Rolling Music Theory Thread

But that A in no way feels like a dominant chord to me!

I can't hear the D to G as being I to IV either. It settles on the G.

It still feels like E minor/Dorian at that point to me. The chorus hinges on the chromatic descent E - D# - D - C#. I think the D# minor is subbing in for B major (the V chord).

It does to me, too, when it's on the E minor chord and even the chromatic chord, but I can't help feeling that it, again here, seems to rest on that A chord.

that is strange — I don't hear it resolving on the A chord at all!

Plagal cadence on A.

The melody does go to A (over the D chord before it and the A chord).

How would you number that chord? I know it's different because it's modal, but is it a IV chord because E is still the root?

Yikes! Why does chromatic harmony in a pop song move one to question the tonal centre?

Verse
i - IV - i - VI

Bridge
i - vii - bVII - IV

There’s no question the bridge remains in e-minor, the song is defined by i - IV - i movement and the cycle of the bridge continues to reflect that

What I wanna know is what happens on the last bridge into the outro! That part of the song always mystified me

Hm well on another listen, that farfisa’s overtones are just complicating my perception of everything about this song. This actually might be the most subtly complicated song I can think of and it’s weird I don’t know any other songs by this weird band

sorry, when i said "chorus" earlier i meant bridge and likewise "bridge" meant middle 8

Yeah I figured “bridge” meant “chorus”... the actual bridge (or middle 8) is v confusing! The ending too! I don’t have a piano on me rn

Why does chromatic harmony in a pop song move one to question the tonal centre?

I was responding above that I wasn't questioning it relating to the chromatic chord. The D to A that follows it feels like it settles on A to me, though, and there's zero pull back to E minor.

I'm calling that part the chorus, by the way.

The bridge (if that's what it is) - D to G to F# minor - those chords repeated once and then, likewise, feel like they LAND on the A chord to me.

(And I realize it would be A mixolydian)

Ya I get you. I’m hesitant to fall into modal descriptions in chromatic music like this BUT the prevalent open fifths in the vocal harmonies did make me think there was some compositional desire for that manner of interpretation

Alternating E major 7 and D major 7 with that movable bass in the outro?

So, Picardy!

Speaking of this weird band and their other songs, this is their masterpiece:

https://thisiheard.blogspot.com/2016/01/the-strawberry-alarm-clock-pretty-song.html

The one good thing about Coldplay is when it hits you feel no shame about whatever crap you're calling "music" and putting out into the world

The Coldplay/Chainsmokers hit "Something Just Like This" came up in a presentation at SMT in the fall and it just came to mind now as an interesting case when I was thinking about chord progressions and tonality because of a dumb post about pop chord progressions on a classical music FB group. D is the clear tonal centre imo: the melody is completely centred around D, the song starts with D-A repetition in an upper voice, and there is a pedal point on D throughout the first verse and at times afterwards. (Wikipedia says it's in B minor but this seems very wrong to me.) However, I don't think there are any root position I chords at all until after the 3m mark here. (Second-inversion I chords, which don't classically have tonic function, are sometimes produced when the vocal melody places D and F# over As in the accompaniment, e.g. "Hercules and his gifts".) There are some D major arpeggios in the upper keyboard voice around 2:20. The bass motion for almost the entire song is ^4-^5-^6-^5 and we keep coming back to full-on IV-V-vi-V triads. (I imagine the way Bm works like a kind of tonic substitute harmony is why a Wikipedia author identified it as the key but the melody just doesn't support a tonal centre on B imo.)

I actually like Coldplay and was just really feeling the mashup with that post

Ha, yeah, I just thought it was funny that that was what came up when I searched for "coldplay" on this thread. I'm interested in more examples of pop songs with clear tonics that avoid or significantly delay the I chord. A Katy Perry song was mentioned on a theory forum I used to read some years back - "Last Friday Night", I think?

(If anyone hears the tonic of "Something Just Like This" differently, I'm up for discussing that too but I think it's p clear. I saw an online chord chart that identified the key as G major which no imo.)

it was a common trick for katy perry, i think fgti even wrote something for slate about teenage dream

That is correct, although I used "Teenage Dream" as an example (I think "Last Friday Night" is decisively in a minor key). I also cited in passing iirc EWF "September", Fleetwood Mac "Dreams" and "Viva La Vida"

Ah, thanks.

