British singer, songwriter and producer lottie has recently released her new single How Does It Feel?. Her third single, it serves as a powerful follow-up to Nervous and Chloe. Signed to Flipside Productions, lottie’s lyrics are personal and related to her experiences as an LGBTQ+ artist. Her smooth and feminine vocals are seamlessly combined with the producing expertise of renowned Iranian producer Hangi Tavakoli. 

​lottie has written melodies and lyrics for as long as she can remember, but recently realized her potential in the last year and focused on building her career in music. She is a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community and all of her songs are voiced from a lesbian perspective. Usually based in the UK, lottie has spent the past few years travelling and is currently based in Singapore where she met Hangi Tavakoli and began her journey as an artist. 

As we touched on before here at Flipside, making music takes courage. So, congratulations on finally deciding to take this crucial step in your journey as a musician.
Recording and producing your own music in a studio can be a highly rewarding experience. At the same time, it can be costly both in time and resources. And if you want to make the most out of the experience, here are some tips for avoiding some of the most common mistakes newbies make in the recording studio.

​Neglecting to use a metronome. The metronome has been around for over 200 years. In fact, wqxr.org recalls how Beethoven was the first to give his pieces metronome markings. Even the world’s greatest classical musician used a metronome to maintain tempo. Today, the device helps musicians in studios keep perfect timing during takes. This is crucial because any slightly off-tempo performances in either vocal or instrumental tracks can throw a wrench in the entire recording process. And this can be avoided by simply utilising a metronome during recording sessions. An instrumental guide track can also be used in the same way.

Emerging British singer, songwriter and producer lottie has recently released her latest single Nervous, an upbeat and catchy follow-up to her debut single Chloe. Signed to Flipside Productions, lottie’s lyrics are personal and related to her experiences as an LGBT artist, her smooth and feminine vocals are seamlessly combined with the producing expertise of renowned Iranian producer Hangi Tavakoli. 

lottie has written melodies and lyrics for as long as she can remember, but recently realized her potential in the last year and focused on building her career in music. She is a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community and all of her songs are voiced from a lesbian perspective. "When I came out, I was desperately searching for music that I could relate to - it’s my goal to make music that normalizes women singing about women." Said lottie. She continued "Combining my love of music with my pride for my identity has been an amazing experience and I can’t wait to make more!"

​One of the big questions I get over and over is whether writing commercial music requires you to sell your soul, abandon creativity, and forsake all that is good in this world. The answer is an emphatic “NO.” Basically this discussion of “art for art, or art for public” had always been going on and I never been solved, but here is my opinion about it. Any time this debate arises, there are those that say “Well, Jackson Browne did it his own way. He was poetic and commercial” or “Bob Dylan didn’t sell out; he wrote whatever he wanted”. It’s curious to me that every example that is ever thrown out to “prove” that you shouldn’t try to be commercial is a person that was commercially successful. No one ever says “I want to be like my neighbor Bob Smith. He writes crazy stuff that no one understands and plays it alone in his garage.” 
The people from the past that we try to model our work after were almost without exception successful commercial writers. They wrote what worked in their time. Those that are successful today are doing the same. 

Our pitch to publisher webinar recently reminded me of several points that I think bear bringing up every now and then. Almost everyone involved in the song submitting process behaved professionally. One or two did not. One of those people e-mailed me after the event claiming that I must not have listened to their songs because they submitted two songs that were better than anything that was played. They went on to say that they would hate to have my job because they could not stomach passing over great songs and playing weak songs that were more commercial instead. I am pretty forgiving, and I have very thick skin, but I want to remind everyone that doing something like that with a publisher or other industry professional will mean the end of your relationship with that person. I have seen it happen. 
My first publisher was the most kind, generous person. He would spend time with anyone off the street that came in my office. And he would bend over backwards to help them. ​

Who would want to say this? An artist is a brand. If a song doesn’t fit their brand, they aren’t going to sing it, no matter how good the song might be. If you can come up with a handful of artists that might think your song fits their brand, you are on the right track. If you can’t, you probably aren’t writing a commercial idea. For instance, I once wrote an amazing song about a boy catching his father cheating on his mom. It was a GREAT song. The only problem was, no one wants to stand on a stage and call his or her father a cheater in front of 60,000 people every night. The audience would believe that it was true. That’s not going to happen. Asking myself “Who would want to say this?” would have saved me some disappointment.

​How does this make the artist look? If you are not painting the artist in a positive light, you have almost no chance of getting a song recorded. 

​One of the biggest mistakes I see aspiring writers make is that of overlooking their peers. When we are trying to get things going with our writing, too many of us are so busy looking up that we forget to look around. There are people at your level right now that are easily accessible to you who will be the biggest writers in town someday. If you spend all of your time trying to set up co-write with writers higher up the ladder from you, you will walk right by these people. And, in walking right by them, you will seal your fate. When they do become successful, they will remember that you didn’t have time for them when they had nothing going on. 

​​My first publisher was a writer as well. He had written with a young artist who was working days selling boots down on Broadway and writing at night. This artist had been turned down by every label in town. He had nothing going on. Still, my publisher believed in him and wrote with him when no one else would.