DOOM songwriting/composition.

[The Wood Wizard]

Hey all. Im pretty guilty of spending most of my guitaring time just either riffing or soloing all over the place. Id like to start taking these ideas and making something substantial more often than I do.. Also this is kinda a cool topic that I feel doesnt get much attention in the genre.

How do you write your doom riffs and doomy songs? what kind of song structure do you use/ like? How do you keep a 120 minute song interesting? How do you keep in time when you play 6 notes over a 20 minute span?

Stuff like that.

[HeavyXIII]

Personally I've gotten away from soloing for the most part, it almost always sounds wanky and never really meshes with whatever my motif is. I've taken to recording everything I play for reference, the only problem was that I would have 50 minute recordings that were poorly organized and hard to listen to. What I started doing recently was leaving the recorder off, and playing until I happen upon something really cool; then the recorder comes back on. I've gotten into playing with dynamics more recently, and giving myself time to consider how best to record the changes has helped.

Having a drummer would help too, because many of my ideas become stuck without a drummer to provide me some type of rhythm to help everything groove and gel.

[samzadgan]

well...firstly, i don't solo, because I'm not good enough for it, and i just don't seem to come up with anything that sounds good. Riffs on the other hand i find much easier to come up with for some reason.

As far as the song composition goes...the songs i write are about 8 mins, that's my standard, and within those 8 mins i center the whole thing around 3 or 4 big riffs. Then its about coming up with smaller parts that either link the main riffs together, are octave up or down of the same riff or some other derivative of a main riff, and I always have a couple of parts that are completely different just to give the song a break. I also have a fair but of acoustic parts in my songs which really help keep the song fresh and makes the big riffs even bigger when you come out of a slow atmospheric acoustic.

My main problem is that i have no concept of timing...the good thing about the current band is that I come up with the music...play it to the bass player (who has better timing than our drummer), we then play it together to get the timing right and amend if needed. once the riffs are set and structure is done, then we come up with melodies over the parts and then come up with lyrics. After all that is done we then go to rehearsal studio and rehears it with the drummer.

[Greenfuz]

find cool sabbath song

play it in drop e or something

rearrange bits

slow down riff

???

doom!

[Achtane]

find cool sabbath song

play it in drop e or something

rearrange bits

slow down riff

???

doom!

[AxAxSxS]

We dont really "write" our songs, they kinda just happen during jams and then if we like it enough we try to remember what we did and refine it. I record everything and thats a big help as far as keeping ideas.

[LOCOPELAND]

^^^ That, and we're both doom riff machines!

[AxAxSxS]

we're probably not that helpfull. "It just, like, you know, happens, mannnnnnnnnn"

[The Wood Wizard]

I find that having a drummer around makes things sooo much easier. having a pule to groove on makes all the difference. I should start recording everything I do too. It seems i hit the red button and nothing good happens, but if the machines off I make golden earshowers that i forget the next day ahah

[AxAxSxS]

I've found that "OMG YOU ARE RECORDING!!!" tends to get everyone tense. But eventually they get used to it and forget about it, except when something good came out, then its "You recorded that right?" People get used to it.
I'd suggest recording yourself with the intention of not even listening to it. just jam out and when you are done, erase it. That will help you get in the right mindset.
The final take on one of our demo songs for drums I lied to him and told him I was not recording. It was a section that was giving him fits so I told him to just play it a couple times and get loose with it and we'd start trying to record again in a bit. The very next take was the keeper.

[Jero]

Load bowl. Smoke bowl. Strum strings. DONE.

This isn't for doom specifically, but the record everything route is what we used to do. We were comfortable enough with each other that no one gave a shat if someone else messed up for a sec, or couldn't immediately come up with something. But yea, it was mostly just riffing until it turned into something we all liked. Again, not doom specific, so I apologize for being no help whatsoever

[HeavyXIII]

Load bowl. Smoke bowl. Strum strings. DONE.

This isn't for doom specifically, but the record everything route is what we used to do. We were comfortable enough with each other that no one gave a shat if someone else messed up for a sec, or couldn't immediately come up with something. But yea, it was mostly just riffing until it turned into something we all liked. Again, not doom specific, so I apologize for being no help whatsoever

Not a waste at all, it just goes to credit the organic jammy mindset that seems to come with the doom/stoner territory. As I recall, Kyuss wrote all of their music before Sky Valley/Self Titled in jam sessions, and Blues for the Red Sun is one of the best albums in existence.