How to Write — A Vinyl
Let me start by saying that I have been saved by music, over and over again. To the extent that I can etch out a progressive graph of my career and endeavors with writing that is directly influenced by the kind of music I’m tuned to lately.
I am moved, stunned and aggravated by music, more than by writing.
I mean, you can choose to shut a book or a boring blog in a matter of seconds, but music, good or bad, takes about 2–3 minutes before you realize whether it’s worth your time or not. I am talking about your kind of music of course, why tune into something that’s exorbitantly not you?
When I realized I can write for a living, I may have been 21 years old. I needed money to give me a slight edge over the other dorm kids whom I’ve been sharing my entire college life with. This was 2009, Delhi, India. A city bustling with talent, but shy to a system around us that was here to feeding more power to the powerful. I felt powerless throughout the day, but when I sat in front of the computer or had a pen in my hand, I had retrospectives that could heal and bind a hundred lost souls like mine. That’s my first cue to dropping a song.
Nine Inch Nails was a fairly new discovery for me. And With Teeth was the album that Trent Reznor spoke to me most in. It seemed like heaven cracked open, and the voice of God was telling me, “ Will you bite the hand that feeds? / Will you chew until it bleeds? / Can you get up off your knees? / Are you brave enough to see?”
The distorted and grungy guitar riffs ricocheted well with the overall emotion of the song, as the album bereaved courage and revolution in the world. When I took up the job, it was more than just writing. It was figuring out how to re-write. On Day 1, I was briefed not to think. Take different copies of pharma literature available on the internet, rephrase the sentences, retain the emotions, run a dupe check using a software, and publish multiple hogwash that caused the death of originality, on a regular basis. It took me two days to give up the comfort of an air-conditioner, the fake warmth of a boss who saw a great writer in me and the gentle escapades from the clutches of college life, to go back to finishing off my final year.
Rule Number One: Don’t just write for some extra bucks. Wait for your moment.
Starting to write professionally is a calculated risk. Calculated because you have trained and programmed your mind to believe you’re here to mix up your words and leave the world lusting for more. Risk, because the medium on which you write may just accelerate your trajectory to a peak, from where there’s no return. It’s like taking an open three-pointer in the final game of the NBA Finals. This is the best opportunity to hit a dagger, but a slight miss and the whole world is on a manhunt to get you out of the franchise.
I was massively intrigued by Logic’s body of work when I saw his chapter on a docu-series called RAPTURE. His bars are literally high, and his writing is off the charts. Besides Kendrick Lamar, he’s probably the second only guy to make you sad and angry at the same time. Here’s an example, “This is war, I declare it / Time is money, I can’t spare it / Futuristic, so simplistic / Please decipher my linguistics / Slow it down, Robitussin / I’m the king, ain’t no discussion.” With Logic, I always get the kick that he’s representing the repressed. And it’s a great attribute to add as a writer, to lend your voice to the voiceless.
When I started to write, I think I felt more about each syllable than I do today. I don’t see words as one of many syllables anymore, they are words. Write them, take them off your chest, and burn them. When you consider the impact of every sound, you tend to focus more and grind on till you find the right emotion to leave your readers with. Writers who are thick-skinned often think about the fire. When you write, make sure you leave everything behind, and think about the smoke.
Rule Number Two: Attention to Detail is clinical; one wrong step and the writing is interpreted in a different way.
When I sit to write down, I often destress from the world and think I am the sole survivor in this world. And that allows me to zone out of the criticisms, negativities, sounds of chores, pressures of criticisms, and other mental diversions. The more baggage you bring to the table, the more unstable will be your literary iteration.
The legend of King Kunta starts somewhat like this, “I don’t want you monkey-mouth motherfuckers sittin’ in my throne again!” What I meant was, always start your piece with clear thought and an even clearer resolution to keep the garbage (thoughts) outside the door. Whether you are writing a catastrophic line or a phrase that is coming naturally from your brains to your fingertips, give it some love, weigh in its chances, and if it mesmerizes you still, chances are that it will have some effect on your readers.
You can read a hundred books, both fiction and non-fiction, in your quest to dominate the art of writing. But what no one will tell you is that writing, just like winning, comes from within. If you are no Xabi Alonso of the 2005 Istanbul Final, you will perhaps hang your head from the shame of having missed an easy penalty to level the game, while the ball is still mid-air. If you have the Xabi Alonso mentality, chances are that you will recoil lightning-quick, to hit the ball on the rebound, and claim the equalizer.
Rule Number Three: Learn to write for yourself, not for the others.
One of the most fundamental rules of writing is to keep your mind open to anything that has the possibility to catch your attention. That means you have to split your time into attending to frequency waves and decrypting them in your own terms.
In my case, it was music from the European electronic underground scene, the likes of Justice and Primal Scream, that did most of the coaching. The French duo of Gaspard Auge and Xavier de Rosnay, aka Justice, teach you to hold on to your fundamentals, as you experiment with something more unique. The whole dichotomy of who you are, and what the universe believes around you, splits a writer apart. And that’s the juice that keeps most of the better ones flowing.
To be able to put one foot on a boat that represents you, and another, that represents a bigger lot, is courageous and to some, maddening. If there’s one thing universal about writers and thinkers, that’s we are big-time risk-takers. If you look into each of Justice’s albums, they change their skins, while keeping their metal-inspired core steady. One half of their creative expression moves, the other half stays behind, as a signature watermark.
