At 14-years-old, Beartooth’s Caleb Shomo started his career when he joined as the keyboard player to his friends’ “electronic, weird” band, but looking back at that time now, Shomo says he has grown into a completely different musician. He says he strives for honesty in his songs and rejects the idea of making music for the radio or singles designed to make money. CreativeLive sat down with Shomo to talk about his songwriting process and tips for aspiring writers.

“At first I didn’t really do much songwriting,” Shomo says. “I was 14, and some of my friends were like, ‘Hey want to play keyboard in a band?’” After leaving his childhood band, he started to work on his own music.

“I just wanted to do something complete opposite. I just wanted to make music that I knew was honest to me, that had no motivation other than writing good songs that I enjoyed,” he says.

Shomo often focuses on the build of a song, without lower points; there is nothing to build up tom, he says. “I want to have it build up to just the biggest chorus ever, or the nastiest riff ever.” But he says typically keeps a traditional pop-song formula. But if a song isn’t stuck in his head, or playing on repeat, it won’t make it on the album.

Watch Shomo’s interview to hear more about his musical upbringing, what he thinks makes a great song, and tips he has to start a song or get over writers block. —Jake Hanson

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By: wildsPosted on Categories : Categories : Creating A Hit Song, How To Write Soul Music, How To Write Soul Music Songs, Most Popular Soul Songwriters, Motown Songwriters, R And B Songwriters, Self Publish SongwriterTags:

22 Replies to ““All I want is honesty”—Beartooth’s Caleb Shomo talks songwriting”

  2. I'll be putting the link to this video in my reading list. Caleb is such an inspiration to the next generation of rockstars and this video was very helpful because Caleb is one of my biggest inspirations and it's nice to know that even the best struggle sometimes. I hope I can be as great of a writer as he is someday. I love beartooth's sound and their lyrical content. Beartooth is so honest and they sound absolutely badass!! I really wish CreativeLive would do a whole class with him on songwriting because I would be one of the first in line to buy that course!

  9. 0:47 this "electronic weird whatever" is Attack Attack. And the NET still holds some videos of Caleb's horrible vocals. He honestly sounded like TRASH, but now its something I can't not to add to my iTunes list))

  10. There used to be a video on Youtube where Caleb gave a tour of his house that he records in but it was either taken down or I can't find it. Can someone help me out?

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