Yo thanks for putting my Guitar Hero clip in the intro, I'm sorry to break this theory but I actually run sped up songs on real guitar now too 😭 it seriously means a lot to be featured by someone I've watched for so many years, you're a legend
@@GHAddict112 he’s even better in person. The most wholesome guy you’ll ever meet. And badass at real guitar too! Glad to hear ! I’m sure he admires you a lot as well!
@@MochaBlendedFun he’s super humble! In fact, him and his brother own an air conditioning company. They came and fixed my AC a few weeks back! I love ole Danny!
The fast tempo aesthetic existed even before this era in jazz. I used to play with Toshiko Akiyoshi, who was actually around during the bebop era, and she told me that in that style, there's a tempo where everyone just plays as fast as they can play. The drums and the bass don't really lock in, but the result is a unique kind of energy that you can't get any other way. It's too bad that in jazz education, we focus so much on the harmonic content of bebop, as if that's the main lesson to be learned from it, when there's so much more visceral rhythmic interplay that made that music what it is.
I was gonna ask you what "succinctly" means but then I remembered I can just Google it. I then realised that I don't have to write this comment. But here we are
idk, i think its really really good but i think the original album version is a masterpiece. I think i prefer the raw, rock tone especially on the guitar.
Wow. I had a back injury post-car accident. I used to write, dj and enjoy music around 128 bpm. The injury has lowered my walking and movement speed, and I've been drifting towards lower tempo music since. I would feel physical pain trying to write music at 128, but 96 provides enough recovery time to not feel pain with every beat. Thanks, Adam! This was super interesting - and I'm only 9:43 in!
I think a great exemple of when going fast is serving a purpose is punk. Punk to me is just raw emotion. You play punk to express your chaotic hate and frustration, so going fast becomes a tool to make the music feel more chaotic and also disorganised as the band dosent really hold it together. Somehow that "i don't care if it's good this is how i feel!" just sounds so great to me.
Good, insightful description of the punk genre. Seems fitting. And also in the other direction provides a good definition for the mindset of people referred to as punks, regardless of chosen appearance. That could be perceived as a derogatory term, but a punk wouldn't give a shit about that. 😁
On one hand yes, on the other punk doesn't really seem to mesh well with the approach of perfecting your musical craft to the level that allows to break the speed limit.
When I heard the segment of the original live version of Vital Transformation, it sounded like the punk version of the original to me. I don't know if it comes from a place of frustration, but it definitely captures a more chaotic feel.
I think mathcore music has a lot of moments that try to force you into these sections you can’t physically feel. It’s like trapping your body in a dance you can’t do, and it’s awesome
I kept thinking about Ben Koller and Converge while watching the video - he and the rest of the band are constantly playing on the edge of what most people can physically comprehend and I think it makes their sound what it is
My favorite music is often stuff with a funkey beat that dances right on the line of a tempo you can just barely keep up and just the right sprinkle of breaking rhythmic expectations. It's like salt, put a dash in my veggies and they from bland to yum but .....there's a point where more salt makes things worse. Just like I sometimes want "regular" food and sometimes I want the salty potato chip experience; I like differing amounts of "rhythmic spice" I don't ever remember wanting to drink a bottle of soy sauce or eat a salt block. There is a reason mathcore and experimental Jazz aren't getting played on top 40 pop stations, or featured on blockbuster soundtracks. When you loose the ability to "feel" the music there's really something lost that we usually appreciate music for. When a sound has a jarring section you can't interpret with your "body" it's special but you're never engaged in the music like that to begin with there's not the same impact.
"Playing fast is for the artist " was always my feeling. If you can comfortably improvise with another being at a pace that's challenging for all parties, its almost like flying.
True, but, to me, music is for the audience. When I hear something that is so fast that I cannot appreciate its melodic value, well, something is lost.
@@AlDunbarat the same time, some things that dont sound melodic at all slow, sound amazing sped up very fast. I think John McLaughlin is a great example of that. He uses so much chromatic stuff that would sound so weird slow but at his speed it flows.
My favourite speeding up happened to the song Hocus Pocus from the Dutch prog rock band Focus. On the album it was about 6m30 long. When they appeared on a TV show, their slot was only 4m30 long, so the show producer suggested maybe cutting out part of the song. To that they said, "what if we just play it faster", and so they did.
I was waiting for Adam to mention that performance. In a sense, I feel like it has a bit more mundane of an answer to the "how do your values reflect in how you play" question he was digging into - their values were to not compromise on the music, to not cut out part of the song in order to fit it into the time they had for performance. And so they didn't, regardless of the physical struggle (and probably substances) that it took to pull it off.
It was such an obvious link to what he was talking about that I was actually astounded Adam didn't at least namecheck this - when I saw the video title I even assumed this was what it was going to be about.
This makes so much sense as an old punk rocker, the "D-beat" is one of the most simplistic intuitive rock beats but when the tempo is turned up the beat stops sounding like that same beat. It sort of sounds like random banging but everything is hitting together so you know there's structure. There's a Mars Volta drum chops video where someone is showing some of their fast beats starting real slow and progressively speeding up. They start off sounding simple then they hit a tipping point and the beat is transformed into something completely new by the blistering speed.
As someone who regularly listen to audiobooks at 200% speed I find it fascinating how quickly one can get used to higher tempos, and how going back can feel so sluggish.
yeah, I have the same thing as someone who watches TH-cam videos at 2x speed and then my mom comes in and is like "why are those people talking so quickly?" and i'm like "they're not mom. they sound normal to me....oh wait"
Adam, you’re the best. You are providing people with university-level music education blended with humor, brilliant tangents, and your inimitable style all at once. There are few programs of any kind at this level and yours is so enjoyable to watch. Bravo, 10/10 every time.
17:18 amazing how Adam illustrates different ways to interpret 9/8, for me it is like a miracle, converting the same phrase to something completely different every time
What helps me hear it best is the eighth note in the middle of the bar: one and two and dot three and four and. I don't think Adam covered that possi initially at 15:20 on, maybe it's different when you're trying to play the notes.
This is interesting to me. I always wondered why I couldn’t really communicate to my friends why I’m skilled at rhythm games. “How do you not fall of tempo? How can you read all of that?” “I… good question. I don’t know? I just kinda feel it?” I don’t look at the judgement zone when I hit a note in a rhythm game I just sense when to hit the note from the song. This video explores this in a very neat way. Didn’t realize how much my body literally vibing with the music helps me.
As a guitar fan, I find that good shredding can do two things. It can blend into a single sound, almost like the sound of heavy rain - Natural but enveloping. Or it can feel like anxiety, like 100s of plates falling from a shelf. One feels super natural but not human, whilst the other is human but unnatural. I either don't care about them individually, content to listen to the overarching feel, or I need to scramble and try to grab them, always missing some because it is an almost impossible task.
Speed is an ingredient that certainly fulfills some impressionisms. Overdone, it's a racetrack instead of a story. When indulged occasionally, it's a dazzling sonic firework spectacle. Guitar is far from alone in pursuing this ingredient.
I became a musician because of the Mahavishnu Orchestra. So glad you appreciate them! I went to three MO concerts. The first was great; the second was unreal - they had really hit their stride. At the third concert,though, I remember thinking they had degenerated into a “I can play faster than you” contest instead of conveying a musical message. It was also too loud, even for a teenager as I was at the time.
I'm a huge John McLaughlin fan but I do think he occasionally played the guitar too fast just to show off, rather than to make great music which hes a master at. I do think he got much better at not getting carried away as he got older. When he joined the Friday night at San Francisco band he managed to balance the slow melodies with the fast flourishes incredibly well. But i still think the first two Mahavisnu albums are some of the best things I've ever heard and it will probably remain that way.
@@JamosHeat If you listen to “Birds of Fire” carefully, you’ll hear amazingly little fast guitar. I don’t know why JM gets such a bad rep for playing too fast. Listen to Bird, Trane, Dizzy & Joe Pass. Thry all played like lightning, I would argue, much more than McLaughlin.
