Listen to the world around you. Take off your headphones, tune in, and actively listen to the sounds that surround you. How many different sounds do you hear? What’s the single most distant sound that you can pick out? And the closest?

Free write. Let loose, then go back to look over the raw material for compelling phrases, rhyme pairs, and intriguing ideas.

Game of chance. Read a random Wikipedia article. I clicked it just now and got a complete list of towns in Oklahoma. What’d you get?

Start with a writing prompt. You can find some songwriting prompts right here at The Halted Clock, and if you’re hungry for more you can always check out another website of mine, Bottled Ink.

Travel. Go to an unfamiliar place. It doesn’t have to be far away—it just has to be somewhere that you don’t typically visit. Anything that shakes you out of your daily routine will keep you sharp and sensitized to new experiences. For example, you could jump a plane to Japan—or visit a local café for a few hours after work tonight before you go home.

Think like a visual artist. Buy a sketchbook and use it to write sketches of things, people, and situations that you observe. Use as much concrete imagery as possible.

Get rhythm. Improvise over a rhythm track. This can be as simple as a drum machine (“canned drums”) or you could go so far as to also decide on a chord progression, play with a bassist, or whatever else is available to you. For best results, pick something groovy and syncopated in a tempo that you don’t usually play in.

Imagine the life story of a stranger. Go to a public place or look around for Flickr photos of people that you don’t know. Ask yourself questions about a stranger’s job, family life, social circles, hobbies, secrets, dreams, health, and troubles.

Search for interesting titles. Good sources for song titles include newspaper headlines, blog posts, movies, books, magazines, and famous speeches. Always keep your eyes and ears open for phrases that have a bit of music in them.

Explore a new scale. Take a scale you’re unfamiliar with and explore its possibilities, its unique flavor. Allow the mood it creates to draw song material out of you, and you could find that it draws both a lyric and a melody from you. For another way of creating both a lyric and music that fit well together, check out this songwriting prompt: “A Moment in Time”.

Collaborate. There’s a whole world beyond just Nashville-style co-writing. Explore new relationships and new creative roles. If you’re extroverted, you’ll love this! You’ll feed off the energy of discussing the song with your collaborator; the ideas will come fast and thick. Introverts, though perhaps a bit skittish about this idea initially, might find themselves enjoying the ways that the process changes when they hand over part of it to another person. Related article: Choose One for Better Songwriting: Put Down Your Guitar, Step Away from the Piano, or Shut Your Mouth.

To be continued…

Okay, the water’s on, but we’ve still got a few dozen feet of tubing to get through. Join me next time as we travel along the hose from idea to fragment to first draft while trying to keep things untangled and moving freely.

Up next: Find the Kink in Your Song Hose, Part 2: Make Sure the Hose is Attached