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I’m guessing most of us, maybe even all of us, have that little inner voice that convicts us of something. It could be a conviction about an issue that deals with ethics, or social concerns, or morals, or spiritual beliefs. It could even be a conviction about something that’s as simple as what to wear or what to eat. I remember one day in 8^th grade art class, I eagerly and proudly showed the teacher what I had created. She said, “I like what you’ve done, but it’s not there yet”.  Although I had never heard that expression before, I knew exactly what she meant. That’s because my inner voice had already told me that maybe my project could still be even better.

Fast forward to the fall season of 2019, I stumbled across an excellent article I found on Twitter. It’s called “Fifth Time’s The Charm” by Scott McCormick. In a nutshell, it explained how the amazing hit song “Close To You”, recorded by The Carpenters, was previously recorded by 4 big name artists and flopped each time. In other words, the legendary songwriter Burt Bacharach had co-written this gem of a song with Hal David and had access to the best singers, the best music producers, and the best recording studios. Yet after 4 attempts, each time the song flopped. He certainly could have given up and moved on to apply his time and money on one of his other great songs.  But clearly, he didn’t give up and finally the 5^th attempt with then newcomers The Carpenters, allowed him to strike gold with a huge hit. That’s right, a song that flopped FOUR times with big name artists, suddenly wins a Grammy and is ranked by Billboard as the #2 song of the year.

So, the question is, why didn’t Burt give up after the 4^th try? Perhaps his inner voice was whispering, or screaming, that the right version was yet to come. It’s also amazing that nobody realized that the 4 earlier versions fell short until after they flopped. Were each of them ignoring their inner voice? I’ll confirm that I did listen to the 4 earlier versions and yes, they absolutely fell short. With this in mind, we should all be careful in discerning if we like or dislike a song based on the song itself or if we’ve been swayed by a particular version.

After reading McCormick’s article, I felt tremendous inspiration as a songwriter. In fact, we should all find relief and encouragement in knowing that if something is half baked, it doesn’t mean it’s a flop. We can always put it back in the oven to bake as long as necessary. Perhaps even tweak the recipe a bit. In our quest to find the “Right Version”, we can always repaint the fence, or try self-improvement courses, or solicit opinions and advice from those we trust. In any case, there’s definitely value in listening to that inner voice (aka gut feeling) when seeking the “Right Version”.