Graham English

Topics covered: The definition of a song, what a song is not, the purpose of a song, the way of the Samurai Songwriter.

It’s time to dig into the first issue of Samurai Songwriting. If you’re not a subscriber, join now. If you want to purchase just this issue, you can do that here:

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Here’s what we cover in this issue:

The inner game of songwriting. [...]

eBay PowerSellers are recognizable by the ‘PowerSeller’ badge next to their name. Maybe you’ve seen these sellers around — and to succeed on eBay, you want to think like they do.
How do people get the right to call themselves PowerSellers?

Information takes energy to create. It takes energy to consume. And it takes energy to manage. Information is energy. I see great opportunity and challenge in this.
The challenge on a personal level is that you need a sustainable source of personal energy. No, I don’t mean a refrigerator stocked with Red Bull. But because information [...]

I won’t say much because I didn’t know him. But I knew his legend. His good friend and world-class copywriter, John Carlton, says it best.

Topics covered: Singing what you hear, the body/mind connection in music, exercises to improve your musicianship, and more.

Another bonus you get when you join Samurai Songwriting is A Guide To Hit Song Forms. Inside this valuable songwriting guide, you’ll learn…

How to begin writing songs with superior structure and the techniques you need to master the craft of songwriting.
The basic song sections with advice on how they relate to each other and tips [...]

I’m into systems. I love figuring out how to get from point A to point B and then optimizing the process as efficiently as possible. Better yet, I love being able to turn a system on and not have to think about it again.
This is one of those systems. I’m an entrepreneur. I don’t have [...]

When I read that you could use Quicksilver with Twitter, I felt as excited as Jack Bauer in an interrogation room full of terror suspects. It all started with Twitter Fan Wiki. And then I lost myself in hours of troubleshooting as I tried to force hack after hack to work the way I wanted them to. As these things are, it wasn’t nearly as hard in the end as all the work that led up to the final result.

“The minute you sign your name, you lose all the rights to your music and you’ll never see a dime.” -Dick Dale

You’ve got a blog. You’ve got email, SMS, and IM. These are great tools for communication. Email and text messaging are two-way conversations. Blogging is mostly a one-to-many conversation. But what about something in-between? Twitter is part micro-blog, part instant message, and can fill the need for short public and personal broadcasts.
If you’ve been thinking [...]

Joining Samurai Songwriting has lots of perks. One of them is the Chorus Cheat Sheet. Inside this guide to writing great choruses, you’ll learn…

Why it’s called a “chorus” and what this means to you as a songwriter.
The seven basic chorus forms — with dozens of hit song examples to show you how it all works [...]

First, they changed the background color of the top ads from blue to yellow. No real big deal to advertisers there. It’s the second change that could make a significant difference to your CTR.

Google’s multivariate testing app, Website Optimizer, just opened to the public. It can help you increase your conversion rates and best of all, it’s free!

When you join Samurai Songwriting, The Hit Song Model is just one of the bonuses you will get. In this powerful guide to writing hit songs, you’ll learn…

The two most important places to put your energy and focus that will make the biggest difference in your songwriting.
The five skills you need to write a hit [...]

Here is a simple, ten-step plan to successful selling on eBay.

You now have the ability to download the entire EMI artist catalog DRM-free. No usage restrictions. Plus the audio is encoded at 256 kbps, twice the quality of the current bit rate.
Check the press releases for the full details:
EMI: EMI Music launches DRM-free superior sound quality downloads across its entire digital repertoire
Apple: Apple Unveils Higher [...]

Google recently added a new feature to the define: search command. A query like define:marketing will bring back a list of related keywords like the following:
direct marketing
marketing plan
marketing mix
marketing research
search engine marketing
viral marketing
affiliate marketing
internet marketing
permission marketing
database marketing
Not only is this a great tool for generating lists of related keywords to implement in your search engine [...]

This exercise builds your resources and congruence. Start by standing in a place where you can take 5 steps backwards.

Think of a situation in which your behavior is not representative of who you really are, or who you would like to be, and you would like to have more choices.
Standing in position one, a place [...]

There’s a perpetually propagated myth that if you have absolute pitch, then if you listen to music that is out of tune, you have a bad experience. If there is any truth to this myth, it’s definitely not an absolute. Some people may be disturbed by music that is out of tune. I believe this [...]