Mike Errico

How did you become a writer? I always wanted to be one, so I always wrote, but I never had anything that needed to be read, if you know what I mean. It was therapy, and sketches, and atrocious conversations between talking dogs. A lot of that became songs—talking dogs and all. It wasn’t until I began teaching that I felt I could write something worth someone’s time.

Name your writing influences (writers, books, teachers, etc.). I didn’t get an MFA or anything, so I basically had to teach myself how to write. I found books by Stephen King, Verlyn Klinkenborg, Annie Dillard, and others. For how to structure an abstract thought, I went to Rebecca Solnit, George Saunders, Mary Ruefle, and back as far as I could reach with philosophers—I wrote a lot during the pandemic, and for some reason, the Stoics spoke to me. I shared some Stoic principles with my students in order to help us all survive, because by late 2020, their songs were getting pretty damn bleak! Lots of “dancing to the end of the world” stuff. I tried to infuse some hope and a sense of agency, which, now that I think about it, is what a lot of pop songs try to do. Stylistically, I love anything that proposes an alternate reality: Richard Brautigan is a long-time favorite, and more recently I discovered Ocean Vuong, who seems to blur poetry, prose, and lyric. I think it would be cool to set him to music. For the life of the songwriter, I read David Byrne, Jeff Tweedy, Questlove, Hanif Abdurraqib, and Patti Smith (of course), among many others. Biographies are a mixed bag because their journeys are not replicable, and oftentimes the writers are as baffled as the readers about how it all happened. Or they just talk about drugs, which gets boring. And I always try to interject the heavy reading with fun stuff: Andrew Sean Greer, Maria Semple, graphic novels… Bill Bryson had me snorting, which I did not expect. There’s a list of books at the end of Music, Lyrics, and Lifeentitled “Summer Reading for Some Time Later in Life”—it’s as scattered as my music collection, but it’s a good list. I recommend them all.

When and where do you write? I write in the morning, mostly. I get up at insane hours without an alarm, and go till I can’t, or till it’s getting dumb, or till my hand gives out. By then, the house is waking up, and I’m grateful. I find that the writing tools really do act on my thoughts, to paraphrase Nietzsche—longhand for longer prose, computer for blurting what might be songs. Where do I write? Wherever. “Appealing workplaces are to be avoided. One wants a room with no view, so imagination can meet memory in the dark.” That’s Annie Dillard, a complete boss.

What are you working on now? I am in the middle of an EP, which I’ve had to pull back on because I have some long Covid symptoms that are affecting my voice. As for prose, I’m taking notes for a follow up to Music, Lyrics, and Life. The similarities and dysfunctions of the music and publishing industries are really stunning. But I just put my head down and do what I do.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? I go into this at length in my book: There’s no such thing as writer’s block. It was invented by a Freudian psychiatrist named Dr. Edmund Bergler in the 1940’s. He blamed things like breastfeeding mothers who were stingy with their milk, which is something I enjoy telling my 18- to 21-year-old students in 2023. Anyway, people who studied the “affliction” actually did come up with a cure: Write through it. Which is to say, keep doing what you’re doing whether or not you have the “affliction.” Which is to say, it doesn’t matter if you have the “affliction” or not. I definitely do have feelings that are mistaken for writer’s block: I’ll hate what I’ve written, or resist completing an idea for a thousand different reasons. That’s not a block, though—that’s fear. The only real block is getting hit by a bus.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever received? I don’t know if it’s advice, but when I walk into the indie bookstore in my neighborhood, my lungs fill as if I’ve been holding my breath since the last time I was there. I’m a little embarrassed to admit it, but I love the energy coming off the shelves; I love the covers, and the spines, and the feel of the pages, and the anticipation of a new and transporting piece of work. That feeling comes to me as advice: “You’re in the right place. Keep going.”

What’s your advice to new writers? I can only give what was given to me by an old showman: Save your money; Never believe your publicity, and leave the party early.

Mike Errico is a recording artist, author, and songwriting professor at Yale, the New School, and NYU’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music. In addition to his performing and teaching careers, Errico’s opinions and insights have appeared in publications including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, and CNN. His new book, Music, Lyrics, and Life: A Field Guide for the Advancing Songwriter, is available everywhere, including: Bookshop | Books Are Magic | Amazon |  Bandcamp (signed copies).