Total Guitar - May 2000

By Sian Llewellyn

Want to have a go at writing your own songs? Or think songwriting is easy? Well, as SIAN LLEWELLYN found out, sometimes even the masters have problems finding the muse. Goo Goo Doll Johnny Rzeznik tells all..

Many people start their musical career by slogging away in cover bands, before they discover their own talent for writing songs, but for Johnny Rzeznik is was a different story. "I never really played other people's songs, I could never figure them out. I wanted to write my own.."

Writing songs, though, is not always an easy task. While some people enjoy the collaborative process - Lennon and McCartney, anyone? - it's not Johnny's favourite thing. "Sometimes it works pretty well, and I'll do it once in a while,"he explains. He does, however, seem a little reticent about it. "The only problem is that I have got a pretty clear idea in my head about where I want things to go. The translation from my head to the tape is sometimes pretty difficult. If you get a lot of people involved in the process it can screw it up. I don't really speak a musical language, I can't read music and I don't write chords or anything."

Many arguments have raged concerning the validity of formal musical knowledge versus good songwriting technique. Johnny, however, is undecided. "All I know is that when I'm playing freeform kind of stuff - and I have been in a room with lots of classically trained musicians - some say, 'I can't jam, I don't have a sheet of music in front of me.'I'll say, 'Well there isn't one, I'm making it up,'and many can't cope with it. But I do keep thinking that I will take a few guitar lessons but it won't expand what I know how to do, and that's writing songs."

Weird and Wonderful

One of Johnny's songwriting secrets is the mysterious world of open tunings. He uses some which he terms simply as "wacky". Take Iris for example, the Goo's biggest hit to date. "It's hilarious because that's like five Ds and a C," laughs the guitarist. "The low E is a bass string because I couldn't get a guitar string to play that low."

The great thing about unusual tunings, Johnny maintains, is that there are no hard and fast rules to restrict your creativity. "I never really choose a tuning by using tuners or anything - just dig round until you get something that sounds good and take it from there. It's strange because you have to reinvent the wheel every time; you come up with these chords that don't make any sense in the real world. One twist more and it becomes completely useless. It changes everything that you're used to."

And the key to breaking out of a creative rut? "Make yourself go in the opposite direction,"Johnny states emphatically. "It's great when the song is like a gift, and then you can run the idea in your head but when you're filling in blanks - and there are always blanks - the inspiration will last a second and the rest you have to work at."

The adage of 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration is clearly true for Johnny, "First there's inspiration, then the tinkering around, then the chord structure, then the actual song and arrangement. Once that's all taken care of, I usually have a few lyrics in my head. The music is really important, it sets the tone of how you are supposed to feel."

The Grammy-nominated musician has a simple piece of advice for people writing their own songs, "Find what gives you goosebumps and forget the books,: he says. "Do what you want and that is really all that matters."

And as for his own songwriting ambitions? "Well, I want to just keep getting better...." And he will, don't you worry.

The second track from the Goo Goo Dolls'phenomenally successful Dizzy Up the Girl is indicative of Johnny Rzeznik's strange tunings. Pete Callard is our man struggling to get his guitar back to normal!

The Goo Goo Dolls are a three piece band from Buffalo, New York, comprising of Johnny Rzeznik on guitar and vocals, Robby Takac on bass and vocals and Mike Malinin on drums. Starting life as a punk rock outfit, they released their first album in 1987, but it wasn't until their fifth album, 1995's A Boy Named Goo, that they started to become widely known.

The more commercial direction adopted on this record continues with last year's album, Dizzy Up the Girl, which contains the singles Slide and Iris (featured on the City of Angels movie soundtrack) and current release Black Balloon. Slide featured on the TGCD in issue 59 and, according to Johnny, is about a "Catholic boy's discovery of girls, life, sex and facing up to your responsibilities...."

Slide Rules

Using one of Johnny's favourite songwriting tricks, the song is in the unusual tuning of (low to high) Eb Bb Eb Ab Ab Eb, which created the open chords and arpeggios central to the song's sound. There are tuning notes on the CD for reference.

As Slide features various acoustic and electric guitar parts, I've transcribed the most prominent ones. Most of the chords are based around open strings with one or two fretted notes, and the electric parts initially back up the acoustic guitar strumming and them become more prominent.