# Writing some Deathcore



## Augury (Aug 18, 2011)

*Hi ppl,*
I have been playing guitar for 1,5yrs and I started to write songs. I founded a Deathcore band with my best friends. Well, we have actually no idea if we stay in Deathcore or move to Death Metal or Progressive Death Metal or whatever. For now we are making deathcore.
We wanted to achieve something different than Chelsea Grin, Carnifex, AOAA and other 'generic' deathcore bands. Our idea was many solos, groovy Veil of Maya-like breakdowns, no pig squeals and some influences from other genres (Jazz, Prog Rock etc.). For some reasons we didn't - not enough musical theory, not enough skill in our hands etc., so we decided to make some *generic Deathcore shit* for the beginning.
I just written the first song that is longer that 80 seconds (xD). Now I need your help. I need some tips how I can improve the song. Feel free to tell me what you didn't liked (or maybe liked too ). Thanks!

Download link (GP5 tab):
endless agony.gp5


P.S. I'm new to SS.org so don't kill me if I placed the topic in bad forum


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## shreddanson (Aug 18, 2011)

I'll be honest, didn't like much of it because deathcore's not my bag. But I really liked how you went an octave up with the main tremolo picked riff. Kinda reminded me of Origin in a way. My advice would be to keep tweaking the songs until you reach a desired effect. Maybe instead of doing the usual generic chugging breakdown you could add some dissonant chords in between. Also, transitions make a huge difference. But you're doing ok for just playing for 1.5 years, keep at it and practice your ass off, it won't come over night.


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## Stealthdjentstic (Aug 18, 2011)

I liked the end because there was none left.


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## Stealthdjentstic (Aug 18, 2011)

But seriously for 1.5 years thats a good start!


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## shreddanson (Aug 18, 2011)

Stealthtastic said:


> I liked the end because there was none left.



 harsh!


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## Asterix (Aug 19, 2011)

Im not a real big fan of most deathcore, but it was decent.
I was not a fan of the "AOAA Break" at all though.


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## Augury (Aug 19, 2011)

Thanks for your help! Surely I know it's impossible to write Necrophagist-stuff in one night so I'll practice alot  I'll try tweaking the song as you said.


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## Oceans (Aug 19, 2011)

I think you should just write what you think sounds good and not be generic, and be unique


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## Mr. Big Noodles (Aug 19, 2011)

The riffs themselves are pretty lackluster, but your song has a decent sense of form, which is more important in the long run. I'd suggest cultivating that so that when you get further down the road and write better riffs, you know how to organize them. It makes the writing process a whole lot easier when you know how to get a lot of mileage out of just two or three ideas.


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## PollutedSanctum (Aug 23, 2011)

Add harmony. I did the first riff for you. 

http://www.mediafire.com/?z7n2nrc8b2wpat4


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## clockworksam (Sep 6, 2011)

Just keep writiing from the heart. technique,practice and theory obviously comes first when it comes to your own personal playing, but when it comes to writing, go with what works for you. once you become more comfortable with your own writing style, it will just keep getting better and better.


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## Winspear (Sep 7, 2011)

The structure and writing is really good for 1.5 years, good job. This could be a legit track in my opinion.

Somewhat unrelated, but I feel the need to say it incase you're going down the same road as I did;
Make sure you can _really_ play what you write. I spent my early years writing plenty of fast parts that I couldn't play properly and just thought I could. I spent years developing awful technique and it's been very difficult trying to fix it.
Parts like that very fast tremolo riff etc - make sure you are sitting down and practicing that precisely, in time with good muting. Not just random fast picking like I would have done while playing along to my tabs 

I only say this because there is absolutely no way in hell I would've been able to play this song properly after 1.5 years - but it is quite possible that you've actually been learning _properly_ and are progressing well. There _are_ people that play well after such short a time.

Just be careful and don't end up going mad writing songs in Guitar Pro that you can't play as a band. I know that situation all to well, and it sucks ass


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## eurolove (Sep 7, 2011)

Arkona said:


> I think you should just write what you think sounds good and not be generic, and be unique


 this. i'm sorry but if your setting out to write a specific genre your doing it wrong because you are limiting your music before its even been created. do what sounds good to you is such good advice. for example if you wanna buy a sitar and put that in your music, most metal heads are gonna be wtflol? but you should not care about pleasing them, make music for yourself. Whether or not other people like it should be only a by product.


