Songs with the 'I Wanna Be Your Dog' chord progression

Yes, this one works. As for the rest (Submission??) I don't really hear it.

Dark Entries!

(four chords rather than three, but even so)

Probably.

Tim McGraw, "Renegade" (1995)

Tim McGraw, "Renegade" (1995)

Great bump. A++++

I can't believe somebody on this thread dissed "We Will Fall".

archigram - doggystyle

Sonik Yoot - "White Kross" ?

-- Noodle Vague, Wednesday, March 14, 2007 2:17 PM (7 months ago) Bookmark Link

that was my first thought, but i think its just the gtr rhythm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54yjLSmXtV0

"magic potion," at least sun dial's cover of it. i've never heard the original open mind version, but i think it came out in 1969. that would be funny if it sounds like the sun dial version, and "i wanna be your dog" follows the "magic potion" chord progression. or i guess not that funny

there was some song by gvsb that had a similar progression -- bulletproof cupid?

NIWBYD is soooo classic, one of Ig's great moments (and the sleigh bells make it even more evil)

Suicidal Tendencies - "I Saw Your Mommy"

Can, Outside my Door

Is there not a Spacemen 3 song that does this?

"PAT! THE TRIP! DISPENSAAAAHHHH!!!"

Is there not a Spacemen 3 song that does this?

You might be thinking of their cover of Mudhoney's When Tomorrow Hits

I was just working on the assumption that all their best songs pilfered riffs from the Stooges (OD Catastrophe), the MC5, Lou Reed etc...

i interviewed Mark Arm once and he told me that they chose to cover Sonic Youth's 'Hallowe'en' because most SY songs used puzzling tunings, but 'Hallowe'en' sort of devolves into 'IWBYD' after a while, and Mudhoney knew they could play that.

You might be thinking of their cover of Mudhoney's When Tomorrow Hits

...which was itself basically a Wire ("Lowdown") ripoff. It gets confusing after awhile...

Peglegasus, "Marcus"

As for "1969", that two-chord riff shows up in The Byrds' "Gathering of Tribes" and (at twice the speed,) Ted Nugent's "Wango Tango".

Swell Maps, "Harmony In Your Bathroom"

You're obsessed!

i think "bulletproof cupid" by girls against boys sorta has it, maybe?

You're obsessed!

Not really. I just keep hearing these songs by accident; it's not like I'm looking for them. The chord progression just jumps out of albums at me.

OMFG I can't believe none of you came up with the most OBVIOUS and GLARING and ILXY one: "Premature Burial" by Siouxsie & the Banshees. Quick! Go listen to it and see.

I like that word "ILXY" and look forward to reading it in future threads

Almost none of these songs have the same chord progression.

Plastic People of the Universe, "Toxica" (though eventually it turns into more "30 Seconds Over Tokyo," maybe appropriately given its title.)

Almost as a dissonance (which might reinforce the idea of the song tending more toward minor modality).

To me the whole point of playing power chords is that it's tonally ambiguous. Doesn't make any sense to try to nail it down like that.

I agree, wk. I was just saying what I would do if I were forced to write Roman numerals.

tim: That riff (it's barely a 'progression') is really just prolonging the tonic. As such, the F# and C# are important parts of the melodic gesture but they don't carry structural/functional weight.

yeah, I was agreeing with you

To me the whole point of playing power chords is that it's tonally ambiguous

Yes and no. When you play a G power chord and E is the tonic, no one is going to think it's G minor.

If the bass just stayed on E, I might agree more with the idea that it's just a prolongation of the tonic and not a progression, but I'm not sure I do as I hear it.

As for functionality, you could just say both the G and the F# chords are movement away from the tonic (or back towards the tonic without any cadence with the F# chord).

Sund4r and wk otm.

Also, since when did C# over an E chord imply major, have you heard of the Dorian mode, Tim?

I think we've even had a thread or two dedicated to that mode.

Warning: undergrad theory below

To clarify my terminology: I'm using terms from common-practice theory but I don't think they're too inappropriate in this case. Take this progression (assume this is a single phrase):

I-ii[6]-V[4/2]-I[6]-IV-ii-V-I [PAC].

Here, I-ii[6]-V[4/2]-I[6] is all what we call the tonic area of the phrase. IV-ii is the pre-dominant area. V is the dominant area and I is a return to the tonic after V (with cadence). Even though I-ii[6]-V[4/2]-I is a chord progression, because of its position in the phrase and the inversions that are used, all the progression is really serving to do here is to expand or elaborate on tonic harmony, so I call this a tonic prolongation. And then, I would say that this V[6] carries less structural weight than the V at the cadence.

All I'm saying with this is that wrt the main riff of "I Wanna Be Your Dog", it doesn't even matter whether you think of it as a chord progression or a melodic gesture: it never really departs from the area of tonic harmony and so I say it is prolonging the tonic. (There is more movement during the other riff.)

