Is Adele's latest single microtonal? | Q+A
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 25 มิ.ย. 2024
- No, it is not. Also, I answer more music theory questions.
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0:00 Intro
0:14 Is Adele’s Easy on me microtonal?
1:53 Who is the better bass player, homer simpson or adam neely?
2:01 Ebmaj7 Dm7add4 Bbmaj7 G7
4:56 Bright size life cover?
5:07 Tips on avoiding taking away the part of a bassist as a keyboardist?
5:57 What does it mean to modulate to a brighter or darker key?
8:32 Caffeine drug?
8:39 What’s a spread triad?
9:37 When did you first start working on Perihelion?
10:02 What’s a good way to brass
10:38 Why low to high scales?
11:30 How to prioritize creativity over theory?
12:20 What’s going on in Sungazer’s Cytherean rhythm-wise?
12:50 What did you do to have a stable lifestyle early in NYC?
13:22 Different string action for studio/live gigs?
14:04 How was it working with Simon Grove?
14:28 The existential dread of TH-cam
(