I’ve ran into a bit of a dilemma.
So, I’ve been practicing many licks and runs and doing all the alternate picking acrobatics that we guitar players do. I’ve managed to hit 200bpm sixteenth notes on a couple runs. Thing is, I can’t write a solo worth a damn. I have like 2 original riffs and 1 original lead lick. Writing original slower, melodic parts that should in theory be easier to play is actually my weakness. I’m a pretty poor songwriter, which is ironic because I actually used to be a lot more creative when I was more amateur-level on the guitar. If any of you guys have been in my shoes, what did you do to remedy this?
Why not take a few classes?
Learn a lot of songs!
Musically speaking you are what you eat 
PS: also useful to learn some songs outside of your favourite genres
PPS: do not over-pressure yourself about trying to be original. You can even start by directly copying someone else’s solo or riff, and then modifying it a little. Little steps get you unstuck
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I studied composition in college. To get better at writing you’ve got to make yourself write. Accepting that it won’t all be incredible is part of the process.
Whatever your current routine is, make sure you dedicate some time for writing. Start simple and work from there. Some days a nice melody or 2 may fall from the sky but more often it just takes work. The great composers had sketchbooks. Capture every idea. Come back to old things. It’s actually easier for us these days to keep audio files of riff ideas than it was for them notate on paper.
Study harmony, study musical form, study phrases and motifs. My favorite style or writing is when very simple 4 or 5 note patterns are cleverly transformed into phrases.
Find a song you love and try to make your own song that matches its structure. Even if it’s a ripoff you may get a cool idea or 2. Put that in your sketchbook.
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I’ve, after a LONG period of writer’s block, been on a big writing kick lately.
For me, I think it’s similar to creation in any other medium. The issue wasn’t writing. It was editing. Starting to write by recording DIs was the breakthrough for me, because then I could record an idea, come back to it a few days later and seamlessly punch in one or two new notes or add a section or remove a section or whatever, and gradually take an idea that on its own was ok, and hone it into something that I was actually pretty excited about.
This is a pretty standard part of the creative process in most other mediums, written word particularly, so I’m choosing to really embrace it with music these days. And sometimes, coming back to an idea after months (or years - some of the songs I’ve written late;y started with ideas that are 6-7 years old that I’d recorded and just left as a little song sketch because I wasn’t sure where to take them) can help you hear how it’s great but maybe one note isn’t sitting right, and finding that note makes all the difference.
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Personally, I’m in a songwriting boom, and to help with creating music I’d say, focus on these two things:
- Focus on writing catchy, singable melodies, no matter what genre you’re playing.
- Let theory, technique, and whatever else take a backseat, let it operate in the background. Throw ideas at the wall and see what sticks, regardless of whether or not it follows any theory you’ve learned or not.
Once you have a really great melody, what I suggest then is to listen to it, and play some chords that you’d think would compliment that melody really well.
Right there, you have your main idea or riff, and a verse or chorus.
Next, come up with variations of that main idea. There’s loads of ways to dress up a melody, like adding more slides, legato, trills, mordents, enclosures, escape notes, passing tones, vibrato, displacing notes up or down an octave to change the contour of the melody, displacing notes rhythmically so they fall on unexpected beats, which is called syncopation.
And so on and so on.
A strong melody can give you hundreds of variations, and to see that in action, take your favorite melodies, and break them down to their principle, most important notes, which are usually chord tones, or notes that fall on strong beats.
Once you do that, you can see what makes the melody tick, and the numerous ways you can ornament or dress that melody up.
When it comes to chord progressions, I usually let the melody guide the progression, as I find it easier to write a strong melody, then use my knowledge of chords to accompany it.
As far as coming up with cool chord progressions, I say, start with a simple idea, then take Marty Friedman’s advice and “fuck” the idea your way. By that, he means to come up with something to make it something unique, or something that sounds cool to you.
For example, I’ve been playing around with augmented 6th chords, altered dominants, substitutions, and secondary dominants. They’re a fun way to dress up a basic chord progression.
My most used progression, at least so far, is bVI-ii°-V-i in a minor key.
In, my favorite key, D Minor, that’d be:
Bbmaj7-Eø7-A7-Dm7.
Sounds nice, but I’ve been preferring the sound of altered dominants and substituting the vii° chord instead of the V chord. For minor keys, because I love using chords for the forces of evil (being a metal player), a philosophy that Joe Stump also does, I prefer the sound of minor triads over minor 7 chords, and my favorite chord is a min(add9) chord.
So I might change it up to:
Bbmaj7/D-Eø7-A7(b9)-Dm(add9).
Or, if I want things to be a little more classical, more Castlevania-esque, which I love, I might use triads more, but inversions and secondary dominants.
So with our Bb-E°-A-Dm progression (bVI-ii°-V-i in a minor key), I might change it to swap out that E° chord, and use a Gm triad, a like function substitution, and I’d put it in first inversion, so a Gm/B chord, and I’d approach it with a secondary dominant, so a D7 chord, emphasizing the Gm chord more, and then I’d approach that A7 chord with the Gm chord in first inversion, called a Phrygian half cadence, which emphasizes the A7 chord more. I can also extend that A7 chord with an A7sus4 chord, resolving it to A7, then that resolves to a nice, open voiced Dm triad.
So really, the chord progression is a bVI-V/iv-iv-V7sus4-V7-i.
In my favorite key, D Minor, that’d be:
Bb/D-C7-Gm/Bb-A7sus4-A7-Dm.
In reality, it is a simple bVI-iv-V-i progression, a common progression, but it’s enormously dressed up, because I love taking a simple idea, and seeing how far I can stretch it.
Most of the songs I write, don’t get that complex though, being a metal player, so this harmony is implied by the bass and two guitars, who the other guitarist and the bassist and I just seem to gel and love ideas like this.
In reality, it just sounds good to us, and that’s ultimately the litmus test. Find a melody you like, find every way you can to dress up that melody or come up with a variation of it. When playing with chord progressions or sections, take a known progression or idea, and stretch or squish it to make it yours.
Keep it as simple as you can, and if you like an idea that sounds complex. Try it out! If you don’t like it, hold off on it.
On top of this, never add another idea in unless it’s absolutely necessary.
So many people don’t practice songwriting, and I say to get started, take a melody and take a simple song structure, and see how far you can take that one idea. There’s nothing wrong with using already established structures and ideas.
Just, you have to come up with unique melodies. Make your guitar sing!
One of our songs just has two ideas. A simple punk chord progression with a tritone in it (my suggestion), then a simple chromatic descending and ascending thing for the chorus. We have a bridge that’s essentially a heavy, funky version of the chorus.
It’s really simple, but simple sounds great!
We do have songs a bit more complex too, but really it comes down, at the beginning, with a strong melody or killer riff idea. You then stretch and expand that idea as much as you can with variations and accompanying it with chords, then only add ideas when it’s necessary.
Make some noise! Forget theory for a bit, start with just writing a really good melody. This can be spontaneous, or something that just won’t get out of your head, or it can be something you’ve been workshopping. Start there.
Then see how far you can take that one idea. That’s the art of songwriting and composing.
Hope that helps!
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Really awesome suggestions @thecrimsonidol7 - that;'s exactly it, take the time to create in whatever way you like to create and see where it goes! Often, I just ditch the pick and just create a loop with the looper and see if I can’t get any ideas going…
HAH! I won’t win any prizes for execution, but the ideas start somewhere, right? Something like this;
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