"Not Worth its own thread" Thread

[Ordacleaphobia]

Anyone else keep a riff/song idea folder, then revisit it and realize you've recorded the same idea several times?

I write so little I have one singular GuitarPro file that has a couple thousand bars across about a half dozen tracks containing pretty much every riff I've ever written.
About once a year or so I'll go through it and realize that I went through the effort of transcribing the same riff multiple times without realizing I've already done it. Sometimes in another tuning, sometimes with a note or two changed, but usually exactly the same riff, at the exact same tempo, on the exact same track.

 

[Crungy]

Anyone else keep a riff/song idea folder, then revisit it and realize you've recorded the same idea several times?

I do a pretty good job recording to my phone or on the computer and fleshing stuff out if I like it.

Now that you mentioned it, I'll probably do it sometime soon lol

 

[SalsaWood]

Anyone else keep a riff/song idea folder, then revisit it and realize you've recorded the same idea several times?

I keep a project full of little one take variations of the same riffs, or the just riffs with different transitions. Keeps me from forgetting them and I can idly mix different mockups for the composition.

 

[KnightBrolaire]

Anyone else keep a riff/song idea folder, then revisit it and realize you've recorded the same idea several times?

sadly yes

 

[nightsprinter]

A lot better than my routine:

Think of a riff, grab guitar off wall, set up cellphone facing me, record riff unplugged while the TV is blaring in the background, lose the video in a thousand cat pics, dump phone photo/video album onto hard drive, never review the riff again

 

[gabito]

I have come to accept that all my riffs are a variation of some Metallica or Pantera riff.

 

[Randy]

I have come to accept that all my riffs are a variation of some Metallica or Pantera riff.

Got me beat. I think every riff is a variation of the dumpy KSE/ATR 5-7-8

 

[Ordacleaphobia]

I have come to accept that all my riffs are a variation of some Metallica or Pantera riff.

Oh yeah there's a ton of this.
How many of you guys have noodled out a riff you think is absolute heat, record it, transcribe it, whatever; and halfway through the process, realize that it's a carbon copy of a riff in a song that you just haven't listened to in a while.

One time I made it halfway through writing a whole damn song based on one such riff before realizing it was completely lifted. Special kind of frustration.

 

[gabito]

Oh yeah there's a ton of this.
How many of you guys have noodled out a riff you think is absolute heat, record it, transcribe it, whatever; and halfway through the process, realize that it's a carbon copy of a riff in a song that you just haven't listened to in a while.

One time I made it halfway through writing a whole damn song based on one such riff before realizing it was completely lifted. Special kind of frustration.

One of the songs from one of my former bands is basically Enter Sandman minus the arpeggios and somehow nobody noticed (even me, the person who wrote it).

Even the solo modulates in a similar way...

Once I noticed I started to switch the riffs mid-song when we played live.

 

[nightsprinter]

With only 12 notes in the chromatic scale, it seems like it isn't possible to write a melody in the year 2024 A.D. that hasn't already been composed or recorded.

We just have to share the riffs and if people don't like it, too bad.

 

[Randy]

Oh yeah there's a ton of this.
How many of you guys have noodled out a riff you think is absolute heat, record it, transcribe it, whatever; and halfway through the process, realize that it's a carbon copy of a riff in a song that you just haven't listened to in a while.

One time I made it halfway through writing a whole damn song based on one such riff before realizing it was completely lifted. Special kind of frustration.

Honestly, id prefer this. Lot you can do with changing key or the order of the notes, drums etc to make a carbon copy song sound different enough to pass.

Rewriting your same shitty song over and over is a much grimmer prognosis.

 

[wheresthefbomb]

It's taken me a long time but I think I'm finally over worrying about "stealing" other people's riffs. I just repeat the mantra "this band did not invent the I-IV-V chord progression and neither did I."

 

[BlackMastodon]

Got me beat. I think every riff is a variation of the dumpy KSE/ATR 5-7-8

Why try to reinvent perfection?

 

[nightsprinter]

Why try to reinvent perfection?

I knew a guy who was writing in the key of killswitch back in the early 2000s and to date he has not changed keys. Every time I hear a new demo of some vaporware that never materializes beyond a 1-mic-in-jam-space demo, it's the nothin' but the drop tuned 0-8-7-10's

 

[Randy]

I knew a guy who was writing in the key of killswitch back in the early 2000s and to date he has not changed keys. Every time I hear a new demo of some vaporware that never materializes beyond a 1-mic-in-jam-space demo, it's the nothin' but the drop tuned 0-8-7-10's

Im assuming a pinch harmonic on the 10?

 

[nightsprinter]

Im assuming a pinch harmonic on the 10?

If not that, at least some hammer on/pull off transitions.

 

[AwakenTheSkies]

I'm very organised so repeated riffs is not a problem for me. The problem is that I have like 50 songs that I should have recorded but haven't recorded, because they weren't good enough as just an instrumental. Just need a damn vocalist.

 

[Seabeast2000]

^ Amazing. That's what I am talking about!

 

[CleansingCarnage]

I'm very organised so repeated riffs is not a problem for me. The problem is that I have like 50 songs that I should have recorded but haven't recorded, because they weren't good enough as just an instrumental. Just need a damn vocalist.

There comes a point when it's just time to learn how to sing. Or in my case, learn to growl. Just like anything else, we're going to suck at it until we don't.

 

[BlackMastodon]

Im assuming a pinch harmonic on the 10?

If not that, at least some hammer on/pull off transitions.