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## Whitechapel7 (Sep 15, 2011)

the link is blocked for me as i am in school right now, so im just gonna say that if you are just doing stuff like this:

1--0--1--3--1--4
1--0--1--3--1--4

its gonna sound like shit. granted i cannot hear what you have written. i would suggest trying to shred a little if you havent. being an intermediate guitar player like yourself, it is harder for me, but find a scale you think sounds awesome for the tuning you use, and just shred on a few strings. OR learn how to sweep pick (if you havent already), that will make people be like hes fucking good. a good example for the shredding is Possession by Whitechapel or Disengage By Suicide Silence. and for sweeping Pray for Plagues by Bring Me the Horizon or Wake Up by Suicide Silence. hope this helps


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## Rick (Sep 15, 2011)

Whitechapel7 said:


> the link is blocked for me as i am in school right now, so im just gonna say that if you are just doing stuff like this:
> 
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> ...





Whitechapel7 said:


> granted i cannot hear what you have written.



So how do you know it's gonna sound like shit?


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## Whitechapel7 (Sep 15, 2011)

Rick said:


> So how do you know it's gonna sound like shit?



im talking if like that is the entire song where one is using frets 1-5 and the 5,6, and 7 strings. and from personal experience.


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## Blind Theory (Sep 16, 2011)

It is very hard to write genuinely unique deathcore. Because 99% of the time it won't sound very unique. The chugga-chugga-dissonant chord-chugga-squee! shit isn't original no matter how hard you try. Breakdowns period are nearly impossible to make sound unique. The bands like All Shall Perish, Veil of Maya, Born of Osiris, etc are all VERY talented and good at thinking outside of the box. So my only advice is learn new techniques then apply them to your songs. And don't try to base anything off of anyone. Because that will just make you sound that much more generic. I've been there many times...it gets old after a while.


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## Tobi (Sep 16, 2011)

Whitechapel7 said:


> the link is blocked for me as i am in school right now, so im just gonna say that if you are just doing stuff like this:
> 
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> ...



Actually I think that you could make that exact thing sound very good, either in some sort of drop tuning with some palm mutes in between and a good rhythm or even just as a doublestop riff ala Smoke on the water (no Idea how to explain that but I am sure you will get the Idea) 


To the OP
I think the song really isnt bad, nothing outstanding, but definantly good enough for a first song for a band. Except for the breakdown bit maybe, but I wouldnt know, Im not into that sort of thing. 
A lot of the time guitar pro deceives you by making stuff sound quite boring, but if you actually play it with a decent drummer bassist and maybe even a singer all that can change. 

To improve the song I would recommend throwing some sort of sour vibrato in that beginning riff, dimebag style. Maybe play with the feedback from your amp a bit, pick at different parts of the string to get a different sound at parts.... All that makes a mediocre song a good song. 
Remember, there is only 12 notes in western music that repeat all over again, the nuances make the song, playing faster or more notes doesnt always do the trick. 

In my opinion


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## Stealthdjentstic (Sep 16, 2011)

Whitechapel7 said:


> the link is blocked for me as i am in school right now, so im just gonna say that if you are just doing stuff like this:
> 
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> ...




This is the stupidest thing I've read in a while.


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## SenorDingDong (Sep 16, 2011)

Whitechapel7 said:


> the link is blocked for me as i am in school right now, so im just gonna say that if you are just doing stuff like this:
> 
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> 1--0--1--3--1--4
> ...





You know, if you're doing things like opening and closing your mouth and producing speech, it gonna sound like shit. Granted, I can't hear your voice, but I know it will sound like shit. I would suggest you think first if you haven't. Good examples of this are: Should I post this? Are my ears tuned it? Am I downing someone who is new to guitar and discouraging them for no reason acting like a shredded nutbag? (this ones fucking good). And my ever favorite, am I being a sweeping jerk off to someone for no reason without the basis of having actually have heard their playing? (This ones called speaking out of your ass) 
Hope this helps! 




Now onto the actual post. 
For one and a half years, you're writing is damn descent man. 
As others have suggested, try incorporating your own techniques and bits of style into genre parts (i.e. breakdowns). 
Try incorporating cleans, or larger dissonant chords. 
It will help set your writing apart from others. 
But as for this, you're doing great so far man. Keep up the hard work and practice, practice, practice.


