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What chords do you need?

jefftk.com

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Re: What chords do you need?

#171

Post by iainmerrick »

coliveira wrote: post #168
bambax wrote: post #15

The obligatory video is of course "Four Chords" by Axis of Awesome: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pidokakU4I Rick Beato has kind of the opposite video about "the most complex song ever": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnRxTW8GxT8 The song in question is Never Gonna Let You Go by Sergio Mendes; plenty of videos exist of it; here's one live: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOPh3bTglak

Rick Beat is trying to deceive you. If you really believe that this Sergio Mendes song is complicated, you need to listen to some older pop songs. For example, Stevie Wonder is a good composer to start.

Yes and no —- it’s definitely pretty far out there for a mainstream 80s pop song, and a bit more fiddly at first glance than your average Stevie Wonder song.

I think the trick is that it’s bossa nova, which tends to have a lot of those semitone shifts that Rick highlights. The Girl from Ipanema is the classic example.

I love that they seem so complex when you look at the individual chord movements, and yet the melody flows very naturally (to my ears, anyway!)

The effect in Never Gonna Let You Go feels a bit like the dramatic key change you often get right at the end of those 80s ballads, but smoothly integrated throughout the whole song. I can well imagine some hate that, but I love it!

Re: What chords do you need?

#172

Post by xaedes »

travisgriggs wrote: post #169
cactus2093 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, I really disagree. I do agree the page is refreshing compared to a lot of the internet these days, just because it has no ads and no glitchy, laggy SPA animations or slow loading times. But it's pretty extreme to pretend that none of basic design practices adopted over the past 30 years have any merit whatsoever. This design is not good. The black text on white is too much contrast. The default browser t…

> The black text on white is too much contrast. This statement intrigued me. Without getting into what is fashion and progress (because I am NOT a designer), I was curious what is "too much" contrast. There's lots of literature out there about applying too much contrast in image/photo elements. But here, we're talking about text, and this honestly piqued my interest. Too little is usually pretty obvious. But what is…

There is a minimum contrast specified for a reason, because more contrast is better to read.

Modern designers argue that high contrast is "harder on the eyes" and they seem to prefer solid colored boxes. It is a real pitty, infested the web with sites that are basically gray on gray. Great, the text is now out of the way for the beautiful design and the eyes can relax from all the reading. Except when you actually want to read it.

No really, low contrast text is a real strain and these "too much contrast" arguments are too blame that it still happens.

Re: What chords do you need?

#173

Post by iainmerrick »

hamburglar wrote: post #32
hejpadig wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of stuff is fascinating to me, that we can react so differently to music and specifically to various chord progressions. Of course personal taste is inscrutable in some sense, but could it also be about conditioning? E.g. if you listen a lot to certain types of jazz you might get used to some stranger chord movements. I have a lot of friends who cant stand Steely Dan progressions for example, though I love…

I do think conditioning must be a big part of it. I hadn’t ever listened to this song since getting a little familiar with music theory but it was certainly on the types of playlists my parents listened to when I was a kid. Listening to it now, I can see what’s unusual about it but it never would have occurred to me to consider it hard to listen to. Repetition legitimizing and all that. My parents weren’t jazz listen…

For me a big part of what makes this song great is that it sounds so innocuous. It’s a nice, catchy, easy-listening pop ballad. As Rick says incredulously at several points “this was a number one song!”

Re: What chords do you need?

#174

Post by tastysandwich »

One thing I've realised is the difference between great songwriters, versus great "players".

Flicking through my songbook, so many great songs are just a few basic chords. Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah - C, Am, F, G, E. Somebody to Love by Jefferson Airplane - Em, A, D, G. Hound Dog is just A, D, E.

Blitzkrieg Bop is just a few power chords the whole song. One of the first songs I learnt but heaps of fun to play!

I have way more admiration for good songwriters. I love Cat Power, and many of her songs are pretty simple & sparse. Leonard Cohen wasn't known for being a guitar virtuoso, and neither was Neil Young. But I'd take them any day over, say, John Mayer. I'm sorry John Mayer fans, but just because Neon is difficult to play, does not make it a good song.

