So your friend has just told you a funny thing he did last night and you think it would make a great song? Should you use him as a character? Is it OK to write about your friends? Are you going to lose your friends if you write about them?

We’ve all been in the situation before, both with friends and family members. We love them and we love the stories they tell us.

Due to the nature of storytelling, more often than not, when our friends inspire us to write stories, it’s when they irritate us, or they’ve done something pretty stupid. Should you risk your friendship with them?

Well, only you can decide but let’s see a few different approaches…

If you don’t tell them before hand that you’ve written a song inspired by their habit to scratch their crotch in unfortunate moments, and the song goes on to number one in the charts, they will hate you for the rest of your life. Why? Because the whole world has heard about their habit, without you giving them a warning or a chance to change it.

If you tell them but don’t ask them for permission, they won’t be too happy either. How would you feel if you got an email from your friend telling you “i’ve written a song about how you can’t get laid; Kylie likes it and wants to sing it”.

No, really, the only sensible option is to tell them and ask for permission… But what if they don’t give you permission and your best lyrics have to stay in a drawer, unheard by the world?

Well, that’s when you have to rely on them being able to laugh at themselves - have your friends got a good sense of humour, or do they take themselves so seriously they cannot even admit that they are sometimes wrong?

If the latter is the case, you could always consider complete denial and make up a story on what or who the song is about.

When writing about your friends, you have to remember this - people don’t like to look idiots but they are quite happy to laugh with you, so make sure you don’t make them look entirely bad and you should be bad. For most people, being silly is acceptable but being stupid isn’t.

Not sure you can pull it off? Then why not use yourself for inspiration… You are not perfect, are you, and you have probably done stupid things very recently so start by writing about those and shaping up characters for your songs based on those character traits you like least about yourself?

If you’ve written 10 songs that essentially make fun of your inability to say the right thing at the right time, your friends will forgive you for writing one about them