search: pop songs with weird time signatures and metric shifts

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Hey, 'Say a Little Prayer' totally counts! Nice one! The chorus has 2 bars of four, then one of 3, then repeats, and then has triplets on the climactic "heartbreak" line.

Maybe it's unfair to exclude Devo. But is Jocko Homo (Are we not men?) the only one?

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Saturday, 23 September 2006 09:24 (seventeen years ago) link

We should probably mention the only hit song (AFAIK) named after its time signature, Dave Brubeck's "Take Five" (so titled because it swings in 5/4).

― Dan Heilman (The Deacon), Saturday, 23 September 2006 13:14 (seventeen years ago) link

Hey Ya doesn't have any unusual time signatures. It just has a bar of 2.

It's a bar of 3, isn't it? What other pop songs have this?

― Cheek0 (Cheek0), Saturday, 23 September 2006 13:51 (seventeen years ago) link

I guess my question is, at what point does a song become "two bars of 4/4 followed by a bar of 3/4" instead of just 11/4?

― Cheek0 (Cheek0), Saturday, 23 September 2006 13:56 (seventeen years ago) link

Isn't "Follow You Follow Me" in 9/8 or sump'n or did I dream that?

― Dedicated to Jaggers Who Do Drive-Bys (noodle vague), Saturday, 23 September 2006 14:07 (seventeen years ago) link

Hang on, I meant "Turn It On Again".

― Dedicated to Jaggers Who Do Drive-Bys (noodle vague), Saturday, 23 September 2006 14:13 (seventeen years ago) link

steely dan's "dirty work" is missing a beat right before each chorus, it's done very smoothly though

― RalphTheHardDrive (RalphTheHardDrive), Saturday, 23 September 2006 14:15 (seventeen years ago) link

I think that counts as a metric shift.

It does, it's just not very unusual or weird in my estimation.

I guess my question is, at what point does a song become "two bars of 4/4 followed by a bar of 3/4" instead of just 11/4?

It depends on the accents. A lot of this ground was covered here.

― Steve Go1dberg (Steve Schneeberg), Saturday, 23 September 2006 14:51 (seventeen years ago) link

And really, sometimes there's no audible difference between, for example, alternating between 4/4 and 3/4 or just playing in 7/4, i.e. "All You Need is Love."

Part of "Tallest Man, Broadest Shoulders" or whatever it's called from Illinois is in 11/8. It's 6+5 or 5+6, I forget.

And "Everything in its Right Place" is in 10, I believe. It's 4+4+2.

― Steve Go1dberg (Steve Schneeberg), Saturday, 23 September 2006 14:54 (seventeen years ago) link

But "Hey Ya" isn't just 4/4 with a bar of 2/4 thrown in, is it? I count it as 11/4 (or two bars of 4 and one of 3, as mentioned above) and it seems others do as well. I'd like to get this sorted.

― Sundar (sundar), Saturday, 23 September 2006 15:55 (seventeen years ago) link

Does Metallica's "One" count?

― Sundar (sundar), Saturday, 23 September 2006 15:55 (seventeen years ago) link

(The way the drummer [Dre?] plays "Hey Ya," it's easy to count it as 22 8ths. I only noticed this after reading it, but it seems pretty clear to me now.)

― Sundar (sundar), Saturday, 23 September 2006 16:00 (seventeen years ago) link

As much as I hate to bring it up, Third Eye Blind's "Losing a Whole Year" qualifies...

― Myke. (Myke Weiskopf), Saturday, 23 September 2006 19:40 (seventeen years ago) link

"Here Comes The Sun" has a ton of weird stuff going on, esp. before, during and after the "sun, sun, sun, here it comes" bit.

― Douglas (Douglas), Saturday, 23 September 2006 20:39 (seventeen years ago) link

The extra beat in the otherwise straight-forward(ish) waltz of 'Golden Brown' by The Stranglers. Ja.

― Wax Cat (Wax Cat), Sunday, 24 September 2006 19:39 (seventeen years ago) link

kool & the gang "jungle boogie"

This is straight 4/4.

The verse in 'Hey Ya' is a six bar phrase where the last bar is 6/4 (or a bar of 4/4 and a bar of 2/4 if you want to think of it like that). Didn't we cover this at length in another thread?

― Jordan (Jordan), Sunday, 24 September 2006 20:09 (seventeen years ago) link

Does Metallica's "One" count?

I don't think so, the first section is in 3/4 then the rest is in 4. 'Master of Puppets' has an odd bar in the verse, though, if that counts.

― Jordan (Jordan), Sunday, 24 September 2006 20:11 (seventeen years ago) link

IIRC "One" switches back and forth between 3/4 and 4/4, sometimes with a 7/4 feel (like the 4/4 bar replacing 3/4 in the last bar of the verses), & some weird metric shifts in the intro. It also often implements sections of, say, 7 bars, rather than organizing them into multiples of 2 or 4 bars.

