Riff Quotes

Well, I think writing is basically about time and rhythm. Like with jazz. You have your basic melody and then you just riff off of it. And the riffs are about timing. (Kathy Acker)
Comedians are really writers who don't have pens and pencils about them, but they riff. View quote
Carl Reiner
A guitar riff played on a piano doesn't come close to the purity of it being played on a guitar but I faked it enough to get by. View quote
Barry Mann
One of my favorites has always been 'Swap Meet.' One of the reasons why I like that is it's a song that's in a drop-D tuning, and of course, also being a guitar player, it's one of the songs that I really like the riff on it. View quote
Chad Channing
In OK Computer, the guitar was already moving towards a tone generator as well as a riff generator. View quote
Colin Greenwood
When I write a song, it's all about the riff - the riff first, then the words come later. View quote
Evan Dando
The truth is, laughter always sounds more perfect than weeping. Laughter flows in a violent riff and is effortlessly melodic. Weeping is often fought, choked, half strangled, or surrendered to with humiliation. View quote
Anne Rice
What interested me about Chuck Berry was the way he could step out of the rhythm part with such ease, throwing in a nice, simple riff, and then drop straight into the feel of it again. We used to play a lot more rhythm stuff. We'd do away with the differences between lead and rhythm guitar. You can't go into a shop and ask for a "lead guitar". You're a guitar player, and you play a guitar. View quote
Keith Richards
Most of the time I sit down with my guitar or at the piano, and I play for awhile until I get a new riff or groove that I like a lot. Then I'll concentrate on building around that line of thought by adding words and textures. At first I'm only trying to please myself, and hopefully what I like will appeal to others. View quote
Jackie DeShannon
Excuse me while I light my spliff (spliff) Good God I gotta' take a lift (lift) From reality I just can't drift (drift) That's why I am staying with this riff (riff) Take it easy, easy skanking Got to take it easy, easy skanking. View quote
Bob Marley
They bend to each other, you know, its not like they like fuckin', beat each other over the head, its like 'oh, hear I come; wenenenenenen or chachachachacha' you know, they bend to each other, and they compromise, you know. And it makes for a good guitar relationship I suppose, you know. So Willie brings in the riff, and hes like 'jejejejeje', and Mark is like 'Oh, psh, wenenenenenen', and like, and you can see it happen dude, physically see it happen, like, they're melding, like Vulcans or something, like 'mind melding', I don't know, you know. I've learned a lot about music from watching those guys, by how different they are, and how they complement each other. (Randy Blythe)
What I do when I write is that I'll do a raggedy, rough version just to hear the chorus, just to see how much I like the chorus. If it works for me that way when it's raggedy, then I'll know it will just work... Listen to that, that's at home. Janet, Randy, Me... Janet and I are going "Whoo, Whoo... Whoo, Whoo..." I do that same process with every song. It's the melody, it's the melody that's most important, If the melody can sell me, then I'll go to the next step. The idea is to transcribe from what's in your mentality onto tape. If you take a song like "Billie Jean," Where the bass line is the prominent, dominant piece, the protagonist of the song, the main driving riff that you hear, getting the character of the riff to be just the way you want it to be, that takes a lot of time. Listen, you're hearing four basses on there, doing four different personalities, and that's what gives it character, but it takes a lot of work. View quote
Michael Jackson
He was an extraordinary bloke. First of all he was very funny. He was straight but very camp. [He] came in and Visconte said, ‘Right, what are we doing?'. He said: ‘Well I haven't got any material, I've just got one guitar riff'. So he played us this guitar riff. It sounded a bit like Chuck Berry to me but I didn't say anything. He went out with the band and after two hours he said, ‘Right, got a song'. So we recorded it and took a few takes. He then said, ‘Right I've got a bit of a tune, just give me half an hour'. In 10 minutes he came back and said, ‘Right I've got the lyrics and got the tune'. So he'd written Get It On in 10 minutes basically. He went out there, sang it and in four or five takes we'd got it. There it was. The guy was absolutely astonishing. View quote
Martin Rushent
I think often times if a guitar riff is centered around the chorus or if it follows the chorus, then it often times turns into the actual hook. View quote
Ryan Tedder
Sometimes one of us will have a riff or a bass line from home but it really gels when we come together. We really have a strong special chemistry that we take advantage of when we get together. View quote
Chad Smith
If you improvise a riff and the crowd immediately reacts to it, you know you're on to something. View quote
Dimebag Darrell
To me, the hook of the riff is what makes a great guitar recording. It's the backbone of the whole song. When you have a strong riff, it's the rocket fuel for the track. View quote
Dwight Yoakam
No one in the world can beat Ella Fitzgerald as a riff singer. View quote
Ethel Waters
One thing will lead to another and somebody will come up with a riff or a line or something we build from. View quote
Johnny Ramistella
I am never happy with what I do, so I try not to watch stuff that is filmed with me in it because I am always like, "Oh, I could have done that a little bit better," or, "I could have done that differently - that riff could have been a little better." View quote
Josh Young
When I need to nail that riff to the cross, Marshall will always provide the hammer! (Dan Hawkins)
I think people will always love a heavy Sabbath riff because it's fundamental to rock. View quote
Stone Gossard
The worst thing to happen at the Oscars would be if nothing happened. You want something unscripted, something to riff on, something kinda out there. View quote
Seth MacFarlane
Ideally, a song should contain both elements of high melodic tension, and low melodic tension. No listener wants to sit through a totally high-energy 180 BPM non-stop 6-minute ride through synth mania unless they are already busy grooving madly on some dance floor in a smoky club somewhere. Also, unless your listener is on heavy sedation, he or she will not enjoy your sparse 18-minute ambient tune which consists of the same languid piano riff repeated over and over again. View quote
Andrew Sega
You would find in a lot of Zep stuff that the riff was the juggernaut that careered through and I worked the lyrics around this. View quote
Robert Plant