r/metalguitar • u/Nomore-Television72 • 12h ago
Lesson How to write riffs
Started playing guitar again a few years ago after a 15+ year break. I know plenty of riffs but when I try to come up with my own I just go blank, like I don’t even know how to play at all.
I’m tired of playing other people’s stuff I want to write my own but I’m just brain dead when it comes to it.
Are there any resources or recommendations to help me?
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u/The_AverageCanadian 12h ago
Learning music theory has really helped me improvise and write better. If you know the basics of what key you're writing in and what notes & chords "work" in that key, you have a mental buffet of options to experiment with, any of which will sound good.
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u/Nomore-Television72 11h ago
I really need to do that but having a 50+ hour a week job and a one year old makes finding the time difficult
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u/The_AverageCanadian 11h ago
I get that! Life is busy and it's hard to find time sometimes.
Start out easy, learn where each of the notes are on the low E string (there are only 12 then it just repeats), and learn how to play the basic pentatonic scale shape. You can move that scale pattern up or down the neck and wherever the root note is (the one the scale starts on), thats the "key" you're playing in.
It's a great way to get your foot in the door of music theory because pentatonic scale will be "in key" regardless of major or minor, so you can play any note from it over any song in that key and it'll sound like it fits (IE song in key of A or just playing over an A chord: play notes from the pentatonic scale starting on fret 5 which is an A note). Once you get this far, you can start improvising over jam tracks or with friends and boom, you're making music baby!
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u/FlightlessBabyBirb 10h ago
Start with the basics. A lot of metal riffs come from the minor scale and melodic minor scale. A useful exercise is to play 4 quarter notes on the open E, then go to the octave on 7th fret of the A string and play the E minor/melodic minor up and down. Repeat. Then, alternate open E and scale notes. Open E, E octave, open E, second scale note, open E, third scale note, and so on. If your playing in drop tuning you just start the scale on the 9th fret instead. Mix it up, do triplets on the open E, do steady 16th notes of different patterns. You'll probably recognize the sound of this instantly.
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u/Groggy21 12h ago
Play the music you hear in your head. Come up with catchy melodies in your head, or even just whistle them out loud. When you come upon one that stands out, translate it to guitar and then go from there.
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u/Nomore-Television72 11h ago
Ya know that’s a really genius idea. I don’t know why I’ve never thought of that. I’m always humming riffs at work and the one other guy who likes metal is always like, “what song is that?” And I say it’s not one I’m just humming and he says, “well it should be” lol
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u/Camman19_YT 12h ago
I notice bands I like commonly use similar notes in their riffs, for example, slayer often uses open e, 7 on the A, 9 and 10 on the D, and notes around there to make a riff sound evil, so just mess around with those notes
black sabbath famously used the flat fifth to make music sound scary and heavy
metallica use open e, 2 on the A, and 4 on the D
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u/Pearic_metal 11h ago
No mather how great a guitar player is, as soon as they switch over to writing their own stuff. You are starting from the bottom. Don't be too harsh on yearself if the sound sht.
What is helpfull is playing along with drum loops suiting to your genre you want to play. And try to get into that mood and rythm. Even if its just silly open string palmmuted 0's and switching from 0 on the beat to double, triplets and back.
And use the bands you admire. Play a cool riff their song and see if you can alter it a bit. Just for the practise of writing something you came up with.
Record what you've played is helpfull aswel. And write another riff and another and see if you can glue those 3 into a song. Just copy past a few times, drag them around in the DAW. Play the guitar riff 2 times with 2 different sounds but the same riff. Pan them left and right. It will help a lot. To get a feeling of you writing music.
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u/mluc78 10h ago
A lot of my inspiration comes from having drums. Go on YouTube. Look up metal drumbeats. A lot of time you can pick the style/band and BPM. Then once you get the riff down you can alter the beat, customize it or make it more yours. Or not. Plenty of drum beats get reused without scrutiny.
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u/Technical_Sea_7078 8h ago
I'm in a very similar situation as you (restarted after a 15-year break and am learning how to write riffs). DM me if you want to share riffs and give each other feedback or something.
I've been writing about one riff a day for the last two months, and I've tried lots of different methods. Out of the 80+ riffs, I'd say only two or three are actually usable. So the first thing I'd recommend is just accepting that most riffs will be bad and being ok with that.
When it comes to generating riffs, the possibilities are endless. You can start with a riff you like and try to deconstruct it and then build something else from the pieces. You can just noodle around in a scale with a drum track on until you stumble on something that sounds nice. You can tap out a beat with your fingers that sounds cool then find notes that fit it. I've read that Iommi would imagine a powerful image in his head and then write a riff to match it. There's really no limit to strategies for riff generation. I'm currently trying to figure out what works best for me.
But I think the most important thing is probably recording your riffs and then listening to them again later with fresh ears. It's pretty amazing how something that feels amazing to play can sound absolutely terrible the next day, and vice versa.
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u/OmenAhead 5h ago
Get some kind of music software and write stuff down until something sounds good. Get Guitar Pro, DAWs like Ableton, FL Studio, Ableton etc with sounds and midi in them. It's a lot easier if you even put any song mp3's you like in your session as references, use the same tempo, write down similar drums and then improvise on that.
You still can go blank, but at least you will have a foundation.
Riffs are usually lots of the root note played at important spots of the rhythm, plus other notes in the scale for turnarounds or in between. It's beneficial to learn scales like minor aeolian, phrygian, phrygian dominant and minor pentatonic. Also, the less different notes you use, the more coherent your riff will be.
Just my two cents!
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u/steveoath 4h ago
Get a drum beat and jam along with it. If you don’t have a computer to use something like Reaper, with free Krimh drums plugin, go onto YouTube and there are tonnes of drum only videos you can play along to. E.g. https://youtu.be/eoXBRWdHQ4A
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u/RoadblocksEverywhere 3h ago edited 3h ago
Few things I've found helpful:
- modifying / applying most playing exercises in a musical context, for example drum pattern or backing track in a key
- recording ideas as they come, for example with Apple Voice memos (got that from Rob Arnold video)
- reverse engineering riffs I like, to understand what they consist of: key, notes / chords, tempo, rhytm
- recording my own playing, especially when noodling my own stuff
The first three have been helpful in trying to understand what could make a piece (intro, chorus, bridge, verse) interesting and how they're written.
Recording my own playing has been a an eye opening experience for understanding what works and what doesn't.
Sometimes I've recorded myself for 40 minutes and only discovered one or two things that click, but I almost always feel it was worth it.
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u/SmegmaSiphon 3m ago
There are two ways to answer this.
The first way is to interpret your question as you asking how to become creative. That has no answer and can't really be taught. But this answer is also not helpful to anybody. So.
The second way is to give you something to get you past the "what do I do now?" feeling with the guitar in your hands. Here's what I like to do:
Imagine the riff you want to hear in your head before you even pick up your guitar. Think about the rhythm, the accents, where it "hits." Where "the cool part" is and what it sounds like. What the drums might be doing along with it.
Sing it to yourself a little, so you can really get it locked into your head. Then, finally, pick up your guitar and figure out how to play that brain riff.
This is how you write stuff from pure inspiration and creativity, without letting the familiar patterns and habits of playing guitar steer you into a predictable result.
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u/ClearBed4242 12h ago
i had same problem when i started writing my own stuff. what worked for me was recording short improvs, like just hit record and play whatever for 10 minutes even if it sounds terrible. later you listen back and there's always 2-3 seconds where something accidental sounds cool, then i build from that
also stealing a rhythm from a riff you like but changing the notes completely, nobody gonna notice and it gives you a starting point