We already basically covered the perceived minimum speed limit; “how slow can music be”. It kinda makes intuitive sense that there would be an opposite upper limit.
my guess before watching the video was 20 Hz, because that's where traditionally the range of audible sound starts. you won't hear the single notes, you'll hear a low buzzing sound. and it's actually crazy to think about that 20Hz/50ms is the drumming world record. but after watching the video, it makes sense that music stops making sense earlier, at lower speeds.
There's an organ performance in a church in Halberstadt that started in 2001 and set to end in the 2600s. There's a list of note changes on Wikipedia with the dates when the changes will happen.
People with adhd would just get overwhelmed by the density of sound and tune it out. You have to have a high level of focus to keep up with music like that.
@@zerologic7912 i totally might. i think the thing about VT was the acoustic side of things. i had never heard anything so powerfully energetic with acoustic instruments before it. John McLaughlin became one of my favourite guitarists not long after hearing what he was capable of on the track
My favorite example of this concept is on the song Bubblehouse by Medeski, Martin & Wood. The main riff feels similar from bar to bar but when you skip a few seconds, the feel completely changes
Anecdote : Taking a beer with my cousin an uncle, I accidentally put the vinyl of Mahavishnu orchestra _The Inner Mounting Flame_ on 45 rpm instead of 33. As we were deeply involved in our conversation, no one notice! A whole side of the album at the speed of that live concert. It sounded great honestly!
I’ve always had a hard time keeping track of the downbeat in music even though I’m good at most of music. Then he said the part of your brain that’s involved in balance is what processes it and that just made my jaw drop. I have horrible balance and that just feels so weird that those are connected
I'm so glad you're highlighting this album, it's one of my desert island pics for sure. A friend of mine showed it to me when I had come over tripping on some bad acid. He handed me a djembe, put the record on, turned off the light and left me alone to enjoy to majesty of the Mahavishnu. Utterly life-changing....
Fabulous video! The section on Yo Yo Ma and the ways in which the same person might approach one piece of music differently over time (and how these approaches exhibit the artist's worldview in that moment) reminded me of another great example from the same sphere: Glenn Gould and his two official recordings of Bach's Goldberg Variations. One might say that the first recording (1955) is (to borrow Nietzsche's dichotomy) *Dionysian*: it's earthy, visceral, subjective, quirky -- and certainly faster in relation to the late (1981) *Apollonian* recording, which is very steady in tactus, slower overall, and generally marked by an intellectual, considered approach. Funny fact: while people have argued for ages over which is better (and hey, why need to choose?), I've been most drawn to the live recordings (1959 from Salzburg, and another one whose year eludes me), as these seem the least "labored" to me, and closest to what Renaissance Italian's called "sprezzatura" -- or what we might call "nonchalance": making something difficult look easy!
Absolute class as usual. You have this way of elucidating the relevance of music, the reason we're all here putting hours into listening to, studying, practicing, writing, improvising and discussing music, and for me it's just the most inspiring thing. Thank you for so much!
The same thing, I think, is with breakcore/speedcore/hypercore (good show would be the band clown core and yamii online) you slow your mind down to a point where you hear every hit and melody and you drown in it. The more it makes your brain work the better.
Band: *makes a recording* Band: *plays it way faster live* Adam: "Anyways, here's a 34 minute video essay" 🤣 Welcome back, hope your tour was amazing. This was utterly fascinating, as always. Reminds me of how you said "music is not a sport" in the Whiplash review.
Thank you Adam for talking about the Mahavishnu Orchestra. Their second album, "Birds of Fire", has really opened my eyes - and my ears - when I was a teenager. It still is my favorite jazz rock album.
Maaaan, I was just listening to that live version of Vital Transformation the other day and thinking how utterly insane it was, so this video is very timely for me haha. Was also a cool surprise to see you guys play it at the Glasgow show! Great show all round.
How fast can a person play a video game? (In terms of raw input speed, and still have it ‘feel good’, as opposed to the more general concept of speedrunning) How does controlling a little digital puppet’s movement relate to the ways we move our bodies? Idk but you’d make a good video about it I’m sure. Love your stuff man, have a good one
@@callumwoulahan7681 To be honest, with video games, at least ones that aren't rhythm games, I don't think there is a hard limit. I think it's just the limits of the player until it becomes physically uncomfortable. I know that Smash Bros Melee only gets more satisfying the faster you play.
This was so awesome! I love that I always learn something that makes me excited to be alive when I watch your videos. Your dry humor always makes me smile. Most of my musical experience is from singing and dancing video game tracks when nobody's watching, but I love music and I love your videos!
I gain a lot of joy from "messy" musicianship, where things are not perfectly clean or smooth and you can hear the raw effort. It's why Brian Chippendale of Lightning Bolt is one of my favorite drummers - dude sounds absolutely unhinged and iconoclastic in comparison to your Danny Careys or Bill Brufords. When you go so fast that you lose minute precision, the music can't help but imbue you with its energy. If you can't find the "walk" of the groove, it's because you're already flying.
it's why I love the song Maggot Brain. It's so...Cathartic, raw and just pure, unfiltered emotion in music form. It sounds like crying your heart out, but as one long guitar solo focused, beautiful and tragical track. Fantastic song!
As an avid fan of Speedcore, and having greatly enjoyed Splittercore and Extratone from time to time, I thought this was going to be a very different video from the title.
The thing about what musicians value when they play specific things reminded me of the variation that happens over the execution of Vivaldi Four Seasons that is made from different orchestras. It's fun to realize the minor differences over those executions
Just wanted to say thank you for everything you are doing! You inspired a passion in music theory for me, and now I am a music theory major at college planning to go on to be a music professor. All thanks to you
Dang, hearing about how rhythm is felt with our motor system and meter is felt with our vestibular system is absolutely wild. It means we have evolved to appreciate movement by co-opting other systems in out bodies. Music is awesome
Inner Mounting Flame was a revelation for me. I stumbled upon it just because I was checking famous guitarists, but this turned out to be something else. I had never sat an listened to an instrumental album over and over before.
Wow...this guy is beyond words...such dexterity with his bass, piano...such musical knowledge...and now neuroscience in a nutshell. What wonderful and clear explanation about the neurological foundationss of MUSIC. A real masterclass!!!
This video seems to be part of an explanation for why I absolutely love bands like Hüsker Dü, Saccharine Trust, King Crimson, Volcano Suns, Meat Puppets, some of Yes, Mahavishnu (just started not long ago), Neu, ELP, My Bloody Valentine, Dinosaur Jr, Bauhaus, Big Black, Black Flag, Bad Brains and especially Charles Mingus!!!!! The thing I adore about these is that they all share the common idea of somewhat speed in atleast one instrument or either frequent changement of tempo. I guess I translate this to apparently being very hyper or remaining hyper in creeping adulthood 😦. This also must explain why I can’t tolerate so much of the music my friends show me or stoner metal stuff, it’s just too slow!!! It’s not that I don’t understand the greatness in slower tempos and styles that incorporate them but rather that my body (specifically feet) is just too bouncy or active all the time and I just don’t have the ability to « chillllll » and music is supposed to be the most beautifully visceral experience that I can live on the daily, not a way for me to relax and sit down. I understand the appeal of relaxing music as one’s leisure activity but to me my down time is sleep!! Calm music will make me want to sleep or I don’t know lie down and not do much. Faster (though I prefer the term visceral to describe it) music just goes well with being in a GREAT mood and wanting to either read, or be on the bus, or run somewhere, or bike, or play instruments, or write down things and especially for studying. I find that the music of bands like Neu trigger the exact areas of the brain needed to understand and then note down onto paper what you are feeling in a very mentally naked fashion. It’s very much stream of consciousness music where I have much awareness as to where an album like The Black Saint and The Sinner Lady by Mingus or Earthbound by KC serve the purpose of evoking the most emotional feelings without any literary or verbally explanatory needed or even attainable. It sends you into the questioning that you must be irrational to be feeling so strongly but the assurance in your feelings is so powerful that it makes you realize nothing else could make you reach that point of rationality (at least in a controlled manner or healthy manner). It is like your amygdala is highly active but remove the flight or fight sense and you are just sitting in a pool of emotional palpitations. The beauty of this can also be felt in albums like New Day Rising by Hüsker Dü as they mix such emotion with velocity but equal it out by having the music be perhaps less complex so that it is a more visceral experience and feeling and can maybe allow or accept more freeing movement or dance, and its in those moments where you should be dizzy from such physical rambunctiousness but you realize that your Cerebellum has never before been at such ease. With all that said, it does not mean that I cannot enjoy songs that are not « heavy » or « fast » and are slow as I do. I just need them to be uncomfortably emotion ridden in their sound, queue: Oh Me on Meat Puppets’s Ii, Myself when I am real by Mingus, Faitbful by Ornette Coleman, and I’ve grown accustomed to her face by Wes Montgomery!! Needless to say, music is amazing. This is why it’s so amazing. Psychology and music go so well hand in hand and only make so much sense together and i don’t say that out of opinion but as a fortunate learner when watching Adam’s videos, as what he explains is frequently quantitative!! Thanks Adam, amazing video like usual. Sad that I missed you playing at the Jazz Fest but oh well, hopefully i can see BASS another time 😎
ok right off the beginning... I'd say the 1972 TV show performance of Hokus pokus by Focus is a very good example of speed running a song... And it's awesome ♥
That Usain Bolt clip is an amazing representation of this argument... Especially when you compare him to the dude right next to him, who takes like three steps for every step Usain takes, and is still like a foot behind him. lmfao It's incredible. I'm not even really into athletics per se, but... You see a whole line of Olympic runners, men who would make you on your best day look like you were standing still... And even among them, Usain Bolt immediately stands out. Absolutely incredible.
