Songwriting

>come up with super catchy riff
>write a bass line
>play out drums
>go to write lyrics
>the lyrics are utter shit every time and I throw them out every time
How the fuck does someone get good at writing lyrics? This is genuinely frustrating

It's a mystery, my man.

Maybe try analyzing what you consider to be "good" lyrics, and what makes them "good", then replicate them with a different topic.

>lyrics

write lyrics that sound good to the ear, i bet youre trying to write "smart" stuff. forget about content focus in the sound and inflections of the words.

steal from poetry. changing words here and there

A lot of the best lyricists in the world read load of books and newspaper articles. Neil Peart, for example, wrote 2112 after reading Anthem by Ayn Rand, being incredibly inspired by it's objectivist themes. You may not be into that progressive bullshit or deeper meanings etc. but literature and old stories with twists are always a good place to start.

Hint: I don't think anyone has done Everyone Poops as a song yet.

Keep the lyrics about imagery more than direct statements. Every single good song, be it a number one hit or your favorite obscure track from your favorite obscure band, the lyrics are almost entirely about imagery.

samesies

I'm genuinely scared of writing lyrics at this point because I know they'll be and sound like shit like they always do, and it'll ruin an otherwise good song I wrote and I'll never be able to return to it because I'll always remember the shit ass vocals I tried tagging onto it

I'm trying to write an album right now, and have a good load of scraps that are ready to be pieced together into a pretty good amount of songs, but I'm thinking a very large proportion of the album is going to end up being instrumental, or at least the vocals are going to be heavily layered with effects, which sucks because vocals are important to me

The only thing I can really hope for is that I write a few good instrumental pieces, or even a song with lyrics where the shitty vocals don't overpower the rest of the song, and someone else listens to it and likes it and wants to sing for me

You seem more hung up on vocals than lyrics.

ALSO, I don't know if this is retarded or not, but I think people actually like how my voice sounds when I sing along with music or do karaoke. I've gotten girls from doing karaoke before, which seems asinine to me, and I've had tons of people (karaoke DJs or whatever, bartenders, bouncers, regular people, friends/strangers) shake my hand and tell me how good I sound after doing karaoke

I can write music pretty well. People always get excited when I tell them I'm thinking about releasing an album because they've heard me play with other people and mess around on instruments whenever I'm near one. So this vocal shit seriously doesn't make sense to me. I can make good sounding songs and apparently I can sing well, but it always sounds like total shit when I sing with my own music. The lyrics are always cheesy and retarded, even when I try to sing about simple shit or when I try to be completely nonsensical and just write what I think sounds good, and the melody is always way too subpar to accompany the rest of the music

it's both

>wank out a riff
>have no clue how to do anything with it and turn it into song
sucking at music when its the thing you love the most is painful

Read what I wrote here: >it's both
Try not to worry about it so much if you keep having all this positive reinforcement, man.

Also I guess I'm just ranting right now because this has been a huge annoying roadblock for me lately and seeing OP's thread kind of unleashed my frustration, but any input is appreciated

Do you mean get Tolkien with my lyrics and just describe what things look like in intricate detail?

You're overanalyzing your own lyrics
Most lyrics are shit desu
If it sounds good with the music it's fine

only fags care about lyrics unless you're doing folk, don't sweat it

Your riffs probably aren't very catchy anyways.

Take one of your favorite songs. Look how much imagery is used. Look at the songs you're trying to write, see how much you're using in comparison to direct statements i.e. "begging you please," "you don't know," etc.

Spend a week away from your own music and just learn covers of songs you really like if you play at all. Get used to mindlessly singing while playing. Apply that to your own music and your own stuff kind of comes out

find a Lennon to your McCartney?

Don't focus too much on riffs. About 80% of the time, if I write a cool riff but didn't write any background for it beforehand, I end up scrapping it because it's kind of a lost cause. I come up with good sounding riffs pretty often too which makes it kind of painful

To combat this, I'd suggest getting a looping pedal. Write a backing track, simple or complex, and play over that. That way you'll be coming up with cool riffs and have something to go with it. It makes shit a lot easier