TELL A MUSICIAN to follow the rules, and you’ll invariably get a host of arguments that all boil down to the same dictum: Screw the rules. Yet Grammy-winning singer-songwriter and guitarist Daniel Tashian, who for the past five years has served as Kacey Musgraves’ main collaborator and has had success writing songs for artists such as Josh Turner, Tenille Townes and Lee Ann Womack, is a firm believer in musical guardrails. “I don’t know if I ever got anywhere with ‘no rules,’” Tashian tells Guitar Player. “When you think about it, we have lots of rules in society that are very helpful — and they exist for good reasons. Making music is very similar. I think when you’re writing, you want to be very open-minded about letting melodies come to you, but making records is the second part of the process, and it’s very different. I’ve found that certain rules can really help you get your point across.”
On his newest solo album, Night After Night (Big Yellow Dog Music), Tashian got the chance to co-write with his longtime friend and childhood hero Paul Kennerley (known for penning hits for Emmylou Harris, the Judds and Marty Stuart, among others), but in doing so, he had to adhere to his idol’s three golden rules of record making. One: No minor chords. “Paul writes in a certain mode, and he thinks that minor chords really ratchet up the drama,” Tashian explains. “When you take that tool out of the toolkit, you have to make up for it some other way, usually by having really good lyrics and catchy hooks.”
Which brings us to Rule Two: Hard rhymes only. “If with , it’s kind of lazy and it just doesn’t hit very hard,” Tashian explains. “But and nails it directly. It’s solid and it sounds better.” Speaking of sound, there’s the last rule: Each song should have at least three acoustic guitars, preferably six. “Paul says that it shouldn’t be about drumming; it should be about strumming,” Tashian says. “Let the sound of the rhythm guitars do the work of the drums. You’ll get a really great propulsive sound. And it works.”