In a marching band, feeling the pulse was almost more important than watching the drum major. I wasn't marching, instead I was in the front ensemble. The sound delay from the back of the field was tiny, but still noticeable, so instead of following what the marchers were watching, we needed to feel the groove of the snare drum. When the music is supposed to be fast, we halve the tempo and the duration of the notes, so the pulse is felt on what would have been a half note instead of every quarter note. It makes marching actually possible sometimes. The craziest experience I had was the time signature changing 11 times in 20 measures, from 3/4 to 5/4 to 4/4 to 7/4 and back, not with any repetitions of pattern. If I've learned anything from coordinating with 100+ high schoolers it's that staying together is relative, and the beat goes wherever it wants. Sometimes 9/8 is felt as two sets of 7 16ths and then one set of 4 16ths, sometimes 4/4 is two groups of 6 8ths and one group of 4.
I just want to say, oh my god! When I was in my mid-20s in the mid-00s, a musician coworker recommended a 70s jazz fusion album to me, which I downloaded and liked a fair bit, but I lost it when my ipod broke. In the years since, I've thought of it a number of times, but couldn't remember the name of the band for the life of me until you name dropped it in this video. It was Mahavishnu Orchestra and, after looking it up, the album was Birds of Fire. Thanks!
I'm an english/british folk musician primarily and I was so confused when trying to feel the pulse underneath Vital Transformation's riff, because I saw 9/8 and immediately made all of the obvious assumptions. When I just let myself feel the rhythm the music is trying to tell me, it was more like 3/4 + 3/8, or a hemiola followed by three quick pulses. When you slowed it down for the 18/16 analysis I agreed, but there was no way I could notice that at tempo as a listerner.
my immediate thought is that theres two limits towards the speed of music, Practical and theorethical. practically the human body can only move so fast and for soo long and whilst you can train your body to go to extreme speeds there has to be a limit to where you simply cant go any faster. and theoretically. if we take a 8th note ostinato at 180bpm. you can write the same ostinato as 16th notes at 90bpm. but the slower the tempo the faster the note you have to write it as and at some point it will just become impracticle to write it
Great topic, and excellent video! Regarding “too fast”, in various bands, I would first try to remove me being too slow as an obstacle. But then you also find, at higher speeds, that details get lost: the full sound of a muted guitar string hit hard, the bass drum head getting a chance to bounce back, things like that. I have also many times as a drummer witnessed the “walking” thing: people stop moving when it feels “too fast”. You can play with accents and help people feel a slower pulse, but at 100mph it’s hard to express those accents.
I'd like to see a study that looks for a correlation between music genre preference and how the subject interprets the words "walk," "jog," and "run." To see if people that prefer fast music also generally move a little bit faster.
Great video! One of your best and that's saying a lot. I loved the things I learned in this and the through line of the mahavishnu song from studying it musically to transcending with it was really awesomely put together. Gonna revisit those two Maha records again
It's nowhere near as complex but I love seeing how crowds move to Silhouette by Thrice. It switches back and forth between 4/4 and 7/4. It's a slow, head-bangy sort of a song, which encourages you to nod on the 1 & 3 accents initially. But when the signature changes, if you don't keep up then you end up nodding on the un-accented 2 & 4 beats which feels really wrong. Luckily, the snare drum shows you the way. There's an extra snare accent on each bar, which if you move to it, sort of "resets" you back to the correct beat every time. Once you find it and move to it, it feels fantastic.
I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the band Focus played their 7 minute song "Hocus Pocus" on a 4 minute TV segment in 1973. So instead of shortening the song, they just played it faster.
Hey Adam, thank you for putting so much work and passion in your videos. It really shows. This video made me think about Hella. I am a massive fan of their first album "Hold Your Horse Is". As @ufoufo2788 put it so well (with your inspiration) in the comments: " I think mathcore music has a lot of moments that try to force you into these sections you can’t physically feel. It’s like trapping your body in a dance you can’t do, and it’s awesome". Hella gave me this feeling, bodily and mentally. They take me places I rarely go. I would be thrilled to hear you talk about them, and math rock / core in general.
My favorite sped-up song is King Gizzard's The Evil River, from their 2022 live performance at Red Rocks. It's a normal version of The River for the first five or so minutes, but for the following section the song is sped up so much it's hard to keep up in your head. The whole feel of the song changes from 5/8 to 5/16. And then they keep it going at that insane pace for like eight minutes.
Another gem, actually one of your most interesting and stimulating videos so far. As a groove-centric musician who loves to dance and make people dance, i have never been a fan of very fast tempos: tempos within the range of our heartbeat and walking pace, always sound more natural and enjoyable to me.
Part 3 probably could have been it's own video. As a viewer I wonder how much Adam cut out. One really important point that I would add is that the interpretation of speed is cultural and context dependent. So in metal or hardcore punk, fast is seen as aggressive. Meanwhile, in Bop or bluegrass, music can be exceptionally fast without ever having the connotation of being aggressive; the music is fast because that's the tradition. I think this is to say that speed can have many interpretations that might not even be related to how fast the music actually is.
Definitely. I think the question of whether you want to lose yourself or keep yourself grounded to yourself is really interesting deserving of its own video. Or maybe he already made that video idk
As a dancer, I absolutely do hear music as dance. When I hear a new song, my brain thinks about the grooves I can do. As l learn the patterns in the music, I can start making movements more intricate and catching smaller sounds in between the main beats. Similar songs within a genre can illicit drastically different movement based on the instruments, tempo, or voice/energy of the vocalist. Something I also enjoying is switching the groove up with half time breaks and catching the beat back at the normal tempo. Theres so many different way to feel the music. Thanks for this great analysis!
I’ve always loved the Mahavishnu Orchestra and Larry Coryell’s 11th House, and studied for a few years with Larry, before his passing in 2017. Ever since developing heart arrhythmias in 2020, I’ve avoided those fabulous complex rhythms, because it feels so much like the skipping of my ventricles that led to a near death experience in 2021. The music feels… dangerous to me now!
Really cool topic. Made me think a lot more about speed and the purpose of it. Kind of reminds me of one of my favorite violin riffing songs by Diego's Umbrella called "Der Badkhen Freylakh". It starts out super slow and clear and methodical and by the end it starts falling apart and is frantic. And all it does it play the A and B parts over and over again. The whole journey lasts only a few minutes and is so satisfying to hear the transformation.
