Something in the way

Imagine you’re an aspiring original songwriter and you come to your bandmate with a genius lyric, one that you’re really proud of.

‘Hey Pierce, check out this lyric I just wrote… Something in the way she moves’

‘Right well we’re looking to be original so if you could try again.’

‘What? That line has been taken?’

‘Yeah it’s a Beatles lyric and the name of a James Taylor song’

‘Ok what about if I change it to Something in the way you move?’

‘Yeah that’s a Rihanna lyric and the name of an Ellie Goulding song’

‘Alright what about just – something in the way?’

‘Yeah that’s a Nirvana lyric and song title’

Similarly Jamie Foxx said in an interview:

“I remember going in and reading for Russell Simmonds for some comedy, and I was doing my thing and he (Simmonds) was going ‘Oh that’s Eddie (Murphy), oh that’s Martin (Lawrence), oh that’s Rock, that’s (Chris) Rock!”

To which Foxx thought ‘what the fuck is going on?’

And Russell Simmonds replies:

“No I was just saying you sound like Chris Rock, you sound like Eddie.”

And Jamie said: “So that was tough because I was like damn I don’t have anywhere to go”

…

So together (I hope) these two points allude to the difficulty the artist encounters when trying to find a tiny sliver to create their own original style.