"...for patterns.
This is what I found."
The idea is interesting, but I wish it went a little further. I guess maybe worth keeping an eye on him to see where he goes.
That's an interesting thing and worth keeping an eye on...at least I will being a kind of pet thing, especially at the moment....
The important thing to understand is the 'function' of things in relation to a key, this little applet is really good as it scrolls through these things as the song plays....
www.hooktheory.com/analysis/view/the-rolling-stones/satisfactionThis shows the melody contour as well, but as the song plays you can see a line moving through the 'functions' of the chords (the way they relate to one another) in that case above, a basic 12 bar 3 chord blues progression. And this is a useful thing, very useful. A lot of the tunes are only looking at a tiny part of a tune, say in 'wish you were here' the thing is only looking at the verse...
www.hooktheory.com/analysis/view/pink-floyd/wish-you-were-hereBut, for many it could really be of a great benefit to hearing these things and seeing all the commonalities there and robot or know, must have taken a fair bit of work and growing
...
Lately I ahve been really taken with Rikky Rooksbys books of a similar nature, in particular
How to write songs on gutiar : a guitar-playing and songwriting course which analyses some 1,800 songs...very clearly written and easy to understand and a good read and really a bargain.
Of particular value is the chart on page 42 that has the chords of all the keys (in this chart major keys) with C major in the middle. In this book, he quite rightly 'skips' the Vii chord in the keys because it is rarely if ever used...how often do you actually see a half dim chord, more likely it will be an inversion like G/B in the key of C.
What is cool about Rikkys thing though, is that he takes the 6 chords
I, ii, III, IV, V, VI...C,Dm,Em,F,G,Am
"these are the most important chords and sound good in any order"...
to this he also adds, 3 "flat degree chords"
bVII, bVI, bIII...Bb,Ab,Eb in C
These are common in hard rock, bVII often substituting for V...largely from a blues influence or borrowing from the mixo mode (maj scale but b7) or minor sclaes. In C, Bb contains the b7 Bb note while Ab the b7 and b3 plus the root C of the key, and Eb contains the b3 and b7 of the key.
and then, related to the whole thread here seeing the bIVm chords popping up everywhere calls 'reverse polarity chords'...
IImaj, IIImaj, IVmin... D, E, Fm in the key of C
So, basically reversing what is naturally 'maj' in the key to minor and visa-versa.
All these things are in 3 pages given all kinds of contemporary and classic references where they appear in different ways and the effects of them. In addition, 'formulas' or examples of song sequences like the 'hard rock formula' to illustrate the b degree chords...
I-bIII-IV (C-Eb-F) for instance 'back in the ussr, I am the walrus, sgt peppers' or reversed I-IV-bIII 'my sharona' to take just a few examples.
The book in many ways is a tour-de-force that this site is only just touching really, at least at present (or perhaps if you buy the eBook)
Just at random, he has pages of progressions...
I-IV-bVII-V^...in a minor key, the ^ indicates a reverse 'polarity'...examples given are the pretenders 'talk of the town'(verse) and David Bowie's 'Fame' (chorus) and the chords are...Am-Dm-G-E
...
Personally I find these things to be really useful and puts a different kind of perspective to things that more tradition theory ideas. Certainly very traditional theory that can be hard to relate to contemporary music and practice.
You can see the kinds of patterns that make a 'song' in the manner of the 'axis of awesome' skit...their '4 chord song' does illustrates a particular time of ballad that is popular and has a certain kind of 'feel'...
I-V-VI-IV but you could have arguably done more with I-VI-VI-V popular in the 50's....less common things like I-IV-bII-bVI will give you that Nirvana 'smells like teen spirit thing. For many 'bands' or songwriters their 'identity' is largely buried in this type of movement or another.
I think that the real skill in a lot of song writing is not to agonize about the familiarity of tunes, but to be slightly different or clever with the familiar. This is of course overlooked by things like the "four chord song" ...
Take a tune like "Love Hurts"...this is that classic well over used I-vi-Vi-V progression so often heard and yet, on the 'hook' "love hurts' it is followed by bVII-IV-I. (C-Am-F-G) A tiny addition different from millions of similar songs... (man loves a woman (in half time) to 'who put the bop...). A little more 'theory' (or if a church goer) will recognize that bVII-I thing to be what would be traditionally called the 'amen' or plagal cadence. It is like a gentle 'resignation' but in this case on the IV or F chord and using the bVII (Bb) chord and clever reinforcing the return to C or home key. One simple additional chord and makes the most mundane just that little more interesting.
It's not even that you need to know the 'theory' and all the numbers so much...just knowing this small collection of chords and playing them in every combination and duration's, thousands of songs will pop out in the process and perhaps there will be combinations that particularly appeal to your sensibilities. Knowing the chords and the 'effect' though can really help with being able to recognize or choose to use them and make learning songs or writing them so much easier.
C Dm Em F G Am ~ Bb Ab Eb ~ D E Fm
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So yeah, nice find and will be interesting how it progresses with that site...