Our Top 5 Riffs/Tracks From The 2000s Rock Revival Era

Our Top 5 2000s Rock Revival Riffs/Songs

As the title states, this will be a list on the top tracks/riffs of the era - if you have any of your own favorites or recommendations, do share:

Arctic Monkeys - Fake Tales Of San Francisco: The 2:58 bombshell of a track features the heavy interlocking of guitars and groove between the bass and drums, making it highly danceable and sing-a-longy. The riff itself is such a catchy arrangement of notes, with Alex Turner on his strat playing the main riff WHILE SINGING WHICH IS HARD. My favorite part is the outro bit where the whole band runs into this driving section with the bass holding the key as a countermelody to the vocals with that really spicy lead line and its all held together by Helders’ tight knit but raw drumming.

Bloc Party - Helicopter: Do i even have to say anything about this song? The guitars play a huge role in this song, with its 2-part riff which interweaves itself into eachother. It’s jangly, it’s sharp and it’s genius.

The Strokes - New York City Cops: The 5-piece New York City band and their debut album ‘Is This It’, fully written by Julian Casablancas features track 9 being, ‘New York City Cops’. It sounds angry. It sounds furious. It sounds like you hit a cop in the face with a rock. The riff itself features a “hoppy” feel making it easy to dance to. And watching the band’s video performing it at their MTV live was honestly pretty life changing, everyone says that “theres nothing special about a I-IV chord progression with mainly downstrokes…” but I beg to differ. The simplicity of the riff is what makes it good, the accenting of the other instruments (such as rhythm guitar and bass) make the riff hit harder. There is a reason Is This It topped the charts in 2001.

The Vines - Get Free: One of the more aggressive tracks on this list, the growl of the double tracked guitars make the whole song sound big and as if you’re about to go break shit or something… The fact that this riff is one of the most simplest ones on the list, with it just being 2 notes and a bend, it completely outshines itself by it’s howling and angry tone. Couple in the fact that Craig Nicholls’ vocals introduce an edge to the song. (Do watch them live, older performances include Nicholls breaking the fucking set).

The Kooks - Naïve: The Kooks may be one of the first bands described by the NME as - “landfill indie”, while that may be true, you CANNOT deny that their first album ‘Inside In, Inside Out’, is full of 99% bangers and 1% stinkers (Got No Love…). However, ‘Naïve’ is amazing. That clean but kinda crunchy tone on the guitar accentuates the riff so much, making it really REALLY catchy. It’s really unique. I can’t say much about the riff itself, because I don’t even know what to say about the riff - it’s that good. The vocal melody and lyrics though. Amazing.

HONORABLE MENTIONS

Amazing songs that don’t make it to the list due to them being mainly chords:

The Libertines - Don’t Look Back Into The Sun: Pete Doherty’s and Carl Barât’s interlocking harmonies and just how coming of age this song sounds is so satisfying. It’s basically intro music.

The Hives - Hate To Say I Told You So: The aggressive wall of sound that The Hives created in this track (aswell as most of their songs), is projected heavily in the guitar riff and vocals. Making this track a bombshell and a great summarizer of the genre.