Possible the most eloquent and appropriate segue I've ever seen between the subject matter of the video and the promotion of the sponsor. Also, a great video. As a guitarist and bass player I appreciate the attention played to the virtue (or not) of mere speed.
You've just shown that music is a natural thing, and that our bodies are linked to it. The faster beats are really unnatural to us. That's why our brain and body really can't adjust to it. Take for instance, a natural painting made by a human being. We can relate to that. Now, look at a picture made totally from A.I. It goes into that uncanny valley and it's disturbing and sometimes scary, because our brain can't relate to the unnatural. Thanks for another excellent video Adam!
The feeling of unfathomably fast music that's nearly impossible to groove to is actually really key in some genres of metal. Check out Archspire in particular, pushing the speed limit is their raison d'etre.
It's weird, but I feel the Mahavishnu Orchestra rhythm in two separate ways; First style, I separate the first note from the rest almost like a pickup measure and feel the rest of the music as a regular 4 beat feel. I'll abruptly stop myself wherever I am in the rhythm to get that "POW" feeling at the beginning of the measure. If I counted it out, it'd be something like "1....1-2-3-4" with the next measure's 1 being the "e" of 4 for that POW feeling. Second style, I just feel the whole rhythm in over two measures, so I'll just bob my head on the down beat regardless of where in the music I am, so in a way I alternate between the down and up beats before actually repeating the rhythm.
Wow, fascinating that you feel the Vital Transformation riff as 2+2+2+1+2. I'm a conductor so my brain goes straight to trying to figure out what would be most useful to a group of musicians following my lead. If I was beating it out I'd put the last three 8ths of the measure into one long fourth beat. It comes up more often than you might expect in Western Classical repertoire (though obviously not really before the C 20th, probably the first example that comes to mind is in Rachmaninov's Symphonic Dances). A potential upside of feeling the last three together is that those last six 16th notes can be one event as you desire, but that may mess with perceptions of pulse in a different way. Very cool, great video
For me, it was neither of the interpretations he offered. I hear only two accents: the 1 and the high c#. and these two accents happen to split the bar in two equal halves, 9+9 sixteenth notes. It gives that groove a really chill half time feeling. and if i were to cheat in a bpm race, i'd use the 1 and the c# as "synchonization" points, the only two notes i'll guarantee to hit on time every time.
When I was young I got into odd times from the Metallica album And Justice For All, which led to Dream Theater, then Mahavishnu Orchestra and onto Shakti and indian traditional music. It was such a great time for me just listening, counting, learning, feeling everything... And then all of a sudden sometimes it felt weird when it was too fast. I don't know how you do it bro, but you always seem to put into words some of the things I couldn't put into words myself. I've been teaching for 20 years now too! I am always learning new ways to explain what we are hearing and playing. Thank you Adam!
I was lucky enough to see John & Dennis with Joey DeFrancesco at a jazz festival in Saskatoon decades ago. Pretty magical. It was a small ballroom venue. Such an amazing performance.
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I think that Vital Transformation beats could also be thought of as quarter note, quarter note, quarter note and dotted quarter note.
Mentioning the Mars Volta reminded me of another awesome example of this: compare the studio recording of Goliath ( th-cam.com/video/lrwMMF2QS14/w-d-xo.html ) to their yahoo live performance ( th-cam.com/video/MK4oeXzdheI/w-d-xo.html ), where they take it lightning fast, especially the last couple of minutes. Some of the nuances are lost but the overall energy is through the roof. It definitely affects how I feel the pulse: I count the bassline in three at the normal tempo, but live that becomes a bit uncomfortable (coincidentally pushing the "walking" tempo), so a dotted-quarter feel is easier. Massive cymbal crashes help with that.
6:09 is exactly how my old guitar teacher has been describing music for close to 20 years, which is exactly how I've been conceiving of it since he told me.
Dass sich Musik nicht gut anfühlt, kann auch zum Stilmittel werden: Die Arie "Komm süßes Kreuz" aus Bachs Matthäus-Passion enthält sehr große, sperrige Akkorde für die Viola da Gamba, was sehr mühsam zu spielen ist, und was man auch hört. Dadurch wird natürlich die Mühe, ein Kreuz zu tragen, ausgedrückt. Musste ich dran denken, weil du die Cello-Suiten erwähnt hast. Spannendes Video 😉
You’ve made some great videos but this one is one of the absolute best. Wow, I’ve been a musician for most of my life and this is one of the most interesting lectures I’ve ever heard.
![[#2024MAMA] ROSÉ (로제), Bruno Mars - APT. | Mnet 241122 방송](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/dgGqD28J6aQ/mqdefault.jpg)
Yo thanks for putting my Guitar Hero clip in the intro, I'm sorry to break this theory but I actually run sped up songs on real guitar now too 😭 it seriously means a lot to be featured by someone I've watched for so many years, you're a legend
Are you familiar with Danny Johnson? “Guitar Hero phenom”? I played in a band with him, and he’s a good friend of mine…..super cool cat….
@@nomandad2000yeah he’s my guy! We’ve known each other a long time, one of my absolute favourite dudes in the community
@@GHAddict112 he’s even better in person. The most wholesome guy you’ll ever meet. And badass at real guitar too! Glad to hear ! I’m sure he admires you a lot as well!
I played GuitarHeroPhenom online on GH3 when I stayed home from school one day in 2010, I was so star struck.
@@MochaBlendedFun he’s super humble! In fact, him and his brother own an air conditioning company. They came and fixed my AC a few weeks back! I love ole Danny!
The fast tempo aesthetic existed even before this era in jazz. I used to play with Toshiko Akiyoshi, who was actually around during the bebop era, and she told me that in that style, there's a tempo where everyone just plays as fast as they can play. The drums and the bass don't really lock in, but the result is a unique kind of energy that you can't get any other way.
It's too bad that in jazz education, we focus so much on the harmonic content of bebop, as if that's the main lesson to be learned from it, when there's so much more visceral rhythmic interplay that made that music what it is.
I am eternally grateful to Adam for succinctly defining what walking is for me 😃 oh, and all the interesting musical and biological stuff too I guess
I was gonna ask you what "succinctly" means but then I remembered I can just Google it. I then realised that I don't have to write this comment. But here we are
7:22 Correction, Usain Bolt's world record is 9.58 seconds from 2009. Massive difference in the athletics world.
How do you feel about Adam’s videos being so chock-full of ideas ?
@@squidward5110😊 24:15 24:44
My favorite 2023 moment was when Adam "Shugudubap" Neely invented walking. Truly one of the moments of musical time.
That 16/18 interpretation of Vital Transformation immediately felt so much more natural to me. 💜
idk, i think its really really good but i think the original album version is a masterpiece. I think i prefer the raw, rock tone especially on the guitar.
@@JamosHeat I think they just meant hearing it in that time signature rather than sungazer's recording
@@stephenahernah I see I see.
18/16.
The bottom number has to be 2^n
@@Lord_Skeptic yeah? or maybe you're just not good enough to hear eighteenth notes
Wow. I had a back injury post-car accident. I used to write, dj and enjoy music around 128 bpm. The injury has lowered my walking and movement speed, and I've been drifting towards lower tempo music since. I would feel physical pain trying to write music at 128, but 96 provides enough recovery time to not feel pain with every beat.
Thanks, Adam! This was super interesting - and I'm only 9:43 in!
Glad you're still jamming after all you've been through!
Experiment: Show the remnants of the accident trauma a smiling middle finger by composing some music even slower than your new comfort level.
@@Dowlphin Brilliant, mate! I'm dropping down to 60 BPM in protest against my pain.
@@pthelo Right on, dude! Feel the paaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiinnnnnn, maaaaaaan. 😄
I think a great exemple of when going fast is serving a purpose is punk. Punk to me is just raw emotion. You play punk to express your chaotic hate and frustration, so going fast becomes a tool to make the music feel more chaotic and also disorganised as the band dosent really hold it together. Somehow that "i don't care if it's good this is how i feel!" just sounds so great to me.