I probably just misremembered the Katy Perry song.

stevie nicks seems to use that trick a good amount in her songwriting--lots of circular progressions that never really settle in major or minor.

I think it intuitively comes to a lot of songwriters (and that charts and the resonance of particular tracks tend to favour songs that do it)... overall I don't think it necessarily needs to be an outright "denial of the tonic" so much as the tendency of certain songs to avoid it creates a harmonic buoyancy, this kind of not-settling that creates the sensation in the listener of "travelling"

i don't know what thread to put this in so i'll put it here. i am losing my mind over how perfect this contraption is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3F-vMXuyE5k&list=PLPYiCOgE6NBTQn3qAZUKeGQN8J8S72wz4&index=1

ugh, let me try that again

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3F-vMXuyE5k

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jobhw89wiFc

I think "Last Friday Night" is decisively in a minor key.

I'm curious why! It ends on an F# major chord and I'm not sure that the melodies frame the notes of D# minor any more than they do F# major.

Well like I said, pop songs are strengthened by tonic ambiguity and the main chorus melody is centred around the theoretical tonic of a major that never appears? Instead it keeps dipping to the minor where that “tonic” is the third and suggesting that it’s in a minor key and it works with the content and mood of the lyric

Yeah, I almost feel like the D# minor chord falling on the third measure of the four-bar cycle gives it enough resonance to register as a tonic. That's a weak rhythmic spot for the tonic to fall, but not as weak as the second measure would have been.

it's the Get Lucky progression with the first two chords reversed

the "tonic ambiguity" thing i think is typically pop songwriters loving the IV chord a whole lot. and they'll throw in the ii chord in order to switch up the bass note while keeping that IV feel going.

(VI and iv respectively in minor, obv)

I feel like the reversal of those two chords makes for a more inventive and interesting progression than "Get Lucky." There's no way "Last Friday Night" is resting on B major just because the cycle leaves you there on a downbeat to end the song, whereas "Get Lucky" could easily end on a B minor chord.

Somebody buy this book and report back: http://www.davecreamer.com/TheOctatonicSystem.html

Seems like a lot of it is on Google Books.

There’s some line in there where he describes bebop scales as a “rudimentary approach.”

Recently came across this blog and from what I have read really like the way the guy thinks and explains: https://antonjazz.com/2012/11/dominant-scales/

Andreyev in the house!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLEwuo5R-tQ

This master's thesis seems to have some interesting stuff in it
HARMONIC RESOURCES IN 1980S HARD ROCK ... - OhioLINK ETD

This looks even better
https://www.amherst.edu/media/view/379212/original/Walser+-+Eruptions-+Heavy+Metal+Appropriations+of+Classical+Virtuosity+.pdf

Hm. Maybe not. It is kind of interesting though.

Not a theory question per se but I can’t remember what the relevant thread is so: how do I shot what beat the Hendrix version of “All Along the Watchtower” starts on?

And of 3. It’s confusing because the crash hits, four bars later, on the and of 4, and the band doesn’t hit the 1 very cleanly. Good Q though, it confused me for a second, and I had never thought about it

Here's a dumb question, because I am dumb when it comes to this stuff. In a lot of Latin music a common sound seems to be a minor key but with the major seventh used a lot, like in a montuno. What would you call this? I don't think it's one of the regular modes, right? Is it just always considered a passing tone?

Like say in the melody to this tune. Let me know if I'm mischaracterizing this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_M9Bv1FmwM

On first listen, isn't this mostly just harmonic minor? Or is there a specific harmonic structure or melodic movement going on that you're asking about? The sixth and seventh scale degrees are variable pitches in minor keys in standard functional harmony.

Oh lol I guess it is just harmonic minor, I was just looking for the name of the scale. And I used to be obsessed with harmonic minor! But I think because I don't regularly interface with a melodic instrument (besides the computer), the specifics of scales always leave my head as soon as I'm done writing a part or whatever.

Heh, no worries. I've blanked on stuff like where Dvorak was from in front of a class before.