There’s a richness to the old works if you look before the 1950s. The chord progressions and the language was more complicated, especially in the jazz and classical world.
I collect art books. I have hundreds and hundreds of them and they get me to start hearing things. Sometimes people look at them, but I find that visual art gets me listening, gets me hearing things.
For a song cycle to work, you have to feel these things when you hear them and you either have an emotional reaction to it or you don’t. The plotline is something that gets woven together in the backstory.