Good, insightful description of the punk genre. Seems fitting. And also in the other direction provides a good definition for the mindset of people referred to as punks, regardless of chosen appearance. That could be perceived as a derogatory term, but a punk wouldn't give a shit about that. 😁
On one hand yes, on the other punk doesn't really seem to mesh well with the approach of perfecting your musical craft to the level that allows to break the speed limit.
When I heard the segment of the original live version of Vital Transformation, it sounded like the punk version of the original to me. I don't know if it comes from a place of frustration, but it definitely captures a more chaotic feel.
Punk doesn’t really go beyond musical tempos, though. It’s just musically fast. Like 160-170, drum-n-bass tempos, kinda normal
I think mathcore music has a lot of moments that try to force you into these sections you can’t physically feel. It’s like trapping your body in a dance you can’t do, and it’s awesome
GRIND
i would love to see an adam neely mathcore video
I kept thinking about Ben Koller and Converge while watching the video - he and the rest of the band are constantly playing on the edge of what most people can physically comprehend and I think it makes their sound what it is
same with war metal solos
My favorite music is often stuff with a funkey beat that dances right on the line of a tempo you can just barely keep up and just the right sprinkle of breaking rhythmic expectations. It's like salt, put a dash in my veggies and they from bland to yum but .....there's a point where more salt makes things worse.
Just like I sometimes want "regular" food and sometimes I want the salty potato chip experience; I like differing amounts of "rhythmic spice" I don't ever remember wanting to drink a bottle of soy sauce or eat a salt block.
There is a reason mathcore and experimental Jazz aren't getting played on top 40 pop stations, or featured on blockbuster soundtracks. When you loose the ability to "feel" the music there's really something lost that we usually appreciate music for.
When a sound has a jarring section you can't interpret with your "body" it's special but you're never engaged in the music like that to begin with there's not the same impact.
"Playing fast is for the artist " was always my feeling. If you can comfortably improvise with another being at a pace that's challenging for all parties, its almost like flying.
Yeah, it's like playing a game and challenging yourself
True, but, to me, music is for the audience. When I hear something that is so fast that I cannot appreciate its melodic value, well, something is lost.
@@AlDunbarat the same time, some things that dont sound melodic at all slow, sound amazing sped up very fast. I think John McLaughlin is a great example of that. He uses so much chromatic stuff that would sound so weird slow but at his speed it flows.
@@AlDunbarmusic isn't for the audience. It's for the listener. The first listener is always the creator.
@@taylordcraig Cool, so play your speedruns at home and leave the venues for the artists who actually care about the audience.
My favourite speeding up happened to the song Hocus Pocus from the Dutch prog rock band Focus. On the album it was about 6m30 long. When they appeared on a TV show, their slot was only 4m30 long, so the show producer suggested maybe cutting out part of the song. To that they said, "what if we just play it faster", and so they did.
Also, I hear Vital Transformation with two beats per bar, I'm pretty sure as like 4+5 eighth notes.
Ah yes, the Cocaine Edit
I love that performance. The guitarist is absolutely shredding lol. The flute part feels so frantic
I was waiting for Adam to mention that performance. In a sense, I feel like it has a bit more mundane of an answer to the "how do your values reflect in how you play" question he was digging into - their values were to not compromise on the music, to not cut out part of the song in order to fit it into the time they had for performance. And so they didn't, regardless of the physical struggle (and probably substances) that it took to pull it off.
It was such an obvious link to what he was talking about that I was actually astounded Adam didn't at least namecheck this - when I saw the video title I even assumed this was what it was going to be about.
This makes so much sense as an old punk rocker, the "D-beat" is one of the most simplistic intuitive rock beats but when the tempo is turned up the beat stops sounding like that same beat. It sort of sounds like random banging but everything is hitting together so you know there's structure. There's a Mars Volta drum chops video where someone is showing some of their fast beats starting real slow and progressively speeding up. They start off sounding simple then they hit a tipping point and the beat is transformed into something completely new by the blistering speed.
As someone who regularly listen to audiobooks at 200% speed I find it fascinating how quickly one can get used to higher tempos, and how going back can feel so sluggish.
yeah it's like listening to 1.25x on youtube and just forget about it until something actually sounds weird.
Playing a recording faster is just going to warp the sound, it's not the same as actually playing something faster
This is so true. Normal speed really sounds like it's slooooooweeeed doooowwwn. 😂😂😂
yeah, I have the same thing as someone who watches TH-cam videos at 2x speed
and then my mom comes in and is like "why are those people talking so quickly?"
and i'm like "they're not mom. they sound normal to me....oh wait"
...I may have watched this (along with most things on youtube) at 2x speed
Adam, you’re the best. You are providing people with university-level music education blended with humor, brilliant tangents, and your inimitable style all at once. There are few programs of any kind at this level and yours is so enjoyable to watch. Bravo, 10/10 every time.
17:18 amazing how Adam illustrates different ways to interpret 9/8, for me it is like a miracle, converting the same phrase to something completely different every time
What helps me hear it best is the eighth note in the middle of the bar: one and two and dot three and four and. I don't think Adam covered that possi initially at 15:20 on, maybe it's different when you're trying to play the notes.
Nothing miraculous, it's all just math and accents.
9/8? No, everything is 4/4 if you try hard enough
oh, get a room already..
a room for one
@@RyanWaldroop To me, everything is 4/4 if I don't try at all. I only have a hammer so everything looks like a nail.
This is interesting to me. I always wondered why I couldn’t really communicate to my friends why I’m skilled at rhythm games. “How do you not fall of tempo? How can you read all of that?”
“I… good question. I don’t know? I just kinda feel it?”
I don’t look at the judgement zone when I hit a note in a rhythm game I just sense when to hit the note from the song. This video explores this in a very neat way. Didn’t realize how much my body literally vibing with the music helps me.
As a guitar fan, I find that good shredding can do two things. It can blend into a single sound, almost like the sound of heavy rain - Natural but enveloping. Or it can feel like anxiety, like 100s of plates falling from a shelf. One feels super natural but not human, whilst the other is human but unnatural. I either don't care about them individually, content to listen to the overarching feel, or I need to scramble and try to grab them, always missing some because it is an almost impossible task.
The worst music is fast the best is slow
@@Kouros-t6d how so? What a strange way to split up music?
@@toblexson5020 Gilmour = wonderful intense playing Malmsteen = boring garbage
@@toblexson5020
just some boomer opinion
Speed is an ingredient that certainly fulfills some impressionisms. Overdone, it's a racetrack instead of a story. When indulged occasionally, it's a dazzling sonic firework spectacle.
Guitar is far from alone in pursuing this ingredient.
I became a musician because of the Mahavishnu Orchestra. So glad you appreciate them! I went to three MO concerts. The first was great; the second was unreal - they had really hit their stride. At the third concert,though, I remember thinking they had degenerated into a “I can play faster than you” contest instead of conveying a musical message. It was also too loud, even for a teenager as I was at the time.
I'm a huge John McLaughlin fan but I do think he occasionally played the guitar too fast just to show off, rather than to make great music which hes a master at. I do think he got much better at not getting carried away as he got older. When he joined the Friday night at San Francisco band he managed to balance the slow melodies with the fast flourishes incredibly well. But i still think the first two Mahavisnu albums are some of the best things I've ever heard and it will probably remain that way.
@@JamosHeat If you listen to “Birds of Fire” carefully, you’ll hear amazingly little fast guitar. I don’t know why JM gets such a bad rep for playing too fast. Listen to Bird, Trane, Dizzy & Joe Pass. Thry all played like lightning, I would argue, much more than McLaughlin.
We already basically covered the perceived minimum speed limit; “how slow can music be”. It kinda makes intuitive sense that there would be an opposite upper limit.
my guess before watching the video was 20 Hz, because that's where traditionally the range of audible sound starts. you won't hear the single notes, you'll hear a low buzzing sound.
and it's actually crazy to think about that 20Hz/50ms is the drumming world record.
but after watching the video, it makes sense that music stops making sense earlier, at lower speeds.
There's an organ performance in a church in Halberstadt that started in 2001 and set to end in the 2600s. There's a list of note changes on Wikipedia with the dates when the changes will happen.
