The Riffs of the Year

How to create a killer riff? Muse did it by going full-on metal, Ghost channeled their inner Def Leppard, and Animals As Leaders went where other bands fear to tread...

- Jenna Scaramanga, Paul Elliott

01 Muse KILL OR BE KILLED

When Matt Bellamy spoke to TG in the summer, he said of Muse’s ninth album Will Of The People: “I definitely think a bit more metal has crept in this time.” He cited Slipknot and Iron Maiden as key influences, and that heaviness is most powerfully illustrated in the anthem Kill Or Be Killed. Now, Matt reveals how he created the riff of the year...

How did Kill Or Be Killed come together? I asked Manson to build me a multi-scale/fan fret guitar, based on Nolly’s Onyx, just to experiment with, and as soon as it arrived the riffs for Kill Or Be Killed and Won’t Stand Down came pretty quickly while jamming. Originally the Kill Or Be Killed riff was more straightforward – no pitch shifting. But as with previous experiments with songs like The 2nd Law: Unsustainable, I decided to try pre-programming extreme whammy moves and program changes – that are not entirely possible by foot – to give the riff a more synth/modern feel to it.

What kind of pitch shifter did you use? Was it a latching/momentary switched unit or treadle-operated as per the Digitech Whammy? I used a Digitech Whammy and programmed MIDI program changes into Pro Tools so it could jump between 2 octaves up, 1 octave up and bypassed. I automated some expression changes as well but did most of it with my foot in the studio during takes, so it wasn’t all repetitive.