“The last thing you want to do is play a widdly-widdly riff that’s getting in the way of the vocal”: Those Damn Crows’ Ian ‘Shiner’ Thomas on how to write a No.1 album, what he learned from Nirvana, and the Slipknot riff he wished he wrote

Ian "Shiner" Thomas of Those Damn Crows onstage playing to a festival crowd with his Gibson Les Paul. He wears a baseball cap and sunglasses.

There is a mechanical efficiency to modern pop songwriting. It is art as engineering, a process that can – and has – been codified in a formula. Just think of the ABABCBB structure. Like the screenplay for a blockbuster, the pop song is gamed out from the beginning. Sure it’s a little bloodless but is effective. That’s pop. The question is: Can you do the same for rock?

Ian “Shiner” Thomas might be able to tell us. He is the guitarist with Those Damn Crows, and the Welsh rockers have just scored a number one album with God Shaped Hole. Whatever they are doing, it’s working.