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Sunday, 24 September 2006 20:22 (seventeen years ago) link

I just realized that the accents in Tool's "Schism" (in 6/4, or 12/8, I suppose) form a mirror image within each bar:

^-^-^--^-^-^

(^ = accented eighth-note)
(- = unaccented eighth-note)

Perhaps to represent the idea of a "schism" itself. Maybe this is what people are talking about when they say Tool are clever/inventive (because to me they mostly just sound like a shitty rock band).

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Sunday, 24 September 2006 20:30 (seventeen years ago) link

IIRC "One" switches back and forth between 3/4 and 4/4,

Oh, you're right. And then in the section before the drum break, it's in 3/4 but the drums play through it in 4/4. Then the double-time section is all in 4.

(wow I had not heard this song for years)

― Jordan (Jordan), Sunday, 24 September 2006 21:28 (seventeen years ago) link

The verse in 'Hey Ya' is a six bar phrase where the last bar is 6/4 (or a bar of 4/4 and a bar of 2/4 if you want to think of it like that). Didn't we cover this at length in another thread?

Where's this thread? I'm pretty convinced of it being 4+4+3 right now.

― Sundar (sundar), Sunday, 24 September 2006 21:47 (seventeen years ago) link

"Hey Ya" (as written on the handy-dandy sheet music I have at hand) = 4+4+4+2+4+4

― Rodney doesn't like polka. He is racist. (R. J. Greene), Sunday, 24 September 2006 22:24 (seventeen years ago) link

Sorry, I actually listened to it this time: it's six bar phrases, but the 2/4 is in the fourth bar (so it's 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4, 1 2, 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4).

There's definitely no bar of three, because the backbeat never changes.

xpost

― Jordan (Jordan), Sunday, 24 September 2006 22:25 (seventeen years ago) link

Outkast - Hey Ya

― Jordan (Jordan), Sunday, 24 September 2006 22:26 (seventeen years ago) link

The most notable ones listed on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_works_in_unusual_time_signatures) are "Wired For Sound" by Cliff Richard (7/4), "Addicted to Love" (7/4 intro drum solo), and "I Love Rock n Roll" (a few 7/4 bars), but the one that really surprised me is "Buy Me a Pony" by Spiderbait, which is mostly in 6/4 and 7/4. Non-Australians probably wouldn't know it, but it's a classic in these parts.

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Sunday, 24 September 2006 22:38 (seventeen years ago) link

Yeah, I can hear "Hey Ya" as 4+4+4+2+4+4 now. I think I was counting the pickup as beat 1 before hence the confusion.

― Sundar (sundar), Sunday, 24 September 2006 23:11 (seventeen years ago) link

Go-betweens, "Cattle and Cane"

― scriblerus (mike lynch), Monday, 25 September 2006 02:34 (seventeen years ago) link

Annie's "Chewing Gum", maybe?

― daavid (daavid), Monday, 25 September 2006 16:47 (seventeen years ago) link

Chewing Gum is regular 4, isn't it? Although, admittedly, I can only remember the chorus.

― Wax Cat (Wax Cat), Monday, 25 September 2006 18:57 (seventeen years ago) link

There seems to me like a beat is missing somewhere or maybe an unusual part is accentuated. It just sounds odd. Dunno much about this really.

― daavid (daavid), Monday, 25 September 2006 21:37 (seventeen years ago) link

seven months pass...

I know it's not radio-friendly enough for the original question but how do you guys count Sunny Day Real Estate's "Seven?" I hear it as alternating between sections in 4/4 and sections in 5/4 (e.g. the bit that begins at 0:13, switching back to 4/4 around 0:40), but with tempo shifting at the same time so that one bar of 5/4 takes as long as one bar of 4/4 (allowing them to sometimes use similar riffs over both sections.) (I'm a little disappointed that none of it is in 7.) Am I off?

― Sundar, Saturday, 5 May 2007 14:28 (seventeen years ago) link

I don't understand most parts of music technically at all, but if I were to just go by ear, I'd guess that the Stranglers' "Strange Little Girl" might have this?

― Kim, Saturday, 5 May 2007 19:39 (seventeen years ago) link

xpost

I don't know that song Sundar, but what you're describing sounds like it could be playing quintuplets rather than changing meter.

Also not radio-friendly, but there's a song in 5 and a song in 7 on Final Fantasy's He Poos Poo. I don't remember the titles. I've wondered if that aspect didn't draw more commentary because of the lack of drums on the album.

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Saturday, 5 May 2007 19:47 (seventeen years ago) link

I just realized what Myke meant by the weirdness in "Ageless Beauty" -- I think it's how the bassline hits the home chord early in the chorus, before the downbeat. It's something you don't even notice because your mind has already set up the chords on its own, or something. It's nothing that screams "LOOK AT ME I AM OUT OF SYNC" (and I still wouldn't call it a matter of time sig/meter), but it is interesting nonetheless.

― Curt1s Stephens, Saturday, 5 May 2007 19:52 (seventeen years ago) link

It's a measure and a half of IV, then two-and-a-half measures of I, whereas it *sounds* like two measures of each.

― Curt1s Stephens, Saturday, 5 May 2007 19:55 (seventeen years ago) link

He Poos Poo

Classic typo!

what you're describing sounds like it could be playing quintuplets rather than changing meter.

Right, but it's the fact that the whole rhythm section seems to be switching to tuplets that makes me want to call it a time change.

― Sundar, Saturday, 5 May 2007 20:00 (seventeen years ago) link

Classic typo!

Heh, that was an intentional poke at the anti-poo folks.

Right, but it's the fact that the whole rhythm section seems to be switching to tuplets that makes me want to call it a time change.

Ah. Well, again I haven't heard the song, but I don't think the whole rhythm section switching to tuplets makes it more likely to be a time change. It's pretty much a purely academic distinction, so I'm not saying the song doesn't fit in this thread, but I'd try to think of which would easier to notate - bars of quintuplets in a constant meter would be pretty easy for a player to read (this is what tuplets are for, really), while constantly alternating meter and tempo would be really awkward.

― St3ve Go1db3rg, Saturday, 5 May 2007 20:20 (seventeen years ago) link

Yeah.

I'm starting to think now that I'm hearing it switch to six, then to five/quintuplets. Someone with a better ear for rhythm than me to thread?

― Sundar, Saturday, 5 May 2007 20:30 (seventeen years ago) link

Maybe not pop/rock, but certainly popular music, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Burt Bacharach have both done this a lot.

― Geir Hongro, Saturday, 5 May 2007 22:27 (seventeen years ago) link

Stevie Wonder: Livin' For The City

― Geir Hongro, Saturday, 5 May 2007 22:30 (seventeen years ago) link

First to come to my mind are both Grateful Dead songs.

"The Eleven" came to mind right away as its name is actually derived from its time signature (11/8). Also, early versions of "Playing in the Band" were known as "The Main Ten", a name also based upon its time signature (10/4).

My understanding is that, perhaps surprisingly, amongst its members, that Bob Weir was the biggest fan of odd time signatures. This bears out as "Lazy Lightning", "Supplication" and "Estimated Prophet" are all in 7/4.

Lest anyone uninitiated get the notion to seek out any of these tracks, I recommend "The Eleven" from Live Dead, although its 11/8 time signature might be difficult to pick out. You can really tell "Estimated Prophet" is in an odd time signature just by hearing it though.

― Saxby D. Elder, Sunday, 6 May 2007 00:03 (seventeen years ago) link

I know it's not radio-friendly enough for the original question but how do you guys count Sunny Day Real Estate's "Seven?" I hear it as alternating between sections in 4/4 and sections in 5/4 (e.g. the bit that begins at 0:13, switching back to 4/4 around 0:40), but with tempo shifting at the same time so that one bar of 5/4 takes as long as one bar of 4/4 (allowing them to sometimes use similar riffs over both sections.) (I'm a little disappointed that none of it is in 7.) Am I off?

-- Sundar, Saturday, 5 May 2007 14:28 (Yesterday)

nah, it's all in 4/4; the part you're talking about just has the measures broken up into four dotted 8th notes followed by two 8th notes, which is a fairly common syncopated rhythm (or at least, one I spend a lot of time banging out on tables).

― bernard snowy, Sunday, 6 May 2007 00:29 (seventeen years ago) link

[i]Perhaps to represent the idea of a "schism" itself. Maybe this is what people are talking about when they say Tool are clever/inventive (because to me they mostly just sound like a shitty rock band).[i]

Haha.

OTM upthread abt Spiderbait's "Buy me a Pony", and now I'm trying to figure it out in my head, I know it switches back and forth from 6/4 to ... shit, 7/4 or something? Arent all the 'bait guys formally trained jazzbos or something?

God this thread has made me realise I have completly forgotten all the music theory I studied :(

― Trayce, Sunday, 6 May 2007 02:15 (seventeen years ago) link

Fuck a nu ilx bb code grargh.

― Trayce, Sunday, 6 May 2007 02:15 (seventeen years ago) link

five months pass...

Revive on the back of Starless being all 13/8 and polyrhythmic and such.

I'll also chuck in Gorillaz's '5/4' just to sound clever.

― Autumn Almanac, Thursday, 25 October 2007 00:36 (sixteen years ago) link

"Wanderlove" by Claudine Longet, which alternates 6/4 with 4/4, I think. Extraordinarily pretty tune, written by Mason Williams though her version is much better.

― dlp9001, Thursday, 25 October 2007 01:21 (sixteen years ago) link

Not a huge hit, but De La Soul - Stakes is High

― Hurting 2, Thursday, 25 October 2007 02:13 (sixteen years ago) link

Also it's more of a strange number of bars per phrase for a hip-hop song than a strange time signature

― Hurting 2, Thursday, 25 October 2007 02:14 (sixteen years ago) link

50 Cent's "Like My Style" is in 7/8, if I remember correctly.

― Jordan, Thursday, 25 October 2007 02:45 (sixteen years ago) link

Genesis: "Turn It On Again". Some of their earlier material with weird time signatures may not be called "pop songs" but that one is, no doubt.

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 25 October 2007 09:20 (sixteen years ago) link

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