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Patrick • 12/09/03 • 1:03 PM:

Okay, I finally went to this site and listened to some of the songs. You’re right that the “A Day in the Life” one seems like it doesn’t fit, but then it sort of does. I’d say that about all of the ones I listened to. What I wonder (though I didn’t look around for the answer yet) is what sort of quantitative research they do beforehand. Do they know the keys these songs are in? Do they count out the measures? I noticed that sometimes they have to hack things to make them fit. Do the songs have the exact same beat pattern, or can they speed up or slow down one of the songs without distorting tone? I’ve often wondered how many patterns there are in pop music. “Ghostbusters” and “I Want a New Drug” are very similar, so that you can hear it, as are “He’s So Fine” and “My Sweet Lord.” But how about “Skinny Girl,” which I wrote, and “Jane Said,” by Jane’s Addiction? Both of those are just a basic variation between A and A-minor chords. I don’t think I had even heard “Jane Said” before. If I had, it certainly didn’t register consciously. But the pattern is so simple that it must exist in tons of songs. Another example are some old King’s X songs. I never noticed when I was just listening, but when I read the guitar tab, I saw a lot of the same chords showing up, often in similar patterns. Of course the rhythms and riffs were different, but you could superimpose them pretty well. And when I was in Uruguay, there was a lady in one branch who directed the music. Nobody played an instrument, and she didn’t really read music, but she knew a lot of the hymns and had a good voice, so she just sang and we all followed. Several times she sang the music for one hymn but with the words to another. Often they lined up well, but sometimes you were done singing before the music was finished, or we had more to say and our notes were all used up (and then you, if you were me and Hubble, laughed your head off as reverently as possible). So is there research somewhere on chord progressions and patterns? I’d be interested in the findings. I bet there are a lot or songs that are completely coincidental, and many more that line up very closely, or are three half-steps from each other, or something. And I bet a lot of them were written by Diane Warren.

Dad • 09/09/04 • 9:43 PM:

Thanks to the spam comment, I finally went to the link and listened to the 2 songs. I like them. As Patrick points out, there are lots of songs, especially in rock, that sound alike, or use the same chord progressions. Much of this happened because rock started as a lot of untrained “musicians” got guitars and just started playing. The early groups often only knew a few chords, but had some musical ability and just made stuff up. They all listened to a variety of music, including blues, jazz, gospel, big band, broadway, etc. So a mixture came out and it got popular. I used to hate it when a singer or group had a hit and then did another 3 or 4 songs (if they lasted that long) that all sounded like minor variations on the “hit.” Most likely, the followup hits were done by “professionals” who knew how to capture the same flavor in a song that was technically new. Music theory covers most of the “quantitative research” you’re talking about, Patrick. I would imagine most professional musicians worth their salt (and all conductors) would be able to fit songs together just by looking at the scores. Yes, there’s still room for creativity and those serendipitous moments that happen along the way, but I’m sure it could be codified pretty well. Actually, I think I could do it pretty well just by ear, because I’ve done similar things in the past while thinking up weird vocal harmonies and counterpoints. But for now, I’ll let Go Home Productions do the legwork.

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