Vermin EP track description and analysis

Overview:

The EP as a whole is a massive leap forward for me in terms of recording quality and composition. I explored as many musical concepts as possible in this EP without letting it sound overdone or 'crowded'. In terms of art, it has a slightly more music-oriented feel compared to my debut - ...At The Threshold has a photo for each song, massive underlaying concept, and words for 3 of the pieces.

This EP has 1 single photo, no words and no underlaying concept. Minimalistic. The aim of this EP is to explore practical applications of the musical knowledge I've gained in the past 4 years and to figure out how to use them in metal but not make it sound like a harmony textbook exercise nor allowing it to sound plain and dull.

Land Of The Green Sun:

The track and EP open up with an assault in the form of tremolo picking a compound minor second on the guitar and bass and alternating snare rolls and double kick drum action. Section A is triplet-fest because I'm a massive slut for triplets. Section A starts off with a rhythm guitar playing said triplets panned to the left. Then the bass joins in halfway through the riff. Then a guitar panned to the right and a very quiet center guitar join with the same riff when the riff is repeated to add weight and punch.

Section B sees more tremolo picking in the guitars and pounding double kick drums with frequent rolls. There is a synth arpeggiator mixed in playing a very neat chord sequence I fashioned out of a sort of dorian tonality. In roman numeral analysis, It'd look something like i9-i7-VIII7,9-vio7-ii6. Theres an ambient guitar in the foreground playing this same chord sequence with some dreamy delay, reverb, chorus and such. The riff is played 4 times and in the last time, a lead guitar joins playing some triplets and some tapping demisemiquavers.

Section A repeats.

Section B1 then repeats with a altered drum part with destructive black metal-esque blast beats. The lead section is replaced for an ascending scalic passage featuring some Satriani-inspired pick tapping

Section A1 is a repetition of Section A but features a repetitive melodic motif with occasional fills, chromaticism, loads of accentuated #4s to accentuate the lydian modality, and an accidental pinch harmonic that I didn't mean to play when recording but sounded pretty decent in my ears so decided to keep it.

Section B2 has the same exact rhythm but it's displaced 2 octaves higher except for the first low B. The lead sections is a tapped ascending sequence leading to a passage leading into the drum and bass solo.

The drum and bass solo! This section is 4 bars of fast double kick drums and a syncopated snare leading into fast rolls on the snare and toms. The bass plays a syncopated outline of a BmAdd9,7 chord. I'm not a bass player (I play with a pick ffs...) but this little bass solo was a challenge I set and it was fun composing it.

Then there is an exact repetition of Section A1 ending the song with a short outro section of an ascending sequence of chromatically descending notes. We finish with a huge perfect cadence ending in a BmAdd9,7 chord with the first three notes panned left and top three notes panned right to create a spacious wide atmosphere. During the dominant chord we have natural harmonics on the guitar being alternated between left and right.

Frail And Contorted:

The Intro section begins with a 3 against 2 polyrhythm in the cymbals with a bass riff. Ambient guitars slowly start to fade in playing the same riff and the kick drum starts intensifying by playing faster subdivisions until they reach a climax point and a very ugly bar of noise created by playing behind the bridge of the guitar which creates some very dissonant harmonics.

Right about there.

The Verse section sees the same exact bass riff now played on bass and on the guitar with a few filling notes.

The Pre-Chorus section is a djenty riff playing a minor second over and over again with a slight bit of rhythmic diminution in the riff and the snare pattern. Then a large compound minor second leap before entering the Chorus.

The chorus Begins with a long BmAdd9 chord being played by the rhythm guitars and being arpeggiated by the lead. Then a short segment of the main riff is stated. An A7 with no 5th is then held whilst the lead again outlines this chord. This is followed by a variation of the main riff. Then a repetition of the first section of the Chorus. Then after that we chug on a Do7 and play another variation of the main riff.

We then have a sort of Pre-Verse riff that features chugging on some power chords and some angular leaps. First we have a diminished 5th then a compound minor 2nd (those are like the metal intervals. I your song doesn't have those intervals, is it even heavy?) This is the repeated with a little bit of metric displacement to add some variation.

We then have the djenty riff again.

And the Chorus again.

Then the chugging riff again.

Then we have some ugly harmonics and a bass slide to take us into a 7 against 4 polyrhythm section outlining some chords and being djenty. Theres then another small section where we do the same chugging pattern we did on the Do7 chord in the Chorus section starting on C half diminished with no 3rd, then moving on to a Do7 then G#+ chord, then a lovely A7 with no 5th. The lead guitar arpeggiates these chords homorhythmically with the bass and rhythm.

The verse section comes back with a lead guitar playing some tremolo picking with a rising wah pedal slowly fades in then back out of the mix. And a huge B power chord to finish off.

Vermin:

OMG is that clean guitar? Hell yeah. An Intro Section with some clean arpeggios before a blisteringly fast drum fill comes in prior to exploding into a heavy as fuck riff with Machine Head-esque natural harmonics and some blast beats. We will call this riff "Section A".

We then go into Section B with another fast paced riff panned left whilst the right rhythm guitar plays a long D power chord and the drums accentuate certain beats (mainly 3 and 4) with cymbals and the Hi-Hat and a fast snare roll slowly crescendos in before the riff ends. The second time the riff is played, the drums, bass and right rhythm guitar jump in to add power and drive to the music.

Section C marks the entry of the lead guitar playing an almost brass-like fanfare rhythm whilst the drums play a similar groove. The rhythm guitar plays a similar version of what the lead is playing but 2 octaves below. The second time this riff comes around we see the lead guitar venture off into more rhythmically diverse territory after having established a strong rhythm in conjunction with the rest of the instruments prior. The lead guitar quickly becomes unsatisfied with melodic playing and resorts to playing a fast-paced ascending melody consisting of triplets making its way up the fretboard playing with legato technique then economy picking whilst the wah pedal slowly distorts the equalization. The end of Section C is marked by a descending sequence and some fast wah action.

Section A repeats.

A little interlude section we can call Section D features blast beats and a harmonic minor riff being harmonized repeatedly and rising wah.

Section B1 is a variation of Section B in a much djentier way. We have the typical djent delay+reverb+chorus lead guitar playing a little arpeggio whilst the rhythm guitar plays something very similar to what we played in section B but omitting some notes to create a more open sound for the ambient guitars to cut through in the composition and the mix.

Finally we reach the end of the song and the EP. We culminate this EP with some chuggy Rock N' Roll riff. A beautiful lyrical melody introduces us to this section and sees some variation and some pentatonic runs but we always return to this lyrical melody as the drums, bass and rhythm guitars start to fade out slowly and we are then exposed to the bare lead guitar and its harmony playing a melodic motif that has been present throughout the entire EP.