In short, the purpose of espionage is to gather knowledge about (an) organization(s). He is stealing from other artists, in the music business they like to be cute and say their inspired, or borrowing material….įorms of economic and industrial espionageĮconomic or industrial espionage takes place in two main forms. I get to learn and teach and all that stuff. I’m surrounded by people who are really excited about what they are doing. I’m still always listening to things and checking them out. I did a lot of analytical listening when I was first started. Find people you really love and listen to them and learn from them. You have to write something stellar then. If you can name six hit songs that were written on those three chords then you know there’s a hit song to be written there. Find those standard chord progressions that a thousand songs have been written with and try to find great melodies to go over that. You can fall on the sidewalk and sue the city.ĭo you have some advice for aspiring songwriters?įor people that are making music, there are certain classic progressions. There are plenty of songs that are really similar and they never sued each other. There are standard chord progressions that everyone uses. But you don’t get sued for being similar. These days, anyone can put two songs up and make a mash-up by changing the key of this one and say, “Oh, these songs are similar.” A lot of things are similar. That case got resolved and it’s in the past. The truth of the matter is I had never heard that song before in my life. Where is the line between influence and copying? In 2007, you were part of a court case over the Avril Lavigne song, “Girlfriend”, in which a ’70s band sued you for infringing on their copyright. I remember thinking he was crazy, that he was out of his mind. And we still work together to this day.Ĭlive Davis told me that “Since U Been Gone” would be on the radio in April. He taught me to think bigger, to strive for more. ![]() We think it was the first song we wrote together. I had this really crappy studio in my basement of my duplex apartment. One day he called me when he was in town and asked me if he could use my studio. You wrote Kelly Clarkson’s smash hit “Since U Been Gone” with famed songwriter Max Martin. And when someone goes to play it on piano, you hear the melody. There are songs I’ve written the lyrics for that have become number one songs, but sometimes I look back and think, “Well, that could’ve been better.” But at the end of the day, when you hear the muzak version of your song, it’s not the lyrics you’re hearing. I’m not always proud of all the lyrics in my songs in retrospect. Would you say that it’s sometimes more important how a lyric is sung than what is being sung? I’ve seen other people become incredible players but not incredible composers because of that. You start understanding things and then it becomes a go-to to do things that way. When I started studying music, you learn about voice leading and Bach Chorales and there are all these rules and this and that. That’s when the training comes in – for the music problem solving. But then there’s certain times when people hit a dead end and don’t know how to get out of it. There’s something really pure about people who don’t know that stuff. It’s been very important at times, but it may have also been a hindrance. You have a strong musical background, having attended The Manhattan School of Music. You have to first be committed to making music you like. ![]() If you go in just wanting a hit song, it’s not going to happen that way. But it’s not just “Do you want a hit?” More importantly, it has to be something we – the artist and I – like. Most of the time, that’s what people seem to want from me. A lot of times it takes a while to write a great song.Ĭan you go into the studio with the mentality that you’re going to write a hit? It was difficult at times, but we got through it. There’s a lot of feeling in the music on the song, and the lyrics had to show the emotional qualities of that yet still be a pop lyric. At times, some people were not happy about that, but it had to be right. ![]() What was the process of writing “Teenage Dream”?
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