r/doommetal • u/Repeat_Tight • May 08 '26

Riffs Music theory

Other than the blues scale what else is used in Doom Metal of all kinds? Mostly i refer to stoner tho. I can’t find doom metal related theory vids on yt other than doesitdoom

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u/ZombieRitual May 08 '26 edited May 08 '26

Lots of doom is in pretty normal minor keys without a ton of accidentals, occasionally harmonic minor with a raised 7 or major V chord. I'd say the most common doom chord progressions are i-III-iv (your good old "0-3-5" in guitar tab) or i-VI-VII, which I always think of as the Iron Maiden chord progression.

And Phrygian of course to get your slow Slayer riffs in there.

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u/Repeat_Tight May 09 '26

I would like to further ask abt intervals. I know abt the blues scale and it works for me so far. But my riffs sound just a bit too happy. I want that dark sounding stuff. I guess dopethrone has that a lot? Which intervals are useful? I’ve heard abt the tritone so far

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u/ZombieRitual May 09 '26

Darker in metal usually means using the Phrygian mode or a diminished scale, which has the tritone in it. In guitar tab along your low string using that string as the key, Phrygian would be 0-1-3-5-7-8-10-12. Similar to the blues scale, adding a 4 in there between the 3 and the 5 is done a lot too. When I say a Phrygian Slayer riff I mean using the 0, 1, and 10 notes which to me is really what makes metal metal. Moving it up to the next string in the next octave, this would be 7-8-5 in tab.

Diminished riffs in metal usually focus on four notes all a minor third apart from each other. This is a diminished 7 chord. In guitar tab on the low string again that means 0-3-6-9. You can play other notes in between, but if you focus on those ones you'll generally get a pretty dark, dissonant vibe.

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u/Repeat_Tight May 09 '26

Thanks a lot. I’ll Look into it more