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## broj15 (Sep 16, 2011)

if you wanna make your breakdowns better buy a decent metronome (one where u can tap it and it will lock in on the desired tempo) add some dissonant chords (my have is to fret the b string @ the 5th fret and the g string @ the 8th fret... Thats a movable shape so you can move it around to suit the scale/ key that the song is in) and write in weird time sigs with a few chugs on the up beat instead of the down beat and extra hits where you normally wouldn't think to put them. Just doing this can make a dull average death core breakdown into a cool prog breakdown. Veil of Maya loves to do stuff like this. also mix dirty chords (if your in drop a then fret the a string @ the first fret and then play the e string open) at odd intervals in your breakdowns.


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## oliviergus (Sep 17, 2011)

I play in a deathcore kind of band, but we doesn't really sound like a typical deathcore band. 
It looks like you already have locked your self in a box, thinking that it should sound like this. 

Try to get some unique into your music as many other above me said, there are far tooo many talking shit about deathcore. So lets try to fix that with some different sounding deathcore. 

It was good to be done only playing for 1,5 years, but you can almost hear whats coming next. In my opinion it was boring, but ive been listening to Meshuggah/Periphery/Monuments/Vildhjarta/Veil Of Maya for a while now...
So that may be why haha. 

Tho, good start. Try to make some more unique sounding and not keeping this deathcore image to the death.


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## K3V1N SHR3DZ (Sep 17, 2011)

I like several of your riffs and sections. I'd say arrangement is the killer here.

Your first riff (and the drums behind it) build to a certain level of intensity, then abruptly you ruin that with a breakdown. Do your sick, br00tuhl breakdown LATER, after you've done some cool shit, not during the crucial first 30 seconds of a song, or as a transition between riffs. Use it to BUILD intensity, not accidentally sabotage it. Creeping Death is a perfect example of this. The breakdown is one of the best parts of the song, but if they'd put it at the front indstead of at 3:38, it would be gay as hell. 

This is the main reason I dislike deathcore, as they seem to lack an awareness of intensity as a songwriting principle. Look at your favorite songs and make a graph of the intensity level of the song. Some sections are higher than others and this tends to have a flow.


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## summit101 (Sep 18, 2011)

for deathcore i will always suggest* "the somatic defilement" from whitechapel* and all the first releases of *suicide silence particularly "destrustion of a statue."* for initial influences

this gets more into the genres of perhaps* "grindcore."* although "the somatic defilement" is hands down the most notorious influence on the whole "deathcore" fadd thats going on today.. they were pretty much the first to make that sound and make it big.


also for that *harmony added by PollutedSanctum,* you will find that exact same sound in almost every song off the somatic defilement. that harmony is your key for sounding brutal. but *its better not to keep that harmony limited to the lower register of the neck. hence why whitechapel plays with three guitarist and are playing those harmonies in 3 part sequences. *

odd time signatures make things interesting also. check out the band* "A Black Rose Burial" *theyre somewhat technical but thats why they dont get borring. they use backing tracks and samples which gives an ambient atmosphere, trust me this can give your music a completely different aspect of "musical tension" http://www.myspace.com/ablackroseburial

check out the band "fractals" theyre pretty unknown. (example.2 of odd time signatures, and adding backing tracks)
http://fractalsmetal.bandcamp.com/

one last thing, you dont write music, the music writes through you. if you dont think about it you will just *feel* how the song should go accordingly.

good luck! "stay brutal" "stay grind.."


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## summit101 (Sep 18, 2011)

oh yeah for drums. *listen to (the somatic defilement) how kevin lane adds variation to his drum parts.* if you *listen to prosthetic fluid asphyxiation. **he never repeats a single drum part, not once.* listen for that and how variation keep the whole picture interesting. 

drums are pretty important with any band, doesnt matter what genre your playing, *if the drums aren't tight. your band will never be tight....*

and when your writing music. you need to be *listening to music constantly. and listen to many different kinds of music.* *the somatic defilement has a violin piece for an outro for heck sakes!!*


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## Metal_Webb (Sep 21, 2011)

Write what you want to write. If you feel happy and proud ov what you've created, bloody well run with it.

If you get other people appreciating it, well that's a bonus 

P.s. Consant sweeping =/= instant gratification or fans or good music. Malmsteen = Asshat


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## Captain_Awesome (Nov 12, 2011)

I'd say that you have the hang of deathcore, haha


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