Ask Geir Hongro

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geir: melody or harmony?

― fact checking cuz, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:27 (nineteen years ago)

geir: bass clef or treble clef?

― fact checking cuz, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:28 (nineteen years ago)

Well shit, it's not fair if only Geir gets to answer.

Paul McCartney, iim7b5 -> I, at least four, guitar, snare, melody, and none of the above (alto clef).

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:29 (nineteen years ago)

geir: veronica moser or st3ve go1db3rg?

― fact checking cuz, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:29 (nineteen years ago)

Well, I will have a degree in music composition soon, so I'd like to think I know a little bit. I'm just saying that it's weird how people talk about Geir like he represents this sort of caricatured academic classical musician or something but he never seems to say anything substantial about theory or classical music.

Please feel free to start a "Ask Steve Goldberg" thread, Steve Goldberg.

― Pleasant Plains, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:29 (nineteen years ago)

veronica moser: st3ve go1db3rg or geir?

― fact checking cuz, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:29 (nineteen years ago)

st3ve go1db3rg: geir or veronica moser?

― fact checking cuz, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:30 (nineteen years ago)

xpost to Brigadier:

I'm pretty much the whitest person amongst me and my friends, and we're all pretty white. Funk just doesn't do that much for me. But I have been inquiring at my local used CD store about Parliament-funkadelic records, and they assure me that they're going to have a bunch out during their big sale on May 23, so give me a few weeks. Sheesh. (On a funny side note, when I asked the clerk about said records, he told me that George Clinton had come in a few weeks ago looking really old and worn out, and it took him a couple seconds to realize who it was. Apparently he smokes LOT of crack [George Clinton, not the clerk].)

― Jeff Treppel, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:30 (nineteen years ago)

xpost

But that would be improper!

fact checking: st3v3 goldb3rg or geir?

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:30 (nineteen years ago)

Paul McCartney, iim7b5 -> I, at least four, guitar, snare, melody, and none of the above (alto clef).

effort much appreciated. unfortunately, in this thread the only person who can grade your answers is geir. i will be of no use here.

― fact checking cuz, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:31 (nineteen years ago)

the only person who can grade your answers is geir

I hope he doesn't give me an F minor.

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:32 (nineteen years ago)

(This is the greatest threat in the history of ever that I've looked at today)

― Jeff Treppel, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:33 (nineteen years ago)

(thread, not threat. But I supposed threat works too)

― Jeff Treppel, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:33 (nineteen years ago)

I used to get very frustrated by the rigidity of Geir's opinions and then trife was like "he just likes what he likes, why is everybody on ILM so uptite about that" and he was right - he doesn't hate hiphop, he's not an ignoramus. He just has very narrow tastes, which is no crime and is not even an aesthetic crime!

One could take him to task for the way he construes musical history in a rather uninteresting way (rise of melody - golden age of melody - decline of melody & onset of musical decadence: this is faulty model for describing the movements of culture, albeit a very popular one) but I no longer find his tastes offensive nor even particularly strange

― Hans Rott, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:36 (nineteen years ago)

aww man, i don't think he's playing ball…

Please contribute more to this thread, Msieu Hongro.

― Veronica Moser, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:40 (nineteen years ago)

Geir doesn't bother me. I'm honestly curious what his top 10 heavy metal albums are!

― Jeff Treppel, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:41 (nineteen years ago)

of course he's not playing ball - you're being incredibly condescending to him

― Hans Rott, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:46 (nineteen years ago)

Geir has been getting condescended to on the internet for over a decade now, and he remains very much in the game!

― nabisco, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:50 (nineteen years ago)

I have never had an issue with Geir. My question is an honest one that I could ask anyone who has gone on the record of having musical taste completely opposite of my own.

― NYCNative, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:53 (nineteen years ago)

nabisco you have a point!

― Hans Rott, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:56 (nineteen years ago)

you might even say he's......OTM!

― M@tt He1ges0n, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:59 (nineteen years ago)

it's 1 am in norway, i havent had time to put every ilm thread in a different safari tab and check through them all for geir activity but dude is probably asleeps

― A B C, Monday, 30 April 2007 22:59 (nineteen years ago)

So what is it that you don't like about his music/influence?

Minimalism, repetitiveness, way too few chords, way too little melody. And this goes for the early stuff too, although to a smaller extent.

However, the worst thing about James Brown isn't his music, but the fact that he is to blame for rap.

Geir: Name the top ten heavy metal albums of all time, please.

