Willy Mason
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04.12.2012

Willy Mason

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“The whole album was still based on the philosophy of accidents. We did most of this album in one take as well and, though it doesn’t sound it, it was mostly live recordings.” Willy Mason’s songs are often an intimate personal discussion. He reveals that his songs commonly develop unexpected and elucidating significance.

“I learn from the songs that I write. Carry On is an example of that. When I started out writing that song I thought I was writing a love song but it took on a life of its own. By the end I was writing about old guys thinking back on their lives. Almost every song ends up having a touch of that. A lot of times I don’t really know what the songs are about until a couple of years down the road; an event happens and suddenly the song makes sense.”

A benefit of being a solo artist is total creative control. Mason’s songs do receive input from another source, but this regular collaborator is psychologically located.

“Because you’re forced into a metre where you have to fit only so many words into such a small space with certain rhymes, it leaves a lot of room for the subconscious to come out and tell you things you weren’t thinking about. You think you’re just picking the best word that rhymes, but it takes the song in another direction. It’s a crazy collaboration with the subconscious and the unknown.” Acknowledging the influence of the subconscious coalesces with Mason’s emphasis on spontaneity. Following the direction of impulse can uncover ideas that would be precluded by chasing perfection.

“Like with performance, if you’re put on the spot and you don’t know what you’re going to do, either you totally freeze up or you might let a little bit of truth out that you didn’t even know yourself that you knew.”

Proclaiming the significance of spontaneity isn’t equivalent to suggesting that all great ideas ought to arrive by glorious accident. Making a concerted effort to produce something is a necessary component of any creative practice.

“There’s a quote by a writer that says, ‘if you can’t write, work,’ and that’s sort of how it is with the songwriting. There are times when songs come out like a flash of inspiration and you can’t move the pen fast enough to keep up with it. But that’s a very rare occurrence and the rest of the time it’s pretty hard work.”

There is a romantic fallacy that all great art is conceived in a magic moment, but simply waiting for such a grand interaction with the muse isn’t a reliable creative method. Mason stresses that it’s important to be prepared to forcibly retrieve ideas from the unknown.

“It’s sort of essential to keep in practise as a writer. You have to practise writing like you practise scales on the guitar. A lot of times the process is sort of excruciating. You can’t be afraid to make shitty work. A writer friend of mine says ‘don’t ever let the great get in the way of the good’. The essential thing is to keep writing…and you can’t discount the validity of hard work. You can’t say just because you tried so hard that it’s not inspired.”

BY AUGUSTUS WELBY