I’ve got that mahavishnu record. Omg I love that. Thanks pop for leaving me that. Awesome record.
Inner Mounting Flame is one hell of a Fusion essential. Your pop had amazing taste.
I remember when my friend showed me Vital Transformation. It was ADHD heaven. A perfect cacophony of complex noise. Absolutely made my day
You should try breakcore, speedcore or extratone, depending on how wild you're feeling
People with adhd would just get overwhelmed by the density of sound and tune it out. You have to have a high level of focus to keep up with music like that.
@@zerologic7912 i totally might. i think the thing about VT was the acoustic side of things. i had never heard anything so powerfully energetic with acoustic instruments before it. John McLaughlin became one of my favourite guitarists not long after hearing what he was capable of on the track
@@st_orlie a good musical hyperfocus like i have definitely helps LOL
Just the one day though, long live adhd
Can we talk about that guitar line at 21:30 though? Holyyyy
My favorite example of this concept is on the song Bubblehouse by Medeski, Martin & Wood. The main riff feels similar from bar to bar but when you skip a few seconds, the feel completely changes
Love a bit of MMW!
Bubblehouse is what I kept thinking about as well!
Nothing like a hot mmw show. Usually requires two sets.
I love the rep for Mahavishnu Orchestra. I want everyone to hear their wonderful music
I applaud the sneaky Rick Roll at 4:06. You won this time, Adam.
Definitely one of your best video essays in a while. Great job!
Anecdote : Taking a beer with my cousin an uncle, I accidentally put the vinyl of Mahavishnu orchestra _The Inner Mounting Flame_ on 45 rpm instead of 33. As we were deeply involved in our conversation, no one notice! A whole side of the album at the speed of that live concert. It sounded great honestly!
You and your cousin and uncle sound cool af
What a great way to have a beer!
I’ve always had a hard time keeping track of the downbeat in music even though I’m good at most of music. Then he said the part of your brain that’s involved in balance is what processes it and that just made my jaw drop. I have horrible balance and that just feels so weird that those are connected
I'd love to see a video going deep into Yo Yo Ma's Bach cello suites over his lifetime. It's super fascinating to see them change over time.
That would be an amazing video but idk if its something Adam would make
Finally somebody with great talent put my favorite band (Mahavishnu) in a educational video.
I'm so glad you're highlighting this album, it's one of my desert island pics for sure. A friend of mine showed it to me when I had come over tripping on some bad acid. He handed me a djembe, put the record on, turned off the light and left me alone to enjoy to majesty of the Mahavishnu. Utterly life-changing....
That is such a hippie picture lmao. Love it!
Fabulous video! The section on Yo Yo Ma and the ways in which the same person might approach one piece of music differently over time (and how these approaches exhibit the artist's worldview in that moment) reminded me of another great example from the same sphere: Glenn Gould and his two official recordings of Bach's Goldberg Variations. One might say that the first recording (1955) is (to borrow Nietzsche's dichotomy) *Dionysian*: it's earthy, visceral, subjective, quirky -- and certainly faster in relation to the late (1981) *Apollonian* recording, which is very steady in tactus, slower overall, and generally marked by an intellectual, considered approach. Funny fact: while people have argued for ages over which is better (and hey, why need to choose?), I've been most drawn to the live recordings (1959 from Salzburg, and another one whose year eludes me), as these seem the least "labored" to me, and closest to what Renaissance Italian's called "sprezzatura" -- or what we might call "nonchalance": making something difficult look easy!
Absolute class as usual. You have this way of elucidating the relevance of music, the reason we're all here putting hours into listening to, studying, practicing, writing, improvising and discussing music, and for me it's just the most inspiring thing. Thank you for so much!
The same thing, I think, is with breakcore/speedcore/hypercore (good show would be the band clown core and yamii online) you slow your mind down to a point where you hear every hit and melody and you drown in it. The more it makes your brain work the better.
Band: *makes a recording*
Band: *plays it way faster live*
Adam: "Anyways, here's a 34 minute video essay" 🤣
Welcome back, hope your tour was amazing. This was utterly fascinating, as always. Reminds me of how you said "music is not a sport" in the Whiplash review.
Incredible video. That short bit at the end of an old John Mclaughlin talking about liberation gave me actual goosebumps.
U know where it is from?
Thank you Adam for talking about the Mahavishnu Orchestra. Their second album, "Birds of Fire", has really opened my eyes - and my ears - when I was a teenager. It still is my favorite jazz rock album.
Thank you for this Adam. Long live the Mahavishnu Orchestra
Maaaan, I was just listening to that live version of Vital Transformation the other day and thinking how utterly insane it was, so this video is very timely for me haha.
Was also a cool surprise to see you guys play it at the Glasgow show! Great show all round.
How fast can a person play a video game?
(In terms of raw input speed, and still have it ‘feel good’, as opposed to the more general concept of speedrunning)
How does controlling a little digital puppet’s movement relate to the ways we move our bodies?
Idk but you’d make a good video about it I’m sure. Love your stuff man, have a good one
@@callumwoulahan7681 To be honest, with video games, at least ones that aren't rhythm games, I don't think there is a hard limit. I think it's just the limits of the player until it becomes physically uncomfortable. I know that Smash Bros Melee only gets more satisfying the faster you play.
This was so awesome! I love that I always learn something that makes me excited to be alive when I watch your videos. Your dry humor always makes me smile. Most of my musical experience is from singing and dancing video game tracks when nobody's watching, but I love music and I love your videos!
I gain a lot of joy from "messy" musicianship, where things are not perfectly clean or smooth and you can hear the raw effort. It's why Brian Chippendale of Lightning Bolt is one of my favorite drummers - dude sounds absolutely unhinged and iconoclastic in comparison to your Danny Careys or Bill Brufords. When you go so fast that you lose minute precision, the music can't help but imbue you with its energy. If you can't find the "walk" of the groove, it's because you're already flying.
it's why I love the song Maggot Brain. It's so...Cathartic, raw and just pure, unfiltered emotion in music form. It sounds like crying your heart out, but as one long guitar solo focused, beautiful and tragical track. Fantastic song!
YESSS LIGHTNING BOLT
As an avid fan of Speedcore, and having greatly enjoyed Splittercore and Extratone from time to time, I thought this was going to be a very different video from the title.
The thing about what musicians value when they play specific things reminded me of the variation that happens over the execution of Vivaldi Four Seasons that is made from different orchestras. It's fun to realize the minor differences over those executions
Great video. I am always excited to here anyone doing deep dives into the rhythmic aspects of Mahavishnu music.
Just wanted to say thank you for everything you are doing! You inspired a passion in music theory for me, and now I am a music theory major at college planning to go on to be a music professor. All thanks to you
Duuuuude thanks for informing me about Mahavishnu Orchestra, not sure how it's taken me so long to discover they exist.
Dang, hearing about how rhythm is felt with our motor system and meter is felt with our vestibular system is absolutely wild. It means we have evolved to appreciate movement by co-opting other systems in out bodies. Music is awesome
Adam Neely: “don’t quantize below 50ms if you are a human”
Wintergatan would like to know your location
Inner Mounting Flame was a revelation for me. I stumbled upon it just because I was checking famous guitarists, but this turned out to be something else. I had never sat an listened to an instrumental album over and over before.
Kind of wild to see a great prof I took a class with in undergrad (Justin London) cited so heavily in an Adam video.
Wow...this guy is beyond words...such dexterity with his bass, piano...such musical knowledge...and now neuroscience in a nutshell. What wonderful and clear explanation about the neurological foundationss of MUSIC. A real masterclass!!!
So no one's gonna talk about how this guy literally just Rickrolled us?
I scrolled way too long to find this comment!
For reference: 4:05
th-cam.com/video/erBecZH7b0Y/w-d-xo.html
@@walterd.warren6627 same
Scrolled the comments to see if anyone else noticed lmao
opened the comments just because of that lol
This video seems to be part of an explanation for why I absolutely love bands like Hüsker Dü, Saccharine Trust, King Crimson, Volcano Suns, Meat Puppets, some of Yes, Mahavishnu (just started not long ago), Neu, ELP, My Bloody Valentine, Dinosaur Jr, Bauhaus, Big Black, Black Flag, Bad Brains and especially Charles Mingus!!!!! The thing I adore about these is that they all share the common idea of somewhat speed in atleast one instrument or either frequent changement of tempo. I guess I translate this to apparently being very hyper or remaining hyper in creeping adulthood 😦. This also must explain why I can’t tolerate so much of the music my friends show me or stoner metal stuff, it’s just too slow!!! It’s not that I don’t understand the greatness in slower tempos and styles that incorporate them but rather that my body (specifically feet) is just too bouncy or active all the time and I just don’t have the ability to « chillllll » and music is supposed to be the most beautifully visceral experience that I can live on the daily, not a way for me to relax and sit down. I understand the appeal of relaxing music as one’s leisure activity but to me my down time is sleep!! Calm music will make me want to sleep or I don’t know lie down and not do much. Faster (though I prefer the term visceral to describe it) music just goes well with being in a GREAT mood and wanting to either read, or be on the bus, or run somewhere, or bike, or play instruments, or write down things and especially for studying. I find that the music of bands like Neu trigger the exact areas of the brain needed to understand and then note down onto paper what you are feeling in a very mentally naked fashion. It’s very much stream of consciousness music where I have much awareness as to where an album like The Black Saint and The Sinner Lady by Mingus or Earthbound by KC serve the purpose of evoking the most emotional feelings without any literary or verbally explanatory needed or even attainable. It sends you into the questioning that you must be irrational to be feeling so strongly but the assurance in your feelings is so powerful that it makes you realize nothing else could make you reach that point of rationality (at least in a controlled manner or healthy manner). It is like your amygdala is highly active but remove the flight or fight sense and you are just sitting in a pool of emotional palpitations. The beauty of this can also be felt in albums like New Day Rising by Hüsker Dü as they mix such emotion with velocity but equal it out by having the music be perhaps less complex so that it is a more visceral experience and feeling and can maybe allow or accept more freeing movement or dance, and its in those moments where you should be dizzy from such physical rambunctiousness but you realize that your Cerebellum has never before been at such ease. With all that said, it does not mean that I cannot enjoy songs that are not « heavy » or « fast » and are slow as I do. I just need them to be uncomfortably emotion ridden in their sound, queue: Oh Me on Meat Puppets’s Ii, Myself when I am real by Mingus, Faitbful by Ornette Coleman, and I’ve grown accustomed to her face by Wes Montgomery!! Needless to say, music is amazing. This is why it’s so amazing. Psychology and music go so well hand in hand and only make so much sense together and i don’t say that out of opinion but as a fortunate learner when watching Adam’s videos, as what he explains is frequently quantitative!! Thanks Adam, amazing video like usual. Sad that I missed you playing at the Jazz Fest but oh well, hopefully i can see BASS another time 😎
ok right off the beginning... I'd say the 1972 TV show performance of Hokus pokus by Focus is a very good example of speed running a song... And it's awesome ♥
I love Mahavishnu Orchestra, and it's really awesome that this video was anchored to their music.
That Usain Bolt clip is an amazing representation of this argument...
Especially when you compare him to the dude right next to him, who takes like three steps for every step Usain takes, and is still like a foot behind him. lmfao
It's incredible. I'm not even really into athletics per se, but... You see a whole line of Olympic runners, men who would make you on your best day look like you were standing still...
And even among them, Usain Bolt immediately stands out.
Absolutely incredible.
In a marching band, feeling the pulse was almost more important than watching the drum major. I wasn't marching, instead I was in the front ensemble. The sound delay from the back of the field was tiny, but still noticeable, so instead of following what the marchers were watching, we needed to feel the groove of the snare drum. When the music is supposed to be fast, we halve the tempo and the duration of the notes, so the pulse is felt on what would have been a half note instead of every quarter note. It makes marching actually possible sometimes. The craziest experience I had was the time signature changing 11 times in 20 measures, from 3/4 to 5/4 to 4/4 to 7/4 and back, not with any repetitions of pattern. If I've learned anything from coordinating with 100+ high schoolers it's that staying together is relative, and the beat goes wherever it wants. Sometimes 9/8 is felt as two sets of 7 16ths and then one set of 4 16ths, sometimes 4/4 is two groups of 6 8ths and one group of 4.
I just want to say, oh my god! When I was in my mid-20s in the mid-00s, a musician coworker recommended a 70s jazz fusion album to me, which I downloaded and liked a fair bit, but I lost it when my ipod broke. In the years since, I've thought of it a number of times, but couldn't remember the name of the band for the life of me until you name dropped it in this video. It was Mahavishnu Orchestra and, after looking it up, the album was Birds of Fire. Thanks!
Seeing y’all live this year was seriously epic. My vestibular system was appropriately exercised.
I'm an english/british folk musician primarily and I was so confused when trying to feel the pulse underneath Vital Transformation's riff, because I saw 9/8 and immediately made all of the obvious assumptions. When I just let myself feel the rhythm the music is trying to tell me, it was more like 3/4 + 3/8, or a hemiola followed by three quick pulses. When you slowed it down for the 18/16 analysis I agreed, but there was no way I could notice that at tempo as a listerner.
my immediate thought is that theres two limits towards the speed of music, Practical and theorethical. practically the human body can only move so fast and for soo long and whilst you can train your body to go to extreme speeds there has to be a limit to where you simply cant go any faster. and theoretically. if we take a 8th note ostinato at 180bpm. you can write the same ostinato as 16th notes at 90bpm. but the slower the tempo the faster the note you have to write it as and at some point it will just become impracticle to write it
Great topic, and excellent video! Regarding “too fast”, in various bands, I would first try to remove me being too slow as an obstacle. But then you also find, at higher speeds, that details get lost: the full sound of a muted guitar string hit hard, the bass drum head getting a chance to bounce back, things like that. I have also many times as a drummer witnessed the “walking” thing: people stop moving when it feels “too fast”. You can play with accents and help people feel a slower pulse, but at 100mph it’s hard to express those accents.
Always cool to encounter Mahavishnu Orchestra in the wild. So underrated
I'd like to see a study that looks for a correlation between music genre preference and how the subject interprets the words "walk," "jog," and "run." To see if people that prefer fast music also generally move a little bit faster.
the bassline in the quantized vs unqantized bass is the bassline from Watermelon Man by Herbie Hancock
Great video! One of your best and that's saying a lot. I loved the things I learned in this and the through line of the mahavishnu song from studying it musically to transcending with it was really awesomely put together. Gonna revisit those two Maha records again
It's nowhere near as complex but I love seeing how crowds move to Silhouette by Thrice. It switches back and forth between 4/4 and 7/4. It's a slow, head-bangy sort of a song, which encourages you to nod on the 1 & 3 accents initially. But when the signature changes, if you don't keep up then you end up nodding on the un-accented 2 & 4 beats which feels really wrong. Luckily, the snare drum shows you the way. There's an extra snare accent on each bar, which if you move to it, sort of "resets" you back to the correct beat every time. Once you find it and move to it, it feels fantastic.
Have you ever heard Aphex twin? Its so fast and random yet within its chaos and complexity it si still groovy.
I love Mahavishnu Orchestra
They were so incredibly tight as a band
I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the band Focus played their 7 minute song "Hocus Pocus" on a 4 minute TV segment in 1973. So instead of shortening the song, they just played it faster.
Hey Adam, thank you for putting so much work and passion in your videos. It really shows. This video made me think about Hella. I am a massive fan of their first album "Hold Your Horse Is". As @ufoufo2788 put it so well (with your inspiration) in the comments: " I think mathcore music has a lot of moments that try to force you into these sections you can’t physically feel. It’s like trapping your body in a dance you can’t do, and it’s awesome". Hella gave me this feeling, bodily and mentally. They take me places I rarely go. I would be thrilled to hear you talk about them, and math rock / core in general.
When you quantized it, it sounded like video game music or electronica.
