Composition Struggles!

wolfhalen

masterdebator
Aug 9, 2008
57
0
6
washington us
Figured I would post here since this is the more song oriented forum

Im having trouble getting ideas down, and I'm sure this is a common problem.

I've got some pretty decent tones going on in my DAW with amp sims and impulses.

I usually play along with mp3's but I'm getting tired of being a rip-off artist.

Whenever I try to compose something though I just end up playing a lame riff and repeating it like an android. It doesn't help that the software works easiest when you play to a click track and 4/4 time.

So how do you guys start off when you come up with these great clips with complex changes and all this polyrhythmic stuf?

Do you just play a scratch track and pick out the best parts and expand on them?

Any help or ideas here would be appreciated, or links to great info on composing and arranging.

thanks
 
This probably won't help you too much, but it might so..
I don't play guitar or bass or any of that. I did 4 years of piano, so I know the basic theory and can do basic stuff and that helps a LOT but all I really play is drums, which you can't really compose melodies or chords or anything on. So I do all my composing on the computer, on a program called Sibelius. I have a keyboard and I can work out chords and stuff on it, but I find they come to me easier on the computer, as I can just shift around the notes until the chord being played back at me is the same one as in my head.

Then I work on it for ages, usually my compositions take a few months for a single song (not that I spend much time on them, maybe 2 hours a week at most because I have a lot of other stuff to do). Over time I'll get a few good riffs or chord progressions or melodies and I'll work from that. Granted, I've only finished 2 songs (1 which was a disaster and is ditched ;p), and I'm on my 3rd now. I'm aiming for 7 mins long and I've got 11 or 12 minutes of riffs and ideas with no repetition.

I ALWAYS start with an idea. Never just sit down and go 'lets make a song'. Get the idea first, then compose the song. I tend to compose everything at once, I don't do a guitar riff, then a bass line to go with it, then drums and then vocals and lyrics. If I'm doing the chorus of a song, I'll get the chord done, work out the vocal melody and lyrics for that bar, and then move on to the next bar. Admittedly, bass and drums come last.

Also, when I play drums I never play what the drummer is playing, I just play along to the music. A lot of the time I'll catch myself playing something really cool, so I'll chuck that into the computer for later. If you're playing guitar, perhaps just play along to the music instead of playing the music, and see what you come up with.

Another thing for lyrics, which I find useful. A lot of songs its difficult to make out the lyrics, cos they're screamed, or whatever. So I'll come up with what I think is being said, and it turns out that the real lyrics are way different. Well then, those lyrics that I thought were being sung then sometimes make their way into my songs. Easy way to 'make' lyrics and they turn out pretty philosophical accidentally. MY lyrics, however, always come at midnight just as I'm going to bed and I quickly write em down.
 
I have a hard time understading drums :( For example, Sybreed... how do u get that rhythm, the drum playing triplets? I dont know :waah: