It should be painfully obvious by now to even the most casual observer that my intention for this class was as a means of expanding my creative flow, specifically in the area of music. Even more specifically, I am using each meeting of this class as the jumping-off point for the inspiration for each song of an album. The working title of this album is "Seeing Sideways" (for obvious reasons), though I can't guarantee whether or not that will be the final title.
This gives this class an interesting opportunity: observing the development, from beginning to end, of a full album. Imagine having been there for the recording of Dark Side of the Moon or an other seminal album, and it should be apparent what an incredible experience this could be.
Now, it may seem like this is just a project of creating a few songs in response to a class. But it's more than that. It's an album. Each of these songs will appear on the album in the order they are written. Should the album ever become well known (which, in your humble narrator's opinion, would only be just), this song order will be extremely important in the listening experience. Perhaps that's something of the past - track listing. Back when music only appeared on vinyl, you had to listen to the album all the way through (once they started making albums that is, singles are just tedious to listen to), you didn't have a choice. Nowadays we don't buy albums anymore; we just go to iTunes and buy it or (more likely) just download it off the internet for free, usually with incorrect information and occasionally even listed as another song (I once had a friend who downloaded "Another Brick In the Wall Pt. 2" by 'Alice Cooper').
Perhaps this makes me a bit old fashioned. If I'm going to sit down and listen to music (hell, defining "listening to music" as an activity practically makes me old fashioned), I'm not going to listen to a playlist of my current favorite songs. No, if I have the time to listen to music, I use it to listen to albums. A full album is a piece of art; a song is just a corner. If music were literature, albums would be novels and songs would be their chapters. Granted, most songs can exist on their own, but without the context of the album you can never really understand the full meaning. Even if the album is not a "concept album" (that is to say, an album with a coherent story or message), it still represents one unit that some musician or group of musicians put out. Therefore, it should be taken as a whole; otherwise there would not be a whole.
There are two ways to go about writing a song (music first or lyrics first). Likewise, there are two ways to go about writing an album. Every album that has ever been written exists within two categories: concept albums and collections of songs. A collection of songs is just what it sounds like; still an album, but the songs that appear are in a relatively arbitrary order and having little to do with each other. Albums like this usually appear in bands that have a very strict sound or genre. Bands like Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, and Aerosmith (just to pick a few monsters) tend to put out collections of songs, though they do have some albums that seem to have a theme running through them. On the other side of the coin, bands like Pink Floyd (from Dark Side of the Moon on), Nine Inch Nails, and most prog-rock bands (such as Dream Theater) tend to write concept albums. These albums tend to flow together musically better, have lyrical themes that appear in multiple songs, and/or follow the progression or story of some ambiguous or definitive protagonist to their end (be it good or bad).
[if you ask me, albums that aren't concept albums aren't worth listening to]
Most artists tend to be either a writer of songs or a writer of albums. The former will just write songs as they come to their mind or as they figure them out (in a band setting, this would usually take several months as the guitarist teaches everyone his chord progressions or the singer tries to get the bassist to write a line to fit his new set of lyrics, ad nauseum). The latter, the group to which I belong, tend to write songs one at a time, but always have an overarching vision of the end product in mind. Occasionally, albums are planned out before the music is ever even conceived (one of my favorite ways to make an album is to get the idea in my mind, figure out the general progression that it will follow, then name each of the songs - but name them only). Thus, each song is important not only on its own but also in the context of the album - each song inherently has two purposes. These albums will follow the natural ebb and flow of any great story and occasionally have better storylines than most of today's blockbuster movies (think The Wall or Tommy).
As I stated at the beginning, this class is presented with an interesting opportunity. Not only are they being played a series of songs that are being composed for no reason. Each class meeting the class is being read a new chapter from the novel. Each song played is the next progression of the story. And yes, I can already see a story in the three songs that have been written. It has a story, and a main character, and a plot. There are eleven chapters to this story. It follows the protagonist through his world as he learns to open his eyes and see that everything around him is made of magic and that, if he chooses to, he can live in a world that is magnificent and glorious. If it's not obvious yet, the main character is actually your humble narrator. Yes, this is my story. This is the story of my creative development. I just can't fathom the final song...
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