A Songwriting Cycle!

While awaiting the onset of SpinTunes #2, some Internet friends decided to get together and challenge each other to write an album’s worth of songs.  The challenges were randomly assigned on the evening of September 10th, 2010, and all of the participants had the rest of the month to finish their recordings.

So -- what were the challenges?

Well, to get it all started -- Graham Porter (Emperor Gum) challenged Edric Haleen to write a song from the point of view of a character from Greek Mythology.

In turn, Edric Haleen challenged JoAnn Abbott to write a children’s song.

Not to be outdone, JoAnn Abbott challenged Jenny Katz to write a song about one of the deadly sins.

Then, Jenny Katz challenged Mark Meritt (The Offhand Band) to write a duet that’s not a love song.

Just to keep things interesting, Mark Meritt challenged Charlie McCarron to write a song involving the notion of empathy.

Next, Charlie McCarron challenged Heather Miller to write a song from the perspective of an animal that wouldn’t be considered a pet.

In retaliation, Heather Miller challenged Kevin Savino-Riker to write a dance/club song.

In a vein coincidentally similar to (yet opposite of) another challenge, Kevin Savino-Riker challenged Ross Durand to “write a song from the perspective of your pet.”

And finally, Ross Durand challenged Graham Porter to write a song structured around the idea of a lyrical palindrome.  (Graham chose to have the first letters of each word in each line of the song form a palindrome.  He also had the chords of each verse form a palindromic pattern musically, as well!)

And so the cycle is complete!  (If you’d like to download these songs, we’ve set up the album on a BandCamp page!)