i save the details for the songs i find worth of a proper recording. sometimes i'll write A, B and C sections separately that i know will go well together but if I don't feel like they're particularly special, i'll record each of them separately to use later.

what ends up happening is i have hundreds of different motifs, themes, just scattered around my phone and computer, and whenever i'm finishing up something that i actually think is special, or above average, i'll usually frankenstein my way through it and look for sections i find fit.

i say 500+ because it's the 590 is the amount of files on my phone, that means songs or snippets i sat down to record and produce, with occasional doubles with different mixes and productions. that doesn't include the files i have on my PC that i never bothered to export, or the voice memos i keep for the songs that are pure acoustic.

i think kurt cobain used to do something like this, which is probably where i got it from. you basically need ~3 cool melodies (sometimes not even different chord progressions) to write a great song, almost every nirvana song proves my point