How do you finish a song you started months ago?
Go back to the earliest take before you edit anything. A half-finished song stalls because the current draft has drifted from whatever made the idea worth having, and the evidence of what that was is sitting in the first recording. Play the oldest take and the newest one back to back; the gap between them is almost always the problem, and it is usually something you polished out.
Why
Songs are not abandoned because they are bad. They are abandoned because the writer can no longer hear what they were for — and after a few weeks away, the only reliable witness is the recording made on the day. Reading an old lyric tells you what you wrote; hearing the old take tells you what you meant.
What it does
- Listen to the first take start to finish before you change a word.
- Compare it against the most recent one, deliberately, rather than from memory.
- Keep the drafts you reject. A rejected line is often the right line in the wrong verse.
- Finish a section rather than the song. A finished chorus makes the rest tractable.
What it deliberately does not
- Starting a new draft from the current lyrics without hearing the old take.
- Rewriting the part that already works because it is the part you can see.
- Treating the newest version as the best one by default.
- Waiting to feel the way you felt when you started.
What that leaves behind
Winter song
- the window is fogged over
- and the city goes on without me
- Then
- first take, 4 months ago
- Now
- latest take, yesterday
- Hear it
- then and now, back to back
Related questions
What if the old take is embarrassing?
It usually is, and it is still the most useful thing you have. You are listening for the idea, not auditioning the performance.
How long should I leave a song before coming back?
Long enough that you cannot recite it. The distance is what lets you hear it; that is the whole reason the old take is worth keeping.