So far, I’ve explained my musical journey up to the point where I selected Nashville as a place to live. You know I want to write songs and break out of my opera mold. I moved to Tennessee in February 2016, and now I have a guitar called George. I’ll catch back up to the story, but I’m due for some musings.

As I’ve begun to dabble in songwriting, I’ve discovered a side effect that has possessed me like an unforgivable disease. This disease I call the “Jingles”.

What are the “Jingles”, you ask? Symptoms of this plague include:

1. Trying to turn everything you do into a song.
2. Constantly rhyming words with other words. Birds. Heards. Curds. —-AHHHHHH it’s happening again!!!
3. Creating voice memos of wordless, melody-less, nonsense.

At best, the Jingles can unleash a creative monster, and lead to the makings of true art. At worst, the Jingles are like babysitting a 10 year old who just drank a 2-liter of caffeinated soda, unsupervised. See manic (adj.) 

I recently discovered that I have 52 [saved] voice memos. Those are just the ones I kept. In this cyber-pile of noise I found some prime examples of the Jingles. By that I mean I found some gawd-awful, incriminating recordings of myself singing complete nonsense. Allow me to embarrass myself by giving you a listen into 4 of the lowest moments on my voice memos…..

Let’s start with this fake country twang:

Then the pathetic “he didn’t text back” song:

Literally too tired to be doing this:

And — the holy $h*# — OUCH, my ears! moment:

 

Guys, I told you it wasn’t pretty! But that’s what a case of the Jingles will do to you. Blue. Grew. New. AHHH not the rhyming again!!!!!

 

^lol

In addition to the painful noises I just filled your ears with, I was surprised to find there were actually a couple good recordings. With a little work, I could turn out a song or two from bunch! It is reassuring to know that even if some ideas are bad ones, at least they are in motion. As evil and haunting as the Jingles are, they definitely keep the momentum going. Flowing n’ growing. Reaping n’ sewing. Raking n’ mowing. Windy n’ blowing—

!!!!!!!!

Okay, fine, I’ll stop.

Cheers! To hiding behind the computer….because I would never play those clips for anyone in person….

xo,

Caroline