How To Write A Concept Album Part 2 -
Creating Your Characters

Creating the characters for your Concept is an extremely important part of the writing process. The types of characters you can create could be, but are not limited to:

• The Protagonist (The Good Guy)
• Do you want more than one?
• The Antagonist (The Bad Guy)
• Creatures
• World Powers
• God
• You need to decide if God exists in the World, or if there are multiple gods.
• Aliens
• Nature
  If used correctly, things such as the weather can be used as a character in your story

Depending on how "Sci-fi" your story is, some of these things will or will not apply.

For example, if you are writing a story about two people who fall in love, chances are there will not be any Aliens in your story.

The Protagonist

This "Good Guy" is basically the guy whom your story revolves around.

One thing you want to remember is your protagonist doesn't have to be "Clark Kent Superman, Doing everything right and is always there to save the world". This Does not have to be your view on the protagonist.

This Does NOT have to be your Protagonist

You may want to make him a more realistic protagonist. Or you might want to make him not even a good guy at all.

The point is not that he is the good guy, but that you have the audience see from his perspective.

Remember the movie "Despicable Me"? The protagonist of the movie was...

...an evil mastermind!

Also you want to keep in mind that you might have multiple protagonists.

For example, in the Concept Album I am currently creating, I have several different protagonists all over the world, and they all have their own unique perspective on the Disaster that is taking place on the Earth.

The Antagonist

This is your "Bad" guy. The best way to describe the Antagonist is to just take everything I said about the Protagonist and reverse it. Not every story has to have an Antagonist.

The point of the Antagonist is to give conflict in the story, making it more interesting.

Some stories have "Bad situations" to act as the Antagonist. A good example would be a Romantic Comedy, where the guy accidentally gets two dates. It's an awkward situation, but there's no actual "Bad Guy", instead the Tension acts as the "antagonist. (And yes, I realize that was a ridiculously retarded idea for a Romantic Comedy, Just humor me okay?)

Creatures

Now this is generally for the more weird out there. I enjoy creating some really weird creatures to give more of a unique effect to my story.

Obviously, if you are writing a more Non-fiction story then you probably won't have to invent any of your own creatures.

Perhaps you could be this creative someday

For the Cedric Bixler-Zavalas out there, creatures may be the thing for you. But you'll have to use a bit more of your imagination, and will need to be able to draw your ideas on paper.

I'm a terrible artist, but I can get the main idea on to paper, and then I get someone who is talented to finish drawing a good copy for me.

World Powers

Does your story go to the effect of Global Proportions? Is your world taken over by some Communist government? That would be more where this category applies.

What if your story took place in some Nazi-occupied area....but instead of in Europe, it takes place in Africa! An Alternate reality!

Seriously, you have all the room in the world to be as creative as you would like to be. I consider what I just said a mildly creative Idea, and I just made it up on the spot! Think of what you could do if you put all your emotion into your idea.

Just take some time, and think about how your world is run by the people who are "In Charge".

Speaking of "In Charge"....

God

What if you decided that you wanted God to take a role in your story?

Heck, what if you are the type of guy who likes Greek Mythology, and you use all the Gods of Athens to create your concept album?

The Eye Of God

Or you could use the Traditional Christian God to give your story more of a grounding, and to help emphasize morality and the issue's of right and wrong (If your story has a main emphasis on the contrast between right and wrong actions).

What if there was a world disaster, and in your story, you said that it was God's way of punishing the world for their sins etc. That's just an example that I can come up with from the top of my head, but you get the idea.

Aliens

Are there any outside influences that are..."Out of this world"?

It might be important to include. Perhaps you have a unique idea on Aliens, and would like to incorporate it into your story?

After all, this is music. This is how you portray all of your values, beliefs, and ideas to an audience.

So...Do you believe?

Nature

I have already discussed the aspect of a world disaster, but what if you decided that you wanted Mother nature to play a different role?

What if your story is about a man traveling through the Arctic. He has to battle the Cold, and Storms while out on sea.

How will Nature Affect your story?

You should decide whether or Not Nature will take a place in your story.

Important!

Now I can't write your story for you. But I can help. So the best thing you can do would be to go through each of these sections (Nature, God, Aliens etc.) and just give a Yes or a No to whether you want them to have a part in your story.

Once you do that, you will have a much clearer Idea about what you are writing.

These are the foundations to building your story, and I think 90% of people creating worlds and stories forget to build this "Checklist", so to speak.

Checklist

• Looked Through Each Idea and Decided "Yes" or "No" to whether I wanted to include it in my concept
• Fleshed out the idea's that I want to keep, and decided their role in my story.
• Did NOT go overboard and include every single aspect (ie. Religious Aliens Causing Natural Disasters that Control the World Powers).

Go Back To Part 1 Planning Your Concept

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Andrew Muller is the Editor of TheRealMusician.com. He lives in Chilliwack, BC, Canada and spends much of his extra time writing articles, playing and writing music, setting up and playing concerts and demolishing video games.

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