank didn’t, except for short passages, but they certainly could be sung without instrumentation, so, check...I don’t see that as being all that important as a criterion for songhood; I don’t think I’ve ever heard Dylan sing a capella nor heard anyone sing one of his songs without accompaniment].”

For example, the first recorded version of Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up was performed by former Mother Jeff Simmons on his album of the same name. Frank wrote the song (credited on the album as LaMarr Bruister), co-produced the album, and played guitar on the track.

As you can hear, Frank’s arrangement of the song on Joe’s Garage was significantly different. Frank’s songs went through many different arrangements and interpretations over the years as the lineups in his bands changed and evolved. I’ll spare you a bunch of examples here, that’s better left for the Zappa thread. Okay, well maybe just one example. Here’s Mike Keneally performing a solo acoustic version of Frank’s song Inca Roads.

For the uninitiated, I’ll include two other versions. To conserve screen real estate, I’ll spoiler them. The first is the version released on Frank’s 1975 album One Size Fits All. It has what might be my all time favorite guitar solo. The second is an early performance recorded at Austin’s Armadillo World Headquarters in 1973 and features a keyboard solo by George Duke. There’s no two ways about it, Inca Roads is a song that Frank wrote and satisfies all your criteria.

Spoiler

 

 

Lyrics can be a part of songwriting but they don’t have to be. Although, as Frank recognized, a song will sell better if it has lyrics so he wrote lyrics for a lot of his songs. Some of his songs were sometimes performed as instrumentals and at other times performed with lyrics. Like Oh No or Dog Breath. Is Sofa No. 1 a composition but Sofa No. 2 a song because it has lyrics?  (Incidentally, Michael Hedges did a good solo acoustic version of Sofa No. 1.)

When you get into lyrics it raises the question of whether or not the lyrics need to be meaningful. As you can probably guess, I’m going to argue that they don’t need to be. Lyrics with deep meaning and social relevance are great. But so are meaningless lyrics like Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da. Frank kind of demonstrates the concept in his song Stick It Out. If you don’t know German, the song starts out just a happy, bouncy little tune. Nothing controversial there. But then midway through the song he switches to English and we hear that we’ve been bopping along to “Fuck me, you ugly son of a bitch” and “Don’t get no jizz upon the sofa sofa.” In a foreign tongue the words are just a collection of notes like from any other instrument, but in English they have meaning, and a fairly crude meaning at that. I think that’s very clever. I think George Carlin would agree.

So if you accept that songs don’t have to have lyrics to be considered songs, I could post three very different album versions of the song Peaches En Regalia. (The band Phish does a respectable cover of that song for a 4-piece rock band.) Even if you don’t I could post many examples of different versions of songs with lyrics. Ive already done some of that in other threads. While Frank’s penchant for classical, avant garde composition influenced his songwriting, he still wrote a lot of different songs in a lot of different styles from straight up rock to blues, R&B, doo-wop, country, jazz, disco, boogie, reggae, etc. So while I don’t really think there’s much of a distinction between composer and songwriter, Frank Zappa was unquestionably both. And very prolific.

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Rimbo

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10 minutes ago, WhatTheBuck said:

If you don’t want to read my whole post I’ll try to summarize it by saying that just because Frank Zappa was more than a songwriter doesn’t make him any less of a songwriter. By your definition he was a songwriter. And if you think a song has to have lyrics then you’re talking about best lyricists, not best songwriters. Feel free to scroll on by the rest of my post if you like.

Like I said, in Frank’s perfect world he would’ve made a living as a composer writing for orchestras, scribbling little black dots on paper like Stravinsky or Varèse. And it’s true that Frank saw himself as a composer, but in his mind his composition wasn’t limited to musical notes. That’s part of why I referred to him as a philosopher. He had some unique, or at least uncommon, ideas about his art. He had a concept of “Project/Object” wherein everything he did was collectively thought of as the “Project,” and each instance of him doing something, whether it was writing music, performing music, making a film, writing a book, giving an interview, etc., those were each a separate “Object.” They were all individual artifacts, part of the overall project and the project itself was his art.

A significant percentage of those objects were songs and they satisfy your definition that “The focus of songwriting is on lyrics [I disagree, but check], melody [check], and the chords that go with the melody [check]. A well-written song remains a well-written song through many different arrangements [check], performances [check]. It can be stripped down to one person [check] with or without an accompanying instrument [most songwriters don’t perform their songs a capella, Frank didn’t, except for short passages, but they certainly could be sung without instrumentation, so, check...I don’t see that as being all that important as a criterion for songhood; I don’t think I’ve ever heard Dylan sing a capella nor heard anyone sing one of his songs without accompaniment].”

For example, the first recorded version of Lucille Has Messed My Mind Up was performed by former Mother Jeff Simmons on his album of the same name. Frank wrote the song (credited on the album as LaMarr Bruister), co-produced the album, and played guitar on the track.

