“I write songs completely selfishly”

Richard Marx may be known to casual fans for his big hits – “Endless Summer Nights”, “Angelie”, “Hazard” and the iconic “Right Here Waiting”, but as a songwriter, he remains current even today – working with big-time musicians across genres.  On his maiden tour to Dhaka, Marx – one of the biggest stars of world music in the '90s – sat down with The Daily Star for an exclusive interview, but some major management chaos on the part of the organisers, Creinse, pushed it back by a good few hours and allowed for only about five minutes.

You've toured all over the world. But when you come to a new place, like here in Bangladesh, do you know what to expect from the audience? Is every new place a bit of an unknown territory, or are they all the same in essence?

You can read the interview below, or you can just listen to it here:

Richard Marx: It's definitely not all the same. Every place is different. The way the culture is sometimes determines what the audience is. In certain Asian cultures – Manila for example, they're great fans, but very reserved and calm. Last April, I played in Sri Lanka for the first time, and I had a feeling they would be a reserved, quiet audience. They went crazy. They were yelling, screaming and laughing; it was an incredibly energetic, fun audience. I have no idea what it's going to be tonight, but it's kind of fun not knowing, you know.

As a songwriter, you have written chart-topping hits, from the '80s up till now. Musically and lyrically, people's taste change over time, in general. As a songwriter who has managed to remain current for four decades, how do you think popular music has changed lyrically?

Richard Marx: The first thing that comes to mind is that especially in the last five years, pop songs have gotten more and more conversational,  and have been using phrases much more freely. The Chainsmokers, for example: their lyrics are so simple and conversational, and there's something about it that I don't know if I can describe, but it's very different from even seven or eight years ago. It's changed.

How has your songwriting changed, for example, from now when you're writing for Chris Daughtry and back when you wrote for Kenny Rogers?

Richard Marx: I'm a student of music. Especially if I'm going to write with or for another artiste, I do my homework on them. I listen to what they have done, and I think – as an admirer of who this is, what is missing? What's something that I can bring to their repertoire that maybe they haven't done before? So I go in and say, respectfully, “Why don't we try this? Because I think you haven't really done this.” I try to do that. Sometimes they steer you back. For example with Keith Urban, with whom I have had great success in country music, every time I try to go someplace really different with him, I find that he steers us back to where he is most comfortable. But we still write great songs.

So, your songwriting is very specific to the artiste you're writing for… and is the process different for them?

Richard Marx: The process isn't that different, but it's on my mind that I'm trying to give them something that they wouldn't normally do on their own. And when it comes to my own songwriting for myself, it's the same thing that it has always been: I write songs that I like. I write songs completely selfishly. Sometimes because I need to get something out; I need to purge something. In other cases, I am creating something that I think would be fun to listen to. And if I really like a song I've written, there's a good chance that other people would like it too.