FAWM - A Songwriter's Creative Playground
Every February, a small corner of the Internet lights up with a growing niche network of singers, songwriters, and musicians - all with the drive to create something new permeating their hearts. The FAWM (February Album Writing Month) website is where the magic happens. Where songs are written, new ideas are explored, and where friendships are made.
A Race Against Time Itself
Since its humble beginnings in 2004, the aim of the game has been simple: write 14 songs within the 28 days that is February, or one song every other day if you're one of those math types. Having this goal in mind can be helpful to the aspiring participant, because it forces you to write something. Even if what you put out there isn't perfect per say or even if you don't end up meeting the 14 song goal, you'll more than likely come out of the month having exuded enough motivation to create something, which is of course better than nothing.
To interject a personal anecdote for an example, my self-titled album was very much my pet-project for the span of roughly two years. For a long time, I wasn't sure of which songs I should expand upon for this eponymous release, but when I participated in my second FAWM 2017, I had a bunch more ideas I could expand upon for my eponymous release, and four of my FAWM 2017 songs ended up getting recorded for said album.
"Each year thousands of fawmers try… and maybe half of us hit the 14-song mark. Many haven't written a song in years, and some have never written songs before. (Of course, some can write 20 songs in their sleep.) On average, even the “non-winners” walk away with 7-10 new songs to their name. Not bad for a month's work."
- FAWM Help/FAQ
An Engaging Community
Challenging yourself to be productive for a month is certainly helpful as far as output goes, but you may be surprised to see how much community plays a role in making FAWM as awesome as it is. First and most glaringly obviously, the comment section. FAWM encourages its user to leave feedback on their fellow fawmers' songs. Heck, it even encourages leaving no song uncommented, with a search filter dedicated to songs with zero comments (zongs), so you'll be sure to hear something positive/helpful that someone else has to say about your tunes!
But if you want to get truly engrossed in the FAWM community, head on over to the forums, where there is always plenty to do! If you need someone to collaborate with you, from helping you write lyrics to recording instrumental or vocal parts, there's no shortage of fawmers who will be willing to help you out! Additionally, there are plenty of games and challenges to partake in as a sort of muse for what to write about, especially in the case of the ever-popular skirmishes, where a host will announce a theme at its beginning & leave you with just one hour to write a prompt for it. All of this of course is in good fun that will help you get the creative juices flowing & make some new friends along the way!
Go Try It For Yourself!
Even though, at the time of writing this, FAWM 2018 is over halfway over, there's still time to jump on in there & get something done! If FAWM sounds at all interesting to you or you're a songwriter who's having trouble getting them creative juices flowing, I would definitely recommend giving it a go. This year is my third time in, and I cannot overstate how awesome it is to participate every year!
Seriously... get in there, silly!