Depends on your definition, but if you count Van Halen, Def Leppard, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppeling and Deep Pruple as heavy metal, it would be fairly easy :)

what is the best chord change?

The more surprising, the better

how many chords should a song have?

The more the better, as long as they keep it tonal. Filthy dylan mentioned "Bohemian Rhapsody" and it's enormous number of chords, and that one's my favourite single ever. :)

which is the better instrument, bass or guitar?

Guitar is more useful. But keyboards beats both. :)

kick drum or snare?

I think I take a 4/4 disco beat rather than a Eurodance beat. So snare, then :)

geir: melody or harmony?

They belong together, but I'd pick melody if I have to choose.

What are your favorite Nickelback lyrics?

Probably none of them

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:14 (nineteen years ago)

Geir: Name the top ten heavy metal albums of all time, please.
Depends on your definition, but if you count Van Halen, Def Leppard, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppeling and Deep Pruple as heavy metal, it would be fairly easy :)

In the grand Chuck Eddy tradition, metal is what you make of it. So bearing that in mind, what are the Top Ten Metal albums of all time according to your definition of what is metal and what is not?

― NYCNative, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:16 (nineteen years ago)

"Geir has been getting condescended to on the internet for over a decade now, and he remains very much in the game!"

Precisely! he could have not answered at all, given that my cards 'o condescension were on the table up top. But he did. I'm also geniunely interested as to any answers he might offer.

I find it remarkable that he is always utterly unaffected (as far as one can tell over the netweb) and oddly polite, given the hostility, sarcasm, and, yup, condescension directed towards him here.

― Veronica Moser, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:19 (nineteen years ago)

Geir, what is your job?

― JW, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:23 (nineteen years ago)

Do you have a girlfriend/wife/boyfriend?

― JW, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:23 (nineteen years ago)

what is the best chord change?

The more surprising, the better

Surely you don't mean that literally, Geir? Especially considering your next answer comes with the qualifier "as long as they keep it tonal" - which is kind of a loaded statement in itself.

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:26 (nineteen years ago)

Dear Geir,

Is it normal for a 25 yr old guy to only want to make love to me twice a week (every three days) . We have been married for two years and everytime i hint about it, he tells me he doesnt have bullets... its like he feels dry.... does anybody else have the same problem, or should i be lucky?

― Z S, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:29 (nineteen years ago)

So bearing that in mind, what are the Top Ten Metal albums of all time according to your definition of what is metal and what is not?

1. Van Halen
2. Hysteria
3. 2012
4. Pyromania
5. Caress Of Steel
6. 1984
7. Fly By Night
8. Deep Purple In Rock
9. Adrenalize
10.Led Zeppelin (4)

Surely you don't mean that literally, Geir? Especially considering your next answer comes with the qualifier "as long as they keep it tonal"

As long as every single one of the chords themselves are tonal, I stand by that.

Is it normal for a 25 yr old guy to only want to make love to me twice a week (every three days) . We have been married for two years and everytime i hint about it, he tells me he doesnt have bullets... its like he feels dry.... does anybody else have the same problem, or should i be lucky?

I guess you should ask as sexologist. :)

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:30 (nineteen years ago)

a even

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:30 (nineteen years ago)

As long as every single one of the chords themselves are tonal, I stand by that.

Chords can't be tonal, though - only chunks of music can be, and the notion of tonality itself is a little bit ambiguous. And by definition if you exceed seven chords you're not playing in just one key (like most classical music), and I know some of the stuff you like gets a little chromatic (60s pop and such), so I was wondering what you meant by those comments. Surely the "most surprising" chord change would be something totally non-diatonic and weird, and if all chord changes were really surprising you'd basically get atonality.

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:34 (nineteen years ago)

Geir: Splendid! Taking it a step further are there any Black Metal bands you like? While it seems unlikely you would like any Death Metal, some of the Black Metal stuff might have enough melody in it to at least pique your interest, yes?

― NYCNative, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:37 (nineteen years ago)

Chords can't be tonal, though

OK, but not too dissonant then. Obviously, if you play 2-3 dissonant chords in a row it may be neccessary to follow them with a less dissonant one to keep the feeling of tonality.

But really, the chord changes I like best are more about modulations to surprising keys. My all-time favourite chord-change is the sudden and unprepared change from C-major to F-major at the start of the middle-eight in "From Me To You".

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:37 (nineteen years ago)

Taking it a step further are there any Black Metal bands you like?

