I have reached a crossroads and a mental block when it comes to creating a main riff or melody for a song…when you listen to alot of the popular stuff out today, wether it be Avicii, Nicky Romero, Kaskade, etc…their tunes seem so simple yet so intricate…how do you come up with a melody that is so simple and make it into such a banger!
I’d love to tell you that it takes years of music theory to make melodies like that, but most producers have limited knowledge of hardcore theory.
I look at it like this: can the (imaginary) crowd sing your melody back to you after hearing it once or twice? If yes then you’re set. If no, it’s too complex.
Am the exact opposite atm
Riffs are comin to easy them im stuck!
Should be the other way round.
ksonic is right on target. That’s how it should be. Riffs should stick to your brain instantaneously.
This has always been the case. There should be some vids out there on popular guitar riffs for instance.
I need help! I need some inspiration
Find a muse 
[quote]JaredBerkey (29/02/2012)[hr]I need help! I need some inspiration[/quote]
Inspiration is one of those things that many people blame when they can’t get their ideas onto their chosen media/instrument/etc.
I feel that everyone has fantastic musical ideas in their minds, it’s just a matter of how well they understand them.
Something you can do is take a break from listening to your chosen genre of music and either listen to something completely different that you ordinarily would have never listened to, or take a break from listening to music altogether for a couple days. It will help to refresh your pallette, in a sense.
Music is the communication of human emotion and energy. Make sense of your own and you will be able to communicate it better.
Wax on, wax off.
I feel that one of the things that a lot of people overlook while making a catchy riff is the rhythm part. A lot of people focus and the chords, scale or specifically how pretty/ psychedelic it sounds.
Do this: get your metronome going and start jamming some chords/notes and practice with the metronome going on. A very important part of a catchy riff is how you place your notes. You can have the most beautiful chords in the world but if they are all in the downbeat or upbeat it will sound dull and boring.
Rhythm is how you encrypt the message, chords set the tone, and melodies tell the story.
If it helps think about how we speak. Words can change their meaning depending on where you put the accents within the word, the same happens with music. After all they are both different forms of communication.
Once you get a good sense of time it will be like having a grid inside your brain. It will be much easier to get ideas from your head to your DAW plus they will probably be more groovy and rewarding.
Most top producers don’t have a lot of music theory knowledge but I can guarantee most of them have a good sense of time. Most of them use simple combinations of upbeat downbeat and occasionally throw some of the beats in between to spice it up.
I think 70% of a good melody comes from the rhythm that you give to it.
Great advice!
You should try analyzing your favorite riffs to see what makes them tick
check out this site, it has like every dance music midi ever
http://www.nonstop2k.com/community/
after looking at a bunch I found a rhythmic ‘pattern’ that is in almost ever single hit Riff!
lets take the rhythm from the main riff avicii’s levels
(the places where there are blanks are sustained quarter notes)
Bar 1: 1+2 3+4+ Bar 2: 1+2+ +4+
Both bars have nearly identical patterns of 8th notes, the quarter note thrown in creates a ACCENT, by shifting this quarter note(ACCENT) one eighth note in the 2nd bar he creates an extremely power Call & response.
Daft punk does this a ton too, Human after all, around the world.
shifting accents by an 8th note in successive phrases seems to be the magic way to create never ending surprise within a repetitive riff, i know this technique combined with others has really buffed up my tunes
Can you explain what you mean by:
Bar 1: 1+2 3+4+ Bar 2: 1+2+ +4+
Thanks
heres a picture that hopefully makes it clearer, I highlighted where the quarter notes are
notice how they green notes are shifted one eighth note in the next bar, creating the musical effect call & response. This keeps the melody from sounding too static, like its always new.
also notice how he uses the same exact rhythm from bars 1&2 in bars 3&4, just with different notes
For me, I have found if am stuck, I just randomly play the keys with beats in the background and then go into edit the notes and chop and change and stretch some out, and after about 10mins of tweaking I have a random riff that actually sounds quirkya dn defo sticks in your head after hearing it once or twice.
no point complicating things, sometimes random is good.