This song was honestly...painful to write.

Two weeks ago, we released our second single this year, “If I Leave You Tomorrow”. You can listen to it here:

In the range of songwriting that spans “channeling the muse” to “dental procedure”, this was a root canal. It wasn’t easy. It did not flow.

In fact, it classically stalled after the first verse and chorus. And it stalled for about 3 years.

This is only mildly embarrassing to confess: embarrassing because you’d think that 25 years of practice would inoculate you against this kind of thing.

And yet, not so hard to admit: because that 25 years has given us tools to try out, and also the stubborn perseverance to keep trying if you believe that an idea has merit, and is worthy of a bit of dental work to make it shine.

A question comes up a lot in our songwriter community: when should I abandon a song idea? How do you know if an idea is worthy of pursuing, or when it’s time to cut and move on?

Leonard Cohen famously took 5 (possibly 7) years—and between 80 to 150 draft verses—to finish Hallelujah.

Sometimes I think about this, and it fills me with despair.

I do not have that kind of work ethic. I like spending time with my kids and partner, and going for relaxing walks among trees, and having conversations about dumb tv shows with my friends.

As a baseline M.O. in my own creative life, I have found longevity in my willingness to move onto the next thing, without getting too hung up on what I’ve just done.

But I’ll tell ya - there was something about “If I leave you tomorrow…” that wedged a hook in me and wouldn’t let me go.

(This isn’t always the case. There are many half written songs Benny and I have left in the notes file. And perhaps this is the only insight into when to persist: if it simply won’t leave you alone.)

This song started with my friend, musician and producer Charlie Kendall. Charlie and I decided to write a song together (I was drawn to Charlie’s musicality, his versatility as a guitar player and producer, as well as his beautiful, strong hook-writing—and Charlie basically complied with my request!).

Charlie was telling me about this idea he had for a song, a title he had collected from something his dad used to say, “If I leave you tomorrow, will you love me tonight?”

We both loved it, and felt it had bones as a hook.

Charlie had some chords and a melody, and I quickly responded with some lyric ideas for the first verse and the Chorus. This is what came out, very quickly (within a week):

The fact that this much came out quickly gave me false confidence that the rest would follow in like.

But every time I tried to write the next verse, it never flowed. It didn’t make sense.

So I tried and tried again—and really harnessed my inner Cohen (or a baby version of it). I didn’t quite get to 80 verse variations, but wrote possibly 10 or 12, over the course of 3 years.

I never nailed it. But I also wasn’t willing to let it go.

The shift came in bringing the song to Benny (this was new for us, by the way. All of our other songs as Names of Birds are true duo co-writes, just Benny and Keppie in a room).

Benny heard a direction amongst the many possible pathways, and we followed it.

We also followed some strange calls that felt unexpected and surprising—even to us. Somehow the time signature of the Bridge changed, and we said yes. We ended up with a call and response melody, and followed it along.

The Bridge is probably the weirdest and most interesting section either of us has ever written.

One of our favourite songwriters, Jason Isbell, said [something like]: “Experience doesn’t make it easier. It just changes the nature of the challenge”.

This, I wholly believe. And I would add something:

It also gives you the stubborn persistence to hold tight to something you know could be beautiful, even if it’s hard.