Image from Instagram
Well... I have been writing, and it's been nice - no expectations at this stage, just sifting through the dross of my post-album mind and seeing whether anything sticks, it looks like one or two of them might; the simplest ones to write can be the most effective after all. (The quickest songs I've ever written aside from Dry-Eyed were Swim Any Sea and Wish These Years Away which are both live-set go-to staples now.) There was a time deep in the autumn last year buried in studio work on all those projects when I felt like I might never write again! but I expect that feeling is common enough.
Creating the right time and atmosphere for writing is an art in itself. So many people say you should (though there is no should when it comes to creativity!) write first thing in the morning and capture those wisps of creative ideas that abound in your head as its in the process of waking... morning being a bit adventurous for my current schedule, I did at least sit down and write first thing yesterday and had a couple of good, workable ideas.
Things have to change, writing-wise as with everything else. I realise now how much These Hours represents a very specific moment in my life, and as with Beacon revolves around two or three characters who were big influences on me at the time - it secretly amuses me to recall that all those different facets of emotion relate to only a couple of different people. Each album spans a period of about two years where songwriting was so heavily driven by my inability to communicate in real life - I have often feared that learning to open up too much might cause the song stream to run dry, but that seems not to be the case - though the songs are different. My life has taken several surprising turns, and yet most surprising of all is how settled it can feel amidst the changes, how bewilderment and wellbeing can both be so high at the same time, and how often I find myself looking about me with a fresh lens of gratitude.