Building the Habit aka One Step Closer to Killer Riffs

I’m just getting back into the swing of songwriting regularly the last few days (I know, I’ve not even released the first record yet!) and I forgot how, just like any other musical skill, it’s something that needs to be trained and practised. I haven’t done any writing at all for a few months and the last serious writing I did was over a year ago.

Writing needs to be just as big a part of my guitar routine as practising technique, theory, ear training, etc.

The last few days have gone something like this:

Days 1 - 3: Pick up guitar. Stare at it. Wonder why I have no ideas. Try some bits and pieces. Whatever.

Days 3 - 5:  Go through old ideas I had for album 2. Play through them, edit them a bit

Days 6+: New ideas start to flow a bit more freely.

Even if I don’t like some of the ideas I’m having, I’m recording them and playing with them. While it make not be that killer riff that will make for the most awesome heavy metal song ever, it gives me great practice for my recording skills, song-structure skills and arranging skills.

And each mediocre riff I write… the closer I get to that killer riff that makes the cornerstone for a song to go on my next heavy metal record.

If you want to check out my other songs, you can hear them on my heavy metal record, featuring Doro Pesch.