As I practice and get better at guitar I try to take inspiration from great songwriters rather than great players.

Re: What chords do you need?

#175

Post by QuercusMax »

eatonphil wrote: post #61
usrn wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO: It's much better to understand how to construct chords and then play music and memorize them by trying to play both the melody and some kind of accompaniment. You end up getting stuck in situations where you need to rearrange the chord or learn a new one and you can build them up that way without drilling.

I do know the basics of chord construction but it's still way easier to think through it on a piano because keys are all linear whereas with guitar strings you have to translate across strings with varying relationships. Not saying it's impossible it just takes more work to internalize that on guitar than piano. And I'm not there on guitar.

I'm right there with you - I have lots of experience playing songs on piano with just lyrics + chords, and I use all kinds of inverted chords without even thinking about it. "Reading" the keyboard is much easier than reading the fretboard.

One other thing that makes it harder on guitar is that the chords that are easy to play are often various inversions, so your "A" chord might actually be a first or second inversion. I'm still just learning movable shapes on the guitar, and getting the fingerings right is tricky as things grow and shrink moving up and down the fretboard, something that also isn't a problem with keyboards.

Re: What chords do you need?

#176

Post by smackeyacky »

tastysandwich wrote: post #174

One thing I've realised is the difference between great songwriters, versus great "players". Flicking through my songbook, so many great songs are just a few basic chords. Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah - C, Am, F, G, E. Somebody to Love by Jefferson Airplane - Em, A, D, G. Hound Dog is just A, D, E. Blitzkrieg Bop is just a few power chords the whole song. One of the first songs I learnt but heaps of fun to play! I have…

It's amazing how much Kris Kristofferson or Townes Van Zandt get out of simple chord structures. Of course, they mix it up with a few hammer-ons and intermediate open strumming when performing but still, the beauty they discovered and that you can reproduce at home with really basic skills is incredible to me.

Re: What chords do you need?

#178

Post by iainmerrick »

tallies wrote: post #141
pythko wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t really understand that idea of complexity, but Rick Beato is addressing this song from a music theory perspective, and I think this song would meet anyone’s definition of complex when it comes to theory.

There's no one 'music theory perspective'. Why not analyze it on more axes? - Rhythmic patterns and variation - Interplay between instruments - Instrumentation and arrangement - Structure - Vocal style - Lyrics - Recording and mixing By these metrics (and the ears of 99% of its listeners) it's a more or less generic 80s adult contemporary song. Yes it has a weird chord progression. Would it be more complex if it coul…

By these metrics (and the ears of 99% of its listeners) it's a more or less generic 80s adult contemporary song.

That’s what the word “pop” is being used for in “the most complex pop song ever”. Rick Beato is giving an example of a literally popular song, one that somebody suggested they perform an impromptu concert because it was in the charts at the time, and which sounds totally mainstream, and yet has a very unusual chord progression.

And I think “music theory” in this context is basically jazz theory, where a song is boiled down to what you’d see in the Real Book - melody line, chords, and a description of the tempo and groove. Unless you’re doing big band, instrumentation is one of the standard small combos, or just whatever musicians you have to hand. Which again is reasonable in the context of “here’s a song we tried to busk in a scratch group, and it turned out to be crazily complicated”.

He’s not claiming it’s Schoenberg or anything!

Re: What chords do you need?

#180

Post by djsavvy »

crawfordcomeaux wrote: post #133
hejpadig wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of stuff is fascinating to me, that we can react so differently to music and specifically to various chord progressions. Of course personal taste is inscrutable in some sense, but could it also be about conditioning? E.g. if you listen a lot to certain types of jazz you might get used to some stranger chord movements. I have a lot of friends who cant stand Steely Dan progressions for example, though I love…

After accidentally abandoning my likes/dislikes and disengaging disgust, my experience of music viscerally changed. I can enjoy all music now. So much of it is conditioning, maybe all of it. There's conditioning around chords, progressions, dissonance, harmony, repetition, subjective ideas of what constitutes music, and so much more. The only way to prove it isn't mere conditioning is to remove the conditioning and t…

Love to hear this. How did you accidentally abandon your likes and dislikes?
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