Alter Bridge guitarist Mark Tremonti is making a name for himself under his solo act Tremonti and his third album Dust is full of bursting creativity from the axman featuring an impressive lineup complete with Eddie Van Halen’s son Wolfgang on bass, guitarist Eric Friedman, and drummer Garrett Whitlock. 

Tremonti handles vocals in his own band and he told BraveWords about increasing his reputation as a lyricist and vocalist and not just being a guitarist:

“I’ve always been a songwriter. I’ve always written lyrics as I’ve gone. Then usually whoever’s singing for whatever band I’m in takes charge and finishes the lyrics. I really think whoever’s singing should write the majority of what he or she is singing about so they can feel fully invested in it. Now that I’m doing the solo stuff, and I know 100% of those lyrics are coming from me… when I had to do 20 songs in this last session, it was a daunting task but it was a good challenge. After you get through obstacles like that, going forward I’ll never doubt myself. You just have to get through a record or two before you really get that total confidence you can do it.”

Mark also talked about his lyrical approach: 

“I’ll scat vocals on top of whatever I’m writing at the time. I pretty much improvise vocals, almost like a rapper would,” jokes the mild-mannered musician. “I’m just trying to spit out whatever fits the melody. I think a lot of people would be surprised just how close the final lyrics come to what’s spit out at that moment. I’ll listen to these ideas over and over again to organize them. I’ll get used to the vowel placement and the rhythm of the lines; then when I go back and finalize lyrics I’ll try to mimic it as closely as possible. It makes it easier for me to fill in all the lines. I’ll have a key sentence that really creates the subject matter of the whole song.”

Read more here.