Rolling Music Theory Thread

I am in the "G, obv" camp on this one but am pretty startled that Nicole Biamonte apparently disagrees with me and seems to be using voice-leading as an argument.

I always enjoy the final chord of "the song remains the same," which is in D. The guitar plays an A note and the vocal rounds out an F chord.

xpost I don't even really hear the melodic descent she's talking about in that note as being particularly significant in this song. The resting chord in the progression seems to be the G; the licks seem like straightforward G pentatonic stuff and don't really make sense to me in D Mixolydian; the melody mostly hangs on D but comes to rest on G, suggesting dominant-to-tonic motion.

It's no secret that musicians aren't always good analysts of their work btw.

although actually the story I heard before was that the band thought it was in G and the producer thought it was in D

the melody mostly hangs on D but comes to rest on G

OK, well, it doesn't always really do this and I guess that's the source of the ambiguity.

Ha, I found an old conversation from some years back where I said I could hear it in D.

@ Sund4r I am amazed that anybody could possibly hear "Sweet Home Alabama" in anything other than D-mixo and the live video posted above sounds like somebody in the band exercised veto power of stupidity. Jot down the melody or the guitar riff and they are both 100% functional D-mixo melodies that show zero-allegiance to G. I wonder what key these guys heard "You Can't Always Get What You Want" in

although actually the story I heard before was that the band thought it was in G and the producer thought it was in D

the guitar riff

Isn't this D5 (arpeggiated) - C5 (arpeggiated) - octaves on G - A-B-D-E-D-B-G?

That last lick seems like a really obvious G pentatonic line to me. I don't see how you could see zero allegiance to G. The vocal melody is what complicates things.

(I was with you on Daft Punk btw.)

I am in the "G, obv" camp on this one but am pretty startled that Nicole Biamonte apparently disagrees with me and seems to be using voice-leading as an argument.

OK. I just finally listened and I agree with Sund4r and crüt.

That is not a C5 though, it is a C9, the D is suspended over it. Is there a single F# that resolves to a G in this song? my memory recalls none. F#s always behave like the third of the I chord, not the third of a V chord

You never hear the C behaving like the IVth note of G either... it never creates a D7 chord. If the C9 was a C42 then I'd buy it but this is these are textbook modal cadences.

(Xpost) I am hearing the chords as landing on G. I don't understand argument that a melody could clearly be in D Mixolydian and have nothing at all to do with G- same set of notes, no, unless it kept landing on the note C where somebody said it was a G chord.

But I just read latest owen's latest post and I willing to consider it.

OK, I see his point. But I am used to hearing that cadence in a different harmonic rhythm - one bar of C, one bar of G, one bar of D.

Sorry I meant two bars of D

I'm serious about "You Can't Always Get What You Want", that is another D-mixo song (I can't recall what key it is actually in but you know what I mean). No V-I cadences, the melody plays around with the exact same weighting and shapes, but clearly, clearly, mixolydian. No C-chords per se but C-naturals appear in the string outro

Sweet home Alabama is in d. It never really rests on g. The song is always itching to get back to d when it's on the g.

y'all are nuts!!

That book none of you will ever read discusses this very problem here: http://books.google.com/books?id=K69vQY3RnZUC&pg=PA32&lpg=PA32&dq=%22jeff+brent%22+%22care+must+be+taken%22&source=bl&ots=NwbysDLMA5&sig=E0jVYJ-NZSB833IxWsoGJzjh_iM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=XZhQU6iNMaKT0QGW-IDQBA&ved=0CCQQ6AEwAA

That book is my version of hell. Serious: jot down the melody and tell me how it behaves even remotely like it's in G-major

Find an example of a song with a V-VI-I progression where the melody begins on the VII and always falls

xp that is true. I'll concede that the melody sounds good over IV-V-I on D.

Going to admit that I'm really exhausted and stressed tonight so may have been saying something knee-jerk. Should probably listen and think at a more lucid time.

We have a winner.

lol

So now trying to think up other tunes that do this to firm up my feeble understanding. Let's turn to Revolver, aka The Mixolydian Album. Anything similar? First thing that comes to mind is "Taxman" which seems to be in the same key of D7 and have the same progression on the chorus.

Guess the I chord is the, um, Hendrix chord, which might confuse a bit.

I think "Sweet Home Alabama" trips me up because it's in the same key as "Werewolves of London" which is definitely V-IV-I on G. But "Sweet Home Alabama" is just your standard blues I-IV embellished by a bVII, I guess? I've definitely learned something important from this - thanks!!

Yeah, thanks.

Trying to read that paper. She calls these changes or this cadence the "double-plagal progression" and gives lots of examples, including "Taxman" and "Sympathy For The Devil." Also refers to ideas in this paper http://www.mtosmt.org/issues/mto.04.10.4/mto.04.10.4.w_everett.html

Don't worry, Owen, we won't make you read any papers, just show us the light when we make a mistake.

Don't be shitty about it. I was not aware of Walter Everett's classifications but note that girl is referring to all the same examples I referred to off the top of my head upthread (Phrygian + "Army Of Me", Lydian + "Pretty Ballerina") but when she starts talking using phrases like "low-scoring" with regards to Beck songs I am thinking I am glad I don't write papers

Sorry, I was trying to be nice. I should have put a smiley or something.

Interesting that her other example of double-plagal is the outro to "Hey Jude" which, like "Sweet Home Alabama"-- if we are considering it as being in D-mixo-- has the vocal parts singing the tonic over the bVII and IV

real-naming reads as passive-aggressive, just saying :) real :) this is a good convo

Sorry, I actually felt bad about real name usage but have trouble remembering your screenname and hard to see on iPhone through zing touch.

What about the Birmingham "boo boo boo" line - F and C there. Not making it easier to classify the song as either in G or D though.

Got home finally and was able to relisten to "Sweet Home Alabama" AND: on the first chorus-first stanza there's an explosive C! chord there leading back to D, but more importantly is the secondary plagal cadence F-C-D (guitar line A-G-F#!) into the guitar solo which so decisively and obviously establishes D as the primary key centre-- this is your "boo boo boo", too, but F-E-D in the vocals--

But yeah, that second guitar solo is so clearly performed by somebody who is feeling G as the key centre that yeah my ears are confused, but at least the first guitarist and pianist are in accord

Also there's no A chord in the song - another bit of evidence for G

that second guitar solo is so clearly performed by somebody who is feeling G as the key centre

So I still don't think that it is a black/white, right/wrong situation. Even 'that girl' (who chairs the music theory area at what might be the country's top music school and edits theory journals) refers to it as an "ambiguous". I think there are elements that suggest a D centre and elements that suggest a G centre. In fact, the ambiguity is part of what makes the song interesting. When I said that musicians aren't always good analysts of their own work, I meant that they're not always good at describing or explaining it. I don't think you can really say, however, that the lead guitarist was wrong here or that the band was wrong in how they ended the song live. (I really don't think they were going for a cliffhanger 'half cadence' ending there.)

The vocal melody does point to D as a centre. However, I don't really agree that the riff in itself clearly suggests a different tonal centre than the "Werewolves of London" riff, even with a D suspended over the C. (It's not like most modern artists follow CPP voice-leading principles.) I think a lot of the lead guitar licks throughout the song are based on a G maj pentatonic scale. If I make an effort, I can hear it Hurting 2's way but my intuitive response to the guitars is to hear G as the resting place. The way the vocal line pulls away from this (imo) creates a kind of tension that makes this song interesting to me. It's a duck/rabbit thing: I don't think either view is wrong.

I was not aware of Walter Everett's classifications but note that girl is referring to all the same examples I referred to off the top of my head upthread (Phrygian + "Army Of Me", Lydian + "Pretty Ballerina")

In conclusion, Skynyrd = Bartok.

Yell at me to go mark some exams if you see me on here again today.

I think the fact that they end this song in G on that live recording with a big G-establishing "yeaaaahhhhhhH!!!!!" says more about band dynamics than it does about the song's tonal centre.

Amazing thread

flam otm

I think it's more that they end it in an unusual place. You're not used to hearing G occur at bar one (if you're counting it as four bars). Bar three, where it usually occurs, is a weaker place to end it, but there's a live Zevon youtube video where he ends "Werewolves" there.

(Or sorry flam, not that it's "more" about that, but that it's ALSO about that.)

Isn't this D5 (arpeggiated) - C5 (arpeggiated) - octaves on G - A-B-D-E-D-B-G?

That last lick seems like a really obvious G pentatonic line to me.

By starting on A, I hear it as an anticipation of the D chord.