There are no G or F# (major) chords in the song! They are G5 and F#5 and always presented with a tonic pedal. There is a difference. If you include the bassline and count the tonic pedal as a chord member each time, you could analyse the main riff as i[6/5]-ii[7]-i if you really wanted to do a Roman numeral analysis. This is actually a very standard tonic prolongation pattern: you find variants on it all over Schubert, for example. (Tbh, an ostinato bassline that goes G-F#-E should provide enough confirmation that this is not E major.)

this V[6]

V[4/2], sorry

Yeah, I understand the premise of that analysis of different areas of that progression. And I understand the premise of saying the three chords in this song are all just tonic prolongation. But where would I draw the line?

Take the Sonics' version of "Louie Louie" as an example. They don't play the regular chords of the song - they play I-bIII-IV instead. I'm not sure why I would want to say that the chord in this song is any less of a bIII (or III chord if you want to say that we're in a minor mode) chord than the one in their "Louie Louie."

(Other than, yes, I know, you don't hear the third in this song. But like I said, no one's going to guess that it's G minor.)

since when did C# over an E chord imply major

Yeah, that's a decent argument. I mean, of course, it's a major sixth. I suppose it doesn't really reinforce my thinking of it as being in E major, though.

It would be interesting to know if Ron Asheton had his index finger on G# when he played E (even if he didn't actually play that string when he hit the chord).

My point with the "Louie Louie" argument is this - that song's only three chords, too. One of them's a subdominant. Are those three chords all tonic prolongation, too? If not, I don't think this song is either (because I'm not sure there's a significant difference).

I'm slightly drunk and never listened to the Sonics song before tonight but listening to it now, I'd be fine with saying it's an extended tonic prolongation too, yes. In fact, I think that was probably part of the point of their changing the chords: to reduce the sense of harmonic movement/progression. There's a greater sense of tension in the Sonics' version compared to the Kingsmen's.

The pedal point is another difference between the Stooges' song and the Sonics'. Even if you analyse it as an inner voice, it still makes that 'III' chord seem more like an inverted i. (I would normally try to analyse mediant triads as tonic or dominant harmony when possible anyway.)

I think that was probably part of the point of their changing the chords: to reduce the sense of harmonic movement/progression.

Yeah!

I agree with all that other than to maybe make a case for mediant triads as just really significant things in their own right in rock and roll, distinguishing them from inverted and embellished tonic or dominant chords.

What about I-IV-V songs? I was trying to think of examples and came up with a couple - "Do You Love Me" by the Contours and "Gee" by the Crows. In both songs, you have passages where the chords are moving quickly through the cycle and then there are passages where it clearly builds slower toward a cadence. Are the passages where the chords are changing quicker all tonic prolongation, even though there are IV and a V chords?

Almost none of these songs have the same chord progression.

― billstevejim, Saturday, May 2, 2009 9:41 AM (4 years ago) Bookmark

― wk, Saturday, August 3, 2013 1:19 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

OTM, in any transposition. Not in any stretch. Not even with theory snobbery removed. All the songs xhuxk has mentioned go I-bVII-vi or I-V-IV or something like that, which makes me wonder if some people hear "I Wanna Be Your Dog" (basically G5 - F#5 - E5 with a high E drone) as being in G instead of E?!? i.e. the same chord progression as "Oh Yoko". Is that possible?!

Oh, "Venus and Furs" and "Phoenix" obv excepted :)

I think people were mistaking riffs that have a vaguely similar rhythm and contour as having a similar 'chord progression'??

(Btw, "G5-F#5-E5 with a pedal point on E" was the first thing I said. 'Theory snobbery' only came in when I had to argue the point.:P)

nah man I wasn't calling you a snob at all, your breakdown has been interesting. Just trying to point out that when people are saying "not the same chord progression" it's not because of some subtle difference, it's because they are completely different. Did you try singing I wanna be your dog along with Oh Yoko yet, btw? Kinda fun

It's cool, fgti. Was feeling defensive, I guess.

This revive turned out to be pretty interesting. Enjoyed everybody's comments.

Just started burning that massive history of female punk. Don't much care for this, but it clearly belongs:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VxILA32Nd4

Buzzcocks, "Something's Gone Wrong Again" has not only the riff but the exact same one-note piano as the original.

Hmm, this thread - most of these songs are nothing like I Wanna Be Your Dog chord progression! Bela Lugosi's Dead and the end of Mudhoney's Halloween definitely are though.

Was wondering about this...would some of those curious examples be given if thread title asked for 'riff' instead of 'chord progression'?

Ty Segall - Manipulator

Chrisma, "Black Silk Stocking"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DY-MYND-zg

Alternative TV, "Splitting In Two"

The Fall managed it twice - the peel session version of Clasp Hands used it too...

― Geoffrey Priory (big peach), Saturday, September 16, 2006 12:34 PM (fourteen years ago)

Thrice if you include "Big New Prinz" which is like a mash-up of "Rock & Roll pt 2" & "IWBYD".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wygQmJ59E4Q

Yo La Tengo - "Flying Lesson (Hot Chicken #1)"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEVK7oJNw5A

Just heard “Phoenix” by The Cult blasting out of a nearby barbecue place which brought me to this thread.