As you can hear, Frank’s arrangement of the song on Joe’s Garage was significantly different. Frank’s songs went through many different arrangements and interpretations over the years as the lineups in his bands changed and evolved. I’ll spare you a bunch of examples here, that’s better left for the Zappa thread. Okay, well maybe just one example. Here’s Mike Keneally performing a solo acoustic version of Frank’s song Inca Roads.

For the uninitiated, I’ll include two other versions. To conserve screen real estate, I’ll spoiler them. The first is the version released on Frank’s 1975 album One Size Fits All. It has what might be my all time favorite guitar solo. The second is an early performance recorded at Austin’s Armadillo World Headquarters in 1973 and features a keyboard solo by George Duke. There’s no two ways about it, Inca Roads is a song that Frank wrote and satisfies all your criteria.

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Lyrics can be a part of songwriting but they don’t have to be. Although, as Frank recognized, a song will sell better if it has lyrics so he wrote lyrics for a lot of his songs. Some of his songs were sometimes performed as instrumentals and at other times performed with lyrics. Like Oh No or Dog Breath. Is Sofa No. 1 a composition but Sofa No. 2 a song because it has lyrics?  (Incidentally, Michael Hedges did a good solo acoustic version of Sofa No. 1.)

When you get into lyrics it raises the question of whether or not the lyrics need to be meaningful. As you can probably guess, I’m going to argue that they don’t need to be. Lyrics with deep meaning and social relevance are great. But so are meaningless lyrics like Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da. Frank kind of demonstrates the concept in his song Stick It Out. If you don’t know German, the song starts out just a happy, bouncy little tune. Nothing controversial there. But then midway through the song he switches to English and we hear that we’ve been bopping along to “Fuck me, you ugly son of a bitch” and “Don’t get no jizz upon the sofa sofa.” In a foreign tongue the words are just a collection of notes like from any other instrument, but in English they have meaning, and a fairly crude meaning at that. I think that’s very clever. I think George Carlin would agree.

So if you accept that songs don’t have to have lyrics to be considered songs, I could post three very different album versions of the song Peaches En Regalia. (The band Phish does a respectable cover of that song for a 4-piece rock band.) Even if you don’t I could post many examples of different versions of songs with lyrics. Ive already done some of that in other threads. While Frank’s penchant for classical, avant garde composition influenced his songwriting, he still wrote a lot of different songs in a lot of different styles from straight up rock to blues, R&B, doo-wop, country, jazz, disco, boogie, reggae, etc. So while I don’t really think there’s much of a distinction between composer and songwriter, Frank Zappa was unquestionably both. And very prolific.

Sure, he was also A songwriter. Because he wrote songs.

But this thread is about the GREATEST songwriters. And while I think Zappa was an amazing musician, performer, and artist, I think he was mediocre at songwriting.

And that's okay. MOST of my favorite bands, most of my favorite songs, are pretty far from being great songwriting, because I tend to value composition, arrangement, style and performance far more than songwriting. That's just me.

And if you can't agree that a song has to have lyrics, then you don't know the definition of the word "song." Lyrics are THE defining feature of a song vs. a piece of music.

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baboso

baboso 6056

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Rimbo getting us back on track.  Gracias.

James McMurtry has to get my vote.  Consider:

Flatter than a tabletop
Makes you wonder why they stopped here
Wagon must have lost a wheel or they lacked ambition one
On the great migration west
Separated from the rest
Though they might have tried their best
They never caught the sun
So they sunk some roots down in the dirt
To keep from blowin' off the earth
Built a town around here
And when the dust had all but cleared
They called it Levelland, the pride of man
In Levelland
 
And,
 
Your father always held his ground
He never liked you hanging round with the lesser kind
He suffered not the weak
And he was never loath to speak his twisted mind.

He liked to watch an evening pass
Clinking the ice in his bourbon glass while you played your scales
With eyes that burned right through
He would say he always knew you were bound to fail.
 
And,
 
Ruth-Anne and Lynn, they wear them cut-off britches
And then skinny little halters and they're second cousins to me
Man, I dont care, I want to get between them
With a great big 'ol hard-on
Like an ol' Bodark fencepost
That you can hang a pipe rail gate from
Do some sister twisters till the cows come home
And we'll be having us a time
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jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 45960

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1 hour ago, Rimbo said:

And if you can't agree that a song has to have lyrics, then you don't know the definition of the word "song." 

Yes, that's what I alluded to above.  A lyric is essential.  Some would say a "sung" lyric.  I'm not sure I agree, I mean Lou Reed *tries* to sing, but he's not all that good at it.  Does that make him a lesser songwriter than Dre?

For me, there must be words in the composition to make it a song.  In no way does that mean we're only talking about "best lyricist".  It means we're talking about "best at combining words and music", which obviously leads to a wide range of emphasis.

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