EDIT: Song composition done. File updated.

So, new track, once again with Shreddage 2 and Shreddage Bass. This contains the little riff you may have heard in my tutorial stickied at the top of the Impact Soundworks Forum. This is very much WIP, but is good enough to show off. I've got another minute or two of content incoming, but this should give you some killer metal riffs to enjoy. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

http://soundcloud.com/audiosupernova/beyond-the-ninth-circle
Last edited by audiosupernova on Fri Feb 15, 2013 7:31 am; edited 2 times in total

Relatively completed with this song. I can promise you, this should be at least one of the wildest, or strangest songs I've ever written. File updated in the OP.

Fixed a minor/major/minor transition point. Track is now 100% with the exception of future vocal recording.

Love this one! Again, really nice phat tones. Love the syncopated parts, rhythmic riffs, lead playing... geez. So are you making a whole CD? Any thoughts on what kind of vocals you might be getting?

Yeah, I'm putting together a 4 song EP with vocals. I'm personally a huge fan of melodic vocals, maybe simply because they're harder, but there will probably be some grittier growls, and pig squeals...okay just kidding on the pig squeals.

I have one more track to write and I'll be done. This will be a whole record at some point possibly, but will be broken up into two halves. So I'll write another EP length record for the second half. Putting it together in smaller pieces helps me not to get too ambitious, and end up quitting. Plus, I really have the itch to record vocals for this. I'm aiming to record vocals in March.

I'm really digging it! Can't wait to hear some vocals on this beast.

Amazing stuff Nova. How do you write music? how do you come up with riffs and melodies? Improvising in DAW, playing on guitar or is it like me where ideas come as revelations?

It's a strange process to describe. I hate to use the phrase "the songs write themselves" but to a degree that's what happens. I start out trying to make every new song in a different key and time scale from the previous song. Once I've selected a different key to start in, it just comes together automatically. Part of this is just because I have just about all the scales, modes and various chord progressions all mapped out in my brain already from years of music lessons(piano) as a child, then music instruction in high-school(both band and choir), then music theory courses in college.

I wouldn't say all the courses really help, rather I've just become accustomed to knowing what chords and progressions go together. If anything, it's just years and years of writing music. Not to say that I'm amazing or anything, rather, I'm just well practiced. Song writing is like any other skill in my opinion, it's honed and perfected through a great deal of trial and error. I have a very large repertoire of "bad music" for example that I intentionally choose not to show off.

Anyhow, lots of improvising, and just playing notes up and down in a mode/scale that fits with the current key I'm playing in, or in a key I'm transitioning to. Having all the keys memorized does help me a lot. It's not that I know the notes by name, but I remember which keys are "in key" and which are not. I then play around with dissonances, and cool transitions between major/minor chords as well as diminished chords and what-not. Really I just play around till I find something I think sounds good to my ears. Not exactly scientific.