So earlier today, an amazing thing happened: after months of musical dearth with not a line of lyrics or a single note written, i finally got something written. A binge of Black Sabbath covers resulted in rough draft lyrics and riffs for a song currently entitled “Bishop of Souls.” The inspiration for the title came from the Bible, while a rough concept for the lyrics is a doom metal inspired take on Revelation 13 and the apostate church of Rome.

As far as the riffs that I made, there isn’t too much yet: just a slow and heavy riff for the song intro and a faster-paced blues shuffle riff that could be used either for the chorus or a bridge: riffs are c minor based and written for a drop-C or C-tuned guitar. This is a major starting point for writing a song; this was, after all, how many of the songs from my debut album started off, with little else but an idea and a line or two.

So after writing these down, i plugged in my First Act guitar: it’s old and of pretty poor quality, but i keep it for the tonality, which is very thick and doomy. I also keep it tuned four half-steps down (low to high: C – F – B flat – E flat – G – C), since C-tuning lends itself to the heavy sound of doom metal. So there i was, playing around on my C-tuned guitar, rehearsing the riffs i had written and trying to come up with new ones.

Then, for some reason, i started playing the chords from this song. Not something you’d expect could be played on a C-tuned guitar, or that someone like me would want to play. But there i was, playing Sixpence None the Richer, deftly strumming the chords to the song on a C-tuned guitar: not as difficult as you might think, since the chords can be played in the open position without the need of a capo. The only difficult part was that i didn’t actually know the chords to the song, but i knew the melody and could play chords that were agreeable to that melodic line (this was how i learned Rainbow’s “Temple of the King” without tabs).

And as i was bringing the chorus to a close, i made a realization: here was my crappy First Act, tuned to C, useful only for heavy, doom metal riffs (or for those riffs that, in standard tuning, would result in an E-to-F# major 2nd movement). The bottom strings were old and dirty – all the better to create those doom riffs – and while the higher strings were in better condition, they always made a distasteful ringing noise (just like on my Fender). Yet even so, i was able to play something major-keyed and beautiful sounding.

Then i came to the realization that there is light and beauty even in the darkest and gloomiest times: i just need to know where to look for it.