This is part 4 of a series. Take a look at my archives to find parts 1-3.
Howdy pardners!
Today I wanted to tell you a bit about my 100 Tiny Songs Project. And at the bottom of the email you’ll find a way to get your own Tiny Song made by myself! Exciting!
As a creative person who wants to make a lasting creative career, I have moments of self-doubt. That little voice in your head that goes, it’s too late for you, you’ve wasted too much time, you’ll never get there.
If you’re lucky, you go through life not hearing those kinds of things said to you.
But most likely, if you put yourself out there, you’re gonna hear it at some point.
I got those words when I was 29, during a call with someone who worked in the music industry and was lending their time to mentor me for a handful of weeks. This was during the pandemic.
Before the call I was feeling pretty good, I was getting some advice from someone in the industry! I was puffed up like a little bird.
One hour later, I was completely distraught, in tears.
I had been told that I had wasted my time. That I had been working on music for so long and had nothing to show for it.
In some sort of sadistic impulse to preserve what I was feeling, I recorded myself on my camera (lol), talking about what was said and how I felt. I rarely look at the recording, but I know it’s there, and I wish I could have shown that Olivia what was about to come next. Because I took that embarrassment, hurt and sadness…
…and wrote 100 tiny songs.
🙋♀️ What Is A Tiny Song?
A tiny song is pretty much what it says on the tin. It’s a song, but tiny!
I knew in my heart that I had to find my ‘why’ again. What did I love about writing songs? What made me happy when it came to making music?
I thought about all the songs I first made when I was in my early twenties, the songs about being a waitress and little inconsequential things. How they were funny, quick, and fresh. I wanted to go back to that.
Spurred on by an episode of
’s podcast, I started a 100 days project. I was going to write a tiny song every day, for 100 days.Here was my formula: every tiny song had to be less than a minute long so I could post it to Instagram (this was before Reels had taken over), and had to be made with minimal production involved. I used my guitar, my Casio keyboard and my voicenotes app on my phone (this acted as my microphone). Every tiny song had to be accompanied with a little picture, some of which you can see dotted throughout this email.
Each song took about an hour most days. Some took longer, some took less. Often I’d do my tiny song before lunch, which was a good habit. Some days when I was feeling less great I’d do it last minute, in the evening. But I never skipped a day.
All of the songs got posted to Instagram and Youtube. And some amazing things happened when I started showing up with a tiny song to offer everyone every day.
🎹 What Happened When I Wrote A Song Every Day?
Firstly… I had SO MUCH FUN. It was really, really fun to do this project. I don’t know how feasible it would be to do now (in a non-lockdown world), but writing and posting a tiny song every day gave me purpose, made me enjoy writing songs again, and also gave me a license to just make whatever I wanted, however stupid or silly.
In fact, I went stupider and sillier when I could. I pushed the boundaries of silly songs. For example, writing a song about finding a horse’s skeleton buried in the ground:
Or what about this song, about dogs in space, which contains the lyric “sniffing Uranus” because, that’s what I wanted to do:
And even this song, about a real news story when a guy got punched by a kangaroo:
Okay okay, one more. What about this duet with my Mum about buying milk?
So… apart from having lots of fun (which is a good enough reason to do most things), I also made a bunch of new friends online. Lots of people gravitated towards me as I was doing this project.
shared the project and became a champion of my 100 Tiny Songs endeavour! Everyone joined my team!One week towards the end of the project I decided to invite friends to also write tiny songs, and we had a Group Project Tiny Songs week. One of the best outcomes of this was my friend Ben E. Wood got super inspired and ended up doing his own long-term tiny song project, called Briefs, which has 99 songs!!
Finally, I started to discover a new way of writing songs. I used different instruments, wrote about things other than relationships, and let myself just try a bunch of different stuff. I found a new facet of my songwriting style through 100 Tiny Songs. I made a video talking about it all here:
🥊 Want Your Own Tiny Song?
You’re in luck! Right now, as part of my Kickstarter project, I’m giving people the opportunity to get their own tiny song.
The Early Bird Tiny Song is 20% off, and will be available for this week only. So if you want your own silly little song for the cheap, pledge to the campaign before Sunday, midnight!
Things your tiny song could be:
a hype song for yourself
a reminder for your roommate to do the dishes
a theme song for your pet
a way to tell your partner that you love their weird little habits
a voicemail greeting
a handy, catchy jingle to remember a telephone number or important fact
The possibilities are endless!
So, go on, get yourself a tiny song this week!
And if you want to listen to ALL 100 TINY SONGS… then you can do so here!
🎙 Upcoming Gigs
I’m playing in Glasgow in April! Get your tickets now:
Glasgow, 27th April: With Fergus McNeill, @ The Dream Machine | Buy Tickets
✍️ JOIN ME IN THE COMMENTS…
Have you ever done a 100 day project, or something similar?
What would you want a tiny song about?
Wanna hear the songs I write now? Check out some ways you can support me & my music:
listening to my music on Spotify (or not, if you’ve read my last newsletter)
forwarding this newsletter to a friend!
and if you haven’t already, subscribe:
Til next time! Be good,
Olivia 🌈✨🏔🎶
Yeah, this is a great idea. I'm a composer, not a lyricist, but I've experimented with making instrumental songs - from start to final master - in 20min. It's such a good exercise for me. Forces me to just get something out and not overthink it. Your post is inspiring me to consider making this a more formal practice, like over 100 days and announce it publicly for the accountability.
What a great idea! I love these tiny songs. Always thought it would be a fun challenge to write 3 songs without the word “I” or “me” in the lyrics.