[SB 201] Finding Your Creative Consistency

Hi, I’m Matt. Welcome to Steady Beats. If you like both Van Halen’s “Jump” and think box jumps are a terrible idea for a midlife workout, you’ll probably like this newsletter.

Threads. So many threads.

With Write of Passage’s Cohort 10 behind us, we’re on to Runway, a ten-week program to help students cement writing habits and build audience.

But rather than just helping run the program, I’m in Runway as a student.

I’m taking the Thread Track, meaning I’m responsible for publishing three Twitter threads per week.

(Side note: I’ve always been terrible at writing threads.)

But so far, one thread has done pretty well—for me, anyway. The others, less so.

Lots more to write, though. I’d really like one to go a little viral, just to see what it’s like.

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Writing Beats

As this is Steady Beats #201, odds are you can calculate last week was issue 200. To look back, I wrote a thread about how I found writing consistency.

If you’re struggling to get into and stay in your writing groove, maybe there are ideas here to help you:

Shoutout to Michael Dean for the cool graphic!

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Book Beats

In The Pleasure Groove, by John Taylor

John Taylor is the bass player for Duran Duran, and save for a break here and there, he has been for the better part of 40 years.

His autobiography pushes forward just like a great bassline: methodical, understated, and with enough variety to capture and hold your attention. I sailed through its 417 pages quickly.

I was most interested in what Taylor had to say about the band’s consistency. How did Duran Duran crank out hit after hit through the 80s and into the 90s? And even today, the band is unafraid to reinvent themselves, bringing in fresh ideas, sounds, and voices for their latest album, Future Past.

So I pulled eight quotes from the book that are lessons for us all in how to be creatively consistent, Duran Duran style. You can read them here:

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Music Beats

Last week we saw Bryan Adams in Tampa. At 63 years old, Adams was leaping and bopping around the stage. His voice remains vintage 1985. He puts on a great, high-energy show with a parade of ballads and rock songs that are already seared and sealed into some locked-away corner of your brain. I was singing along about 80% of the time.

Joan Jett and The Blackhearts kicked things off. Jett seemed feisty as ever as she played a rowdy and cover-heavy set, while mixing in her own classic hits, also.

And as we’re all about creative consistency this week, let’s close out with this quote from Adams:

"A songwriter writes songs all the time, whereas just writing a song can be done by anyone, anytime."

Playing the long game is how we win the game, gang. Steady Beats.

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Thank you for reading.

Let’s keep the Steady Beats going. 💚

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