{"id":2490,"date":"2014-11-24T16:58:25","date_gmt":"2014-11-25T00:58:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/?p=2490"},"modified":"2014-11-24T17:16:31","modified_gmt":"2014-11-25T01:16:31","slug":"aimee-mann-roots-of-a-songwriter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/2014\/11\/aimee-mann-roots-of-a-songwriter.html","title":{"rendered":"Aimee Mann: Roots of a Songwriter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>[contextly_auto_sidebar id=&#8221;5wVQPpeXfr5y5GvZGvwRO9ZOy20krZOV&#8221;]<\/p>\n<p>DESPITE our relentlessly gloomy attitude about the world of music and the arts, we CultureCrashers are major fans of Aimee Mann. We spoke to the LA-based singer-songwriter about artists who taught her something about songcraft &#8212; Dylan, Elton John, Gilbert O&#8217;Sullivan, about her first steps into writing, and the importance of song structure and music theory. <a title=\"Aimee Mann on songcraft\" href=\"http:\/\/www.salon.com\/2014\/11\/25\/aimee_mann_i_was_under_the_impression_that_if_i_became_well_known_i_would_have_to_back_up_every_line\/\" target=\"_blank\">Here&#8217;s<\/a> my piece, which starts this way:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>When I was a kid, the first time I really paid attention to lyrics in a different way was the (1972 Gilbert O\u2019Sullivan) song \u201cAlone Again (Naturally),\u201d which was a hit on the radio, and the melody was really nice, I liked the vibe of it, it had a bouncy thing, which was maybe slightly melancholy. And then a friend said, \u201cYou know what that\u2019s about, right?\u201d And I said, \u201cNo,\u201d and they said, \u201cHe\u2019s going to commit suicide.\u201d And that kind of changed the whole thing for me. It was like, for people who wanted to pay attention, there was almost a secret message. If you didn\u2019t want to pay attention, there was this pretty thing, and maybe there was a line or two that stuck out \u2013 it would be a different kind of experience. But if you were paying attention, it was hiding in plain sight.<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-2491\" src=\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Aimee_Mann_October_2008.jpg\" alt=\"Aimee_Mann_October_2008\" width=\"267\" height=\"200\" \/><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>This is for a series I&#8217;m helming for Salon called <a title=\"Trust Me On This\/ Salon\" href=\"http:\/\/www.salon.com\/topic\/trust_me_on_this\/\" target=\"_blank\">Trust Me On This<\/a>; there are several still coming.<\/p>\n<p>Mann, by the way, has a recent collaborate album with the punk musician Ted Leo called <em>The Both<\/em> &#8212; it&#8217;s outstanding. She&#8217;s \u00a0doing a couple of Christmas themed shows at club Largo in LA, on December 3 and 4. She then heads to the Bay Area and the East Coast. Full tour <a title=\"Mann tour sched\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aimeemann.com\/tour\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[contextly_auto_sidebar id=&#8221;5wVQPpeXfr5y5GvZGvwRO9ZOy20krZOV&#8221;] DESPITE our relentlessly gloomy attitude about the world of music and the arts, we CultureCrashers are major fans of Aimee Mann. We spoke to the LA-based singer-songwriter about artists who taught her something about songcraft &#8212; Dylan, Elton John, Gilbert O&#8217;Sullivan, about her first steps into writing, and the importance of song structure [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[40,87,30,683],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2490","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-indie","7":"category-largo","8":"category-los-angeles","9":"category-songwriting","10":"entry","11":"has-post-thumbnail"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2490"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2493,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2490\/revisions\/2493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/culturecrash\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}