Every songwriter knows the feeling. You sit down, pick up the guitar, and three minutes later you’re playing the same four chords you played last week, singing about the same things in the same way.
Talk about predictable
Then there are the other songs. The ones that show up half-finished while you’re driving, or in the shower, or just before you fall asleep. They feel less like something you wrote and more like something you caught.
That second kind of song is what automatic writing is all about, and you can go looking for it on purpose.
I came across the idea in a recent article I read on the Writers Write blog, “What Is Automatic Writing?” by Susanne Bennett. It’s written for authors, but the moment I read it I could see how well it fits songwriting.
This post is my take on it for musicians, and I’d recommend giving the original article a read as well.
What is automatic writing?
Automatic writing is a technique in which you switch off your conscious control and write whatever comes, fast, without steering it. The goal is raw, strange, unexpected language that you’d never produce if you were thinking about it.
The word “automatic” has nothing to do with robots or software but it does refer to how the writer seems to be on autopilot while it’s happening. You still do all the writing yourself.
It’s also different from regular free-writing as proposed in Julia Cameron’s “The Artist’s Way.”
Free-writing is a brainstorming tool and you stay partly in charge but automatic writing pushes further and tries to get past that control completely. Purists won’t touch the result afterwards.
For songwriters, the practical approach makes more sense: treat it as raw material, then shape it.
Why it works so well for songs
It’s believed that how you write changes what you write.
Most of us have spent years absorbing the rules. We know what a verse is supposed to do, where the chorus is most effective, and which words rhyme with “fire.” That knowledge is useful, but in the background, it also steers every line before it reaches the page.
The result is that songs become tidy and familiar.
Automatic writing sidesteps that steering for a while. What comes out is often messy, but it’s also honest, specific and very surprising at times, which are the things that make a lyric stick with the listener.
Seven ways to try it
1. The timed brain dump
Set a timer for 10 to 15 minutes and write non-stop. Don’t cross anything out, don’t fix spelling, don’t stop to think. The first few lines will be your conscious mind talking. Keep going anyway.
When you run dry, write “I have no idea” as many times as it takes. Sooner or later something new shows up, and that’s usually the good stuff.
2. Write to music
Put on an instrumental track or a simple chord loop, close your eyes, and let images form. When you’re ready, write down what you’re seeing and feeling. Keep writing after the music stops.
Instrumental music works best because words from another song won’t crowd in.
3. Gibberish melody
This exercise is definitely one for songwriters only. Record a loop, hit record on your phone, and sing nonsense syllables over it. Don’t try to make sense. Later, play it back and listen for real words hiding in the sounds. A lot of well-known hooks started life as mumbled placeholders.
4. “I remember” lists
The article credits this one to an exercise based on Joe Brainard’s book I Remember. Write “I remember” at the top of the page and finish the sentence with whatever surfaces. When you get stuck, start a new line with the same two words. Memories give you concrete detail, and concrete detail is what makes lyrics feel real.
Watch for the small, odd specifics, like the smell of a car or the colour of a kitchen.
5. The colour game
Pick a colour and a sentence stem, something like “Green is the colour of…” and finish it 15 to 20 times. The first few will be obvious.
Somewhere around the tenth, you’ll run out of easy answers. Keep going. The last lines tend to be the strangest, and they often turn into your best metaphors. You can swap the colour for a place, a season or a time of day.
6. The bedside notepad (or voice memo)
Ideas that arrive just as you’re falling asleep, or just as you wake up, tend to be unfiltered. Keep a notepad or your phone by the bed and capture them straight away. They rarely survive until morning.
7. Build a ritual
The article points out that Stephen King uses his daily routine as a kind of self-hypnosis, a repeated set of actions that tells his brain it’s time to work. Songwriters can do the same.
Same chair, same cup of tea, same five minutes of free writing before you touch an instrument. Over time, the routine does some of the work for you.
From mess to song
Here’s where songwriters need to go one step beyond the original technique. A page of automatic writing is not a lyric. It’s a pile of ore.
The next job is to mine it…
- Leave it alone for a day. You’ll read it more clearly with fresh eyes.
- Highlight what surprises you. Look for images, phrases and rhythms that make you stop. Ignore the rest.
- Find the hook. There’s often a title or a chorus line hiding in the pile.
- Choose a structure. Decide what the song is about, then slot your best lines into verses, chorus and bridge.
- Fit it to a rhythm. Sing the lines over a beat or chord progression and adjust only what you need to for singability.
- Edit lightly. Cut the clutter, but protect the odd, vivid bits. If a line feels slightly strange but exciting, leave it alone.
You’ll put most of what you’ve written to one side (don’t throw it way), and that’s fine. You’re not trying to write a whole song in one go. You’re hunting for the two or three lines that you could never have planned.
A few tips to make it stick
- Keep sessions short and regular. Ten minutes a few times a week beats one big session a month.
- Judge the harvest, not the session. A “bad” session can still yield one great line.
- Keep a running file of lines, images and fragments you can raid later.
- Record everything. A phone voice memo or dictation tool means nothing gets lost.
- If you use AI tools in your workflow, bring them in after the raw writing as a sounding board for sorting and shaping. The raw material should come from you, because that’s the whole point.
Try it right now
Here’s a ten-minute challenge for you. Set a timer, put on any instrumental track, and close your eyes. When you’re ready, write without stopping until the timer goes off.
If you run out of words, write “I have no idea” and keep moving. Afterwards, circle the three lines you like best.
That’s your starting point for the next song. I’d love to hear what came out, so let me know.
In conclusion…
Most of the time, songwriting habits are comfortable, and comfort is exactly what keeps songs sounding the same. Automatic writing is a simple way to shake things up and get surprised by your own mind again.
Treat it as one tool among many, keep the stakes low, and have some fun with it. Your next best song might be hiding in tonight’s messy, ugly first draft.
