Following IVF, storks resort to temp work delivering new riffs to Jet. Image: Sweded.

In the chart-oriented pop sphere, the hooks that used to come from middle-aged Swedish men are now supplied by African-American robots. Hip-hop producers can tinker with minimalist bleeps or tribal rhythms or Bollywood ornamentation and invent something fresh enough to have a two-month life as a ringtone.

Greased-up rock’n'roll bands, on the other hand, have been cursed with the same equipment for half a century. One errant synthesiser or trumpet and the rock act has officially become something else, something “experimental”. Therefore proper rock’n'roll bands are left to live or die by the stickability of their riffage. Despite the prevalence of stylistic tricks (like crabcore), most bands with guitars are leaning on a long legacy of 4/4 guitar-slinging.

Jet are notorious cribbers. Check the debate about which band they ripped off for their new, barely top 40 single ‘She’s A Genius’. Those reliable YouTube posters posit the Knack (ie, ‘My Sharona’), “Jack White’s band” and Cheap Trick’s ‘He’s A Whore’ and there’s a fairly decent case to be made for the first and last suggestions. Regardless, one poster possesses a deep understanding of what signifies a rock song’s success: “This is the best riff of 2009 so far in my opinion.”

We still worship the riff, if AC/DC’s half-a-million ticket sales for their February tour are any indication. This foundation stone of Australian rock actually gathered mostly positive reviews for their first album in eight years, 2008’s Black Ice, and it wasn’t because they started experimenting with crunk or psych-folk. The new riffs, from a band whose ages add up to 285 years, seem to be hitting the spot.

During a recent conversation with Dave Wyndorf, the supreme ruler of 20-year-old New Jersey galactic rock titans Monster Magnet, I got to ask the question: Mr Spacelord, where do new riffs come from?

“Oh, man, there aren’t any new riffs!” Wyndorf cheers like the Central Casting rock dude he is. “I ask myself this all the time. How can this happen? How can I bring myself to pick up a guitar when every great riff has already been done? The trick is, you fool yourself into thinking it’s a new riff. Sometimes I will copy a vocal part as a guitar riff. I’ll hear a vocal part off an old record, like a Grand Funk [Railroad], record and I’ll hear Mark Farner going ‘Eyyyy-eyyy-eyyyy’ and I’ll play that on the guitar. All of a sudden it sounds kinda like a new riff.”

Trust Dave, he's a rock star.

As usual, Wyndorf is on a roll: “I think back to one of the greatest stories of all time about rock’n'roll guitars. Rock’n'roll guitar was pretty much invented by Chuck Berry; the way he played guitar. He was copying piano licks. All that stuff was him trying to sound like a piano player. I always think of that, so I’ll go and rip off a melody line or I’ll plagiarise a rhythm, a drum beat. Rather than listen to the guitars I’ll listen to something else. Then, that combined with my limited physical talent on the guitar – I’m not that good so I have to modify constantly – and by the time it’s modified and put through the Influence Machine it comes out somewhat different.”

“That’s a really good question because how many really good riffs are there left?” he says with mock despair. “There can’t be that many.”

But I still keep hearing great ones, I protest. Particular bands, like the Hives, still keep coming up with kick-arse riffs.

“The Hives are masters of it,” Wyndorf enthuses, “One of my favourite bands of the last 20 years. They come out with these riffs that are unforgettable. And they’re really simple.” He sings me one, unrecognisable but undeniably catchy and simple. “They’re just ripping along and doing this stuff and I go, ‘Wow’. I never ask any questions. It’s funny, when you really like something, you don’t ask that many questions. You just make sure it’s cool and other people might not find out you’re swiping it from the Kinks or whatever.”

I spoke to Hives guitarist Nicholaus Arson a couple of years ago and posed the same question of him. With the band’s trademark satirical chest-puffing, he said they employed hundreds of workers at a riff mine in their home town of Fagersta in Sweden. Much like Wyndorf, I’m going to choose to believe that.