Many people, actually, millions, have seen and heard how The Axis of Awesome perform dozens of songs to the same combination of 4 chords. I noticed the significantly often used pattern about two months before seeing the video, while actively learning songs on my acoustic guitar. Of course, at that point (16 years, I think), I'd rather learn songs people would like to sing with me in parties, and coincidentally, the people I drunk with wanted Zombie, Numb, It's My Life and some other junk. Same chords, alright, but how many are there like that? Lauzto Siržu Dziesma, Christian, 9 Crimes, Crawling, alright, what the fuck. Then I saw The Axis of Awesome doing this and now I'm cursed. The same chords everywhere, every genre, in every key and every rhythm, and I notice every time.
If all the cases were transposed to one key (I will use C major or the parallel key of A minor), the sequence is C-G-Am-F or Am-F-C-G. Now, it doesn't really matter, which chord is the first, because the overall sequence is the same and the same effect is achieved.
Technical details aside, I went through my phone playlist, which contains about 300 songs, and came up with a list of pieces, that I currently listen to, that have the 4 chords hidden somewhere:
Holiday
Little Talks
Motion Picture Soundtrack (In the chorus)
Scenic World (2nd version)
Sinepes (Par Raimi)
Prom Uz Siltajām Salām (Partly - there's an 8 chord sequence: C-Am-Am-F-C-G-Am-F)
Tavas Mājas Manā Azotē (In the chorus)
Friday I'm In Love (8 chord sequence: C-F-C-G-Am-F-C-G)
Okay, not that bad. However, there is a very similar structure, that replaces the G chord (V) with E or Em (VII or vii). G and Em are very related to each other, 2/3 of the notes for the two chords are the same. Replacing G with Em sounds similar, but creates a rather sad feeling (because it is a minor and minors do that). If it is replaced by E (major), there is one additional note added - G#, forcing the Am to become a harmonic minor.
So, there are 2 new sequences:
C-Em-Am-F = Am-F-C-Em
C-E-Am-F = Am-F-C-E
Of course, this is a stretch of the original idea, but in reality, it is quite possible to replace the G with the Em and vice versa in many cases. If you're thinking "But you can't replace the chords, that's changing the song", that's exactly what my hypocritical guitar teacher once said and I can argue about this for a long time before getting tired.
Here's a list of songs in my phone playlist, that correspond to the new structures:
Covergirl (The instrumental parts in beginning and after chorus)
Empathy
Jeanne (Chorus)
La Redécouverte
Untrust Us
Blue-eyed Matador
Ashes (parts)
Crimewave (8 chord sequence: Am-F-Dm-Em-Am-F-C-Em)
I Belong To You (chorus, starts with E, but the sequence is the same: E-Am-F-C-E-Am-F-C-E)
Of course, there are hundreds of songs like these, RHCP alone have at least 5 of them: Snow, Under The Bridge, Otherside, Dosed, Don't Forget Me. Muse has occasional sequences hidden in New Born and Map Of Your Head. Many techno and electro songs have it as well. Pete Doherty is Fucking Forever to the same background.
Rob Paravonian explored another sequence. Chorus of Hush and Hey Joe use the same chords.
There is not a single problem about this. The trouble starts, when all your songs sound the same, despite varied chord progression, rhythm and tonality. But it is still better than not writing songs at all, which is currently my case. Two songs. What the fuck am I supposed to do with 2 songs.
No comments:
Post a Comment