1000ish words today. I’m still writing this super long chapter that I’ve been chipping away at for the last two or three days. I finally finished it, but it’s a mess. My thoughts are all over the place. I’m fine with that. I’ll review it tomorrow and streamline it. (By the way, this is nonfiction which is why I’m revising. I do more of that with my writing books than I do with my fiction.)
For the last couple weeks, I’ve been binge-listening to one of my favorite jazz Japanese fusion bands, Casiopea. (You don’t have to like jazz fusion to understand this post, don’t worry.)
I’ve said in the past that I’m drawn to prolific personalities. I just find them. I discovered Casiopea in college and always enjoyed their work. Lately, I’ve been watching their concerts and am captivated at how tight, consistent, and prolific they are as a band, especially between 1977-1988. In every year during that period, they released at least one album. Some years they did two. Recording an album in the 70s and 80s required an extraordinary amount of manpower and planning.
If you happen to like one Casiopea album, you’ll like pretty much all of them. Their style changes from album to album, but the core sound is the same.
I compare this to oatmeal—there are many, many different flavors of oatmeal and ways you can eat it, but at the end of the day, it’s oatmeal. That’s part of the band’s appeal in my opinion. Consistency and prolificality (is that a word?) lead to amazing results. You always know what you’re going to get when you listen to them.
If you count the albums between the main band and the spinoff bands and solo careers that its members have had over the years, it numbers well over 60 albums.
As I think about writing and publishing, I don’t see why this work ethic can’t apply to writers. We have such a bias toward “taking ten thousand years to write a magnum opus” that prolific writers are often forgotten and sneered upon. And perhaps it’s a matter of preference, but I appreciate the author who writes 100 books even if many of them strike out. Because, I suspect, that, as is the case with Casiopea, that when that author finds his/her “tribe”, they’ll buy EVERYTHING.
This is why prolific personalities fascinate me: if you start with their early works and work your way to the present day, you can see their souls in their work. You learn deep lessons about that person and their artistry that you can apply to your work, in a way that you just don’t get by consuming an artist who only has one masterpiece.
Lessons I’ve learned from prolific personalities over the years:
- Quantity breeds quality
- Never settle
- Every artist evolves, but sometimes audiences don’t like it. True courage is continuing to push in the direction you believe in.
- Being fearless comes with a career cost, but it also comes with a greater respect long-term
- Customer tastes are cyclical; what seemed like a terrible idea decades ago will suddenly find new life with customers.
- Today’s digital age means that styles will never truly go out of vogue anymore; once something becomes popular, it may always be popular with a small group of people.
- Some ideas are ahead of their time.
- Find ways to pay homage to your fans with every new work you do.
- If you enjoy the work you create, readers can FEEL it.
The key is to keep honing your craft. Are you getting better with each new book? Are you developing yourself? If you stay committed, then you’ll find success in the future.
What if you found a way to think of your books like oatmeal—with each new series, you delivered something new and unique, but the core reason why readers love you remained? In other words, while the flavor might be different, the taste is similar. What would that take? What would it look like for YOU?
Anyhoo, that’s what I’m thinking about tonight as I listen to more tasty jazz. Who needs drugs when jazz expands your mind? LOL
Have a good night.
