…the Devil asked me to supper — he said
“Careful with the spoons!”
And God said “Oh, ignore him! I’ve got all your albums.”
I said “Yes, but who’s got all the tunes?”— Robyn Hitchcock, When I Was Dead
Some songs come like pennies from Heaven. Literally a few short hours and they appear almost whole out of the ether. Often mysteriously. Others are made in barter. it seems, for a piece of one’s soul. And after much consternation. There is often more give and take than this, and all of the regions involved extract their dues in one way or another. In the end it’s an author who accepts credit for the words they bring to the song.