I have written a few dozen songs, most of which were part of a rock opera. So I started with some basic themes and some ideas about an overall story. But when it came to writing songs, it often began with an electric bass line. Then I'd figure out what chords on guitar could work with that bass line (mostly trial and error assuming the bass was playing a root note and testing Major and Minor chords). Then I would try to figure out what part of the story I could tell that fit with the song and then I'd go write lyrics. I have a lot of trouble figuring out the vocal melody and I still don't have any clear idea of how that gets done. In some cases, the singers greatly improved on my scratch vocals.

Once in a while I would start with guitar chords and sometimes the whole thing would come chords, melody and lyrics all in 15 minutes. But that's pretty rare.

Here's a song that started with a bass line which sounded creepy and that became the inspiration for the song "The Creeper" which starts the whole story...
https://soundcloud.com/zurlocker/the-creeper

Last edited by ZUrlocker; 04/12/18 11:22 AM.
Music at http://www.soundcloud.com/zurlocker