Adam's videos are honestly perfect to sit back, relax and grab some snacks
That's just an overlearned motor procedure
WHY ARE YOU EVERYWHERE
another nice example can be found in zappa's music: keep it greasy live version from the album bufalo!
My favorite sped-up song is King Gizzard's The Evil River, from their 2022 live performance at Red Rocks. It's a normal version of The River for the first five or so minutes, but for the following section the song is sped up so much it's hard to keep up in your head. The whole feel of the song changes from 5/8 to 5/16. And then they keep it going at that insane pace for like eight minutes.
Wah wah wah wah wah
This video is just a big ad for a band that I wouldn't listen although I love this channel and all the content it provides.
4:35 i couldn't walk properly before i watched this video, props to you Adam 🙏
I hope he will make a video on The Ministry of Silly Walks and the odd rhythms used in their walks one day.
i can hear the microrythmic difference around 12min but it might be because i listen to and produce drum & bass ✨
Love the MO shoutout- the inner mounting flame is my favourite album :)
Another gem, actually one of your most interesting and stimulating videos so far. As a groove-centric musician who loves to dance and make people dance, i have never been a fan of very fast tempos: tempos within the range of our heartbeat and walking pace, always sound more natural and enjoyable to me.
Part 3 probably could have been it's own video. As a viewer I wonder how much Adam cut out. One really important point that I would add is that the interpretation of speed is cultural and context dependent. So in metal or hardcore punk, fast is seen as aggressive. Meanwhile, in Bop or bluegrass, music can be exceptionally fast without ever having the connotation of being aggressive; the music is fast because that's the tradition. I think this is to say that speed can have many interpretations that might not even be related to how fast the music actually is.
Definitely. I think the question of whether you want to lose yourself or keep yourself grounded to yourself is really interesting deserving of its own video. Or maybe he already made that video idk
It's not aggressive..IT'S BORING ! The worst music is fast the best is slow
@@Kouros-t6dthen you’re listening to the wrong bands 🤷🏻♂️
@@Kouros-t6dfound the Doom Metal fan
@@gabriel77196 Good Music fan from Satie to Vangelis
As a dancer, I absolutely do hear music as dance. When I hear a new song, my brain thinks about the grooves I can do. As l learn the patterns in the music, I can start making movements more intricate and catching smaller sounds in between the main beats. Similar songs within a genre can illicit drastically different movement based on the instruments, tempo, or voice/energy of the vocalist. Something I also enjoying is switching the groove up with half time breaks and catching the beat back at the normal tempo. Theres so many different way to feel the music.
Thanks for this great analysis!
I’ve always loved the Mahavishnu Orchestra and Larry Coryell’s 11th House, and studied for a few years with Larry, before his passing in 2017. Ever since developing heart arrhythmias in 2020, I’ve avoided those fabulous complex rhythms, because it feels so much like the skipping of my ventricles that led to a near death experience in 2021. The music feels… dangerous to me now!
Really cool topic. Made me think a lot more about speed and the purpose of it.
Kind of reminds me of one of my favorite violin riffing songs by Diego's Umbrella called "Der Badkhen Freylakh". It starts out super slow and clear and methodical and by the end it starts falling apart and is frantic. And all it does it play the A and B parts over and over again. The whole journey lasts only a few minutes and is so satisfying to hear the transformation.
Just use the Mustaine rule: Faster = Better
Possible the most eloquent and appropriate segue I've ever seen between the subject matter of the video and the promotion of the sponsor.
Also, a great video. As a guitarist and bass player I appreciate the attention played to the virtue (or not) of mere speed.
You've just shown that music is a natural thing, and that our bodies are linked to it. The faster beats are really unnatural to us. That's why our brain and body really can't adjust to it. Take for instance, a natural painting made by a human being. We can relate to that. Now, look at a picture made totally from A.I. It goes into that uncanny valley and it's disturbing and sometimes scary, because our brain can't relate to the unnatural. Thanks for another excellent video Adam!
The feeling of unfathomably fast music that's nearly impossible to groove to is actually really key in some genres of metal. Check out Archspire in particular, pushing the speed limit is their raison d'etre.
It's weird, but I feel the Mahavishnu Orchestra rhythm in two separate ways;
First style, I separate the first note from the rest almost like a pickup measure and feel the rest of the music as a regular 4 beat feel. I'll abruptly stop myself wherever I am in the rhythm to get that "POW" feeling at the beginning of the measure. If I counted it out, it'd be something like "1....1-2-3-4" with the next measure's 1 being the "e" of 4 for that POW feeling.
Second style, I just feel the whole rhythm in over two measures, so I'll just bob my head on the down beat regardless of where in the music I am, so in a way I alternate between the down and up beats before actually repeating the rhythm.
I know I’m a day late but everytime Vulfpeck does another “It Gets Funkier” it also gets faster
Wow, fascinating that you feel the Vital Transformation riff as 2+2+2+1+2. I'm a conductor so my brain goes straight to trying to figure out what would be most useful to a group of musicians following my lead. If I was beating it out I'd put the last three 8ths of the measure into one long fourth beat. It comes up more often than you might expect in Western Classical repertoire (though obviously not really before the C 20th, probably the first example that comes to mind is in Rachmaninov's Symphonic Dances). A potential upside of feeling the last three together is that those last six 16th notes can be one event as you desire, but that may mess with perceptions of pulse in a different way. Very cool, great video
For me, it was neither of the interpretations he offered. I hear only two accents: the 1 and the high c#. and these two accents happen to split the bar in two equal halves, 9+9 sixteenth notes. It gives that groove a really chill half time feeling.
and if i were to cheat in a bpm race, i'd use the 1 and the c# as "synchonization" points, the only two notes i'll guarantee to hit on time every time.
When I was young I got into odd times from the Metallica album And Justice For All, which led to Dream Theater, then Mahavishnu Orchestra and onto Shakti and indian traditional music. It was such a great time for me just listening, counting, learning, feeling everything... And then all of a sudden sometimes it felt weird when it was too fast.
I don't know how you do it bro, but you always seem to put into words some of the things I couldn't put into words myself.
I've been teaching for 20 years now too! I am always learning new ways to explain what we are hearing and playing. Thank you Adam!
"Too many notes." Rock me, Amadeus.
The Brain Processing speed concept explains why I love Slow Blues. 🤠
I was lucky enough to see John & Dennis with Joey DeFrancesco at a jazz festival in Saskatoon decades ago. Pretty magical. It was a small ballroom venue. Such an amazing performance.
I think that Vital Transformation beats could also be thought of as quarter note, quarter note, quarter note and dotted quarter note.
The “Free your mind and your arse will follow” approach to music?
Mentioning the Mars Volta reminded me of another awesome example of this: compare the studio recording of Goliath ( th-cam.com/video/lrwMMF2QS14/w-d-xo.html ) to their yahoo live performance ( th-cam.com/video/MK4oeXzdheI/w-d-xo.html ), where they take it lightning fast, especially the last couple of minutes. Some of the nuances are lost but the overall energy is through the roof. It definitely affects how I feel the pulse: I count the bassline in three at the normal tempo, but live that becomes a bit uncomfortable (coincidentally pushing the "walking" tempo), so a dotted-quarter feel is easier. Massive cymbal crashes help with that.
6:09 is exactly how my old guitar teacher has been describing music for close to 20 years, which is exactly how I've been conceiving of it since he told me.
One Word: Speedcore
That's three words...
Dass sich Musik nicht gut anfühlt, kann auch zum Stilmittel werden: Die Arie "Komm süßes Kreuz" aus Bachs Matthäus-Passion enthält sehr große, sperrige Akkorde für die Viola da Gamba, was sehr mühsam zu spielen ist, und was man auch hört. Dadurch wird natürlich die Mühe, ein Kreuz zu tragen, ausgedrückt. Musste ich dran denken, weil du die Cello-Suiten erwähnt hast. Spannendes Video 😉
nightcore fans:
You’ve made some great videos but this one is one of the absolute best. Wow, I’ve been a musician for most of my life and this is one of the most interesting lectures I’ve ever heard.