Learn About Songwriting from Audiohammer Studios’ Eyal Levi
What’s the single most common mistake made by dudes in metal bands (besides being in a metal band, I mean)? Easy: they spend a gajillion hours to learning to play their instrument (which, granted, is obviously important), but then never learn to write decent songs. It’s the metal equivalent of a movie that spends a couple of hundred million dollars on special effects, but never bothers to develop an actual story (not thinking of anything in particular here). Meanwhile, almost every metal anthem that ever made a dent in peoples’ consciousness — from “Iron Man” to “The Number of the Beast,” from “Raining Blood” to “Hammer Smashed Face,” from “Concubine” to “Fixation on the Darkness” — has managed to do so because, above all else, they were well-written, memorable songs. You know why Metallica get to be the biggest band in the world even though Lars Ulrich can’t actually play the drums? Because they wrote “Ride the Lightning,” “Battery,” “One” and “Enter Sandman.” So, um, yeah.
Which is why I think this newly-announced CreativeLive course sounds so incredibly awesome:
“Eyal Levi, acclaimed producer at the world-famous Audiohammer Studios (The Black Dahlia Murder, August Burns Red, Whitechapel), will host his next CreativeLive class, ‘Mastering Metal Songwriting,’ on June 17 and 18 from 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM PDT (12:00 PM to 7:00 PM EDT). In this two-day course, free to watch live, Eyal Levi and special guests Todd Jones (Nails, Terror) and John Browne (Monuments) will explore what it takes to craft great songs, from basic song structure and riff-writing, to writing melodies, leads and vocals, and then fine-tuning the arrangement to take your song from good to great. Head over to CreativeLive.com at: http://www.creativelive.com/courses/mastering-metal-songwriting-eyal-levi for more information and to enroll today.”
OH MY GOD so many of you need to take this course. And in case for some reason you doubt that these are the right dudes to teach it, let’s give a listen to some of their work, shall we?
Get more details and enroll here.
And (AHEM) this seems like a good time to remind you that our sister site Gear Gods — the only website for musicians in the metal community — will be hosting a live video seminar on creativeLIVE featuring their favorite new gear releases to teach you exactly what you need in 2014. Guests for that course will include Matt Halpern (Periphery), Aaron Marshall (Intervals), Francesco Artusato (All Shall Perish/The Devil You Know), Hannes Grossman (Obscura, Necrophagist), and Doc Coyle (God Forbid). And it’s completely free! The class will air on June 11th from Noon EDT / 9am PDT to 7pm EDT / 4pm PDT. RSVP here.