No. Unless you count Metallica as black metal ("Metallica" probably should have been in the list), but in their "fast" 80s they were more thrash/speed metal than black metal.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:38 (nineteen years ago)

I would imagine you were aware of the black metal/church burning/Mayhem/Count Grishnackh feud in the early '90s, GH. What were/are your impressions of that scandal? It would seem you wouldn't dig much of the music that came from that scene, but what do you think of Emperor?

― Veronica Moser, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:39 (nineteen years ago)

which is the better instrument, bass or guitar?
Guitar is more useful. But keyboards beats both. :)

do you ever wonder why brian wilson and paul mccartney -- hey you haven't answered that question yet, btw!!! -- both chose to play bass in their bands? (yes, i know they both play other instruments including your treasured keybs, but what do you make of their gravitating toward the bass?)

― fact checking cuz, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:39 (nineteen years ago)

I would imagine you were aware of the black metal/church burning/Mayhem/Count Grishnackh feud in the early '90s, GH

Aware, yes. But I still dislike absolutely everything I've heard in the genre very strongly.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:40 (nineteen years ago)

do you ever wonder why brian wilson and paul mccartney -- hey you haven't answered that question yet, btw!!! -- both chose to play bass in their bands?

In the case of McCartney it was a coincidence.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:40 (nineteen years ago)

Geir was at the same school as varg I think. I'm sure i saw him say that somewhere.

So geir, did you know him? What was he like at school?

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:42 (nineteen years ago)

Nope. Øystein Aarseth went to the same high school, but I didn't really know him. His younger brother was in my class though.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:44 (nineteen years ago)

Ahh ok.

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:44 (nineteen years ago)

okay, but did you think what occurred in the black metal scene was abhorrent, or fascinating, or something else? my impression is that it very much consumed Norweigian culture/media at that time…

― Veronica Moser, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:45 (nineteen years ago)

okay, but did you think what occurred in the black metal scene was abhorrent, or fascinating, or something else?

A little bit of both. I mean, obviously very abhorrent, but also kind of fascinating in a weird way. As a militant anti-Christian I almost found satanism kind of funny, but only if it was meant as a joke. When these guys did obviously take it seriously, the fun was gone.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:46 (nineteen years ago)

What of my jazz question, Geir?

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:49 (nineteen years ago)

Well, there is a lot of great jazz, but also some I absolutely cannot stand. I don't really understand jazz the way the people who are into it expect a jazz listener should though.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:51 (nineteen years ago)

What Ulver discs have you heard, Geir? They seem like someone you might actually like... Scott/Phil to thread for recomendations...

― NYCNative, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:53 (nineteen years ago)

I may have heard Ulver and I may not. I know I have heard Satyricon and Dimmu Borgir, and they are seen as sort of the most "accessible" within the genre. I just don't tolerate grinding or fast metal guitars.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:53 (nineteen years ago)

xposts

OK, but not too dissonant then.

I don't think you mean that, either! Part of the compositional chops of bands like The Beatles, The Beach Boys, and The Zombies was clear in their effective use of dissonant chords that less talented pop songwriters wouldn't go near. Anybody can write a nice consonant, tonal song with only I IV and V - but McCartney and such knew how to throw in those diminished sevenths and augmented chords and what have you. That's why they were good!

But really, the chord changes I like best are more about modulations to surprising keys. My all-time favourite chord-change is the sudden and unprepared change from C-major to F-major at the start of the middle-eight in "From Me To You".

I think I've seen you say that before and I thought it was weird then, too. Modulating from C to F is completely unsurprising, the modulation in this case is a pivot chord modulation and is not sudden and unprepared, and it's far from the most remarkable or unexpected harmonic trick The Beatles employed.

So I'm still a bit perplexed.

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:54 (nineteen years ago)

Modulating from C to F is completely unsurprising

In rock, in 1963, it wasn't.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 30 April 2007 23:56 (nineteen years ago)

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why do i have "talking to a computer" in my head on christmas night 2025?

― jaymc, Friday, 26 December 2025 04:24 (five months ago)

Why exactly christmas night I cannot answer, but it does pop into my head now and then as well, say once every two years. Idk maybe because it's a reasonably righteous song, and very very catchy? I tried to reconstruct the chorus in my head now, before trying to find it (not heard it for ~15 years I guess): it's on spotify and I think I was about 70% right.

― anatol_merklich, Friday, 26 December 2025 23:46 (five months ago)

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