Rule Number Four: Listen as much as you write, for it gives you wings to experiment.
Personal losses and moments of grief always greet us in our most vulnerable times. And most of these waves crash into our dreams and positive solitude. You can lose yourself in moments like these, or rise up and take inspiration from the life that was, and the one that still remains. Every writer is an expert commentator of expressions caved deep in and the most worldly encounters awaiting you. I feel, if you can command the worst state of yourself, you can command destiny.
“Arriving Somewhere, But Not Here” is my favourite pill during bad times. It’s melancholia at its best form, and you might think that it may have a worsening effect. But have you tried fighting fire with fire? The reason why a certain Steven Wilson and his brand of music only connects to a noble few is because the roots of his music have the capacity to empty a straggling room of thoughts.
The anti-depressant agent in Arriving Somewhere is perhaps in its utter state of stoicism and narcissism. The raw edges of this sharp blade have the perfect shape, it will bend your mind to run your fingers through it. The song constantly reminds, “Never look for the truth in your mother’s eyes.” One single progressive drum sequence keeps a 12-minute song scientifically structured and melodiously welcoming.
I have often felt the need to write when I’m most challenged. Waking up from a sudden jerk in the middle of the night, an extremely fidgety day followed by an extremely unforgiving incident or just thoughts occupying most of the state of your health. While there can be no explanation of why these moments are an inspiration to my appetite, I believe you’ll have to really feel gut dry to have the hunger to go on a colossal diet.
Rule Number Five: Don’t look for opportunities to write, create yours.
Unless you’ve read my previous article, you wouldn’t know that I’m a commercial writer, not exactly an artistic one. I have a long drawn relationship with advertising, and as of today, it feels like a heroin addiction that I may never give up. There are moments when criticisms shoot beyond the four walls of the room. And there are more moments when strange people enter the room, with no backstory to the thought process whatsoever, trying to interpret it in a way that best suits their narrative. In advertising, the amount of rewriting that accounts on a daily basis can easily suffice the thickness of a mediocre fiction that your cousin buys from airport lobbies.
When I was watching Apocalypse Now as an 18-year-old adult, I was fascinated by the poetry that emblazed the movie. From Martin Sheen’s portrayal of the American soldier losing his sanity to the Vietnam War to the ceiling fans symbolizing the blades of an infuriated American chopper raining fire, everything made sense in a weird way. In the same sequence, I bumped into the band that perhaps changed my life, The Doors. The movie started with The End and it just blew open my mind that such poetry can exist and co-exist with each other in this world, which is fascinated with real stats.
The End was the first The Doors song I ever heard, and will perhaps be my favourite song from the short-lived, immortal band. In a world full of rockstars and fake hair do’s, a 24-year-old Jim Morrison decided to be himself. And bring his inner Nietzsche to the world stage. That’s the power of poetry, up in the rafters along with some of the greatest poets ever. The Doors were thrown out of radio stations and pubs because of Jim’s uncontrolled creative outbursts, some of which had to do with his interpretation of the world versus Sigmund Freud’s new world. A song that started with him saying goodbye to a friend ended up in dark place, that cited Western Civilization as the false prophet and an unforgettable connection to the Oedipus Complex, all in the same simple song.
To have a perception about your creative powers is great, but to have the determination to be unpredictable is another. As a writer, we must elevate our thoughts to those of the brilliant poets, who can rhyme Pyre with Fire and stay methodological to their eccentricities. The future is uncertain, and it should be the same with those, to whom the future belongs.
Rule Number Six: Be an unpredictable poet.
When you sit down to write, sometimes you are wrapped up with many thoughts. Some conflicting, some complementing, clutter nevertheless. The ability to be a poet, a reflection of the society and all of that comes at a price, and the ones who actually leave a mark behind are the ones who exude clarity. As a writer, you are by virtue fated to get lost, but it is your providence to find your way back.
When Kanye and Jay-Z collaborated for their album ‘Watch the Throne’, it was expected that the two great creative minds were coming together for an unforgettable project. However, like two sides of a coin, it could’ve opposed each other. But that’s what I call creative clarity. It doesn’t matter how many minds fuse in for a single thought process. If the idea has the ability to take form and the guides the strength to carry the idea through tough corners, then it can take the throne.
‘No Church in the Wild’ has one of the most iconic writings and poetic hypothesis I’ve ever come across; now add a Kanye, Jay-Z, and a Frank Ocean to it. Towards the end of the song, Kanye drops multiple truth bombs to shake up our mental resistance, “Two tattoos, one read “no apologies” / The other said “love is cursed by monogamy” / That’s somethin’ that the pastor don’t preach / That’s somethin’ that a teacher can’t teach / When we die, the money we can’t keep / But we prolly spend it all ’cause the pain ain’t cheap.”
Sheer clarity comes from what you want to preach, in this case, the trio wanted us to question humankind, civilization, and the state of modern-day affairs. By using a certain SFX of mimicking chimpanzees, the song was making it evident, that it was questioning our evolution as a species. But nothing of that kind ever appears in the actual lyrics. That’s what I meant by clarity. Leave your readers no option but to read between the lines. That’s the power of crystal clear thinking and writing.
Rule Number Seven: Clarity is King.
Do you have a modus operandi to how you write and think? Can we contain this madness to a certain method? Do you have a different parallel, just like music, to reprogram one’s basics of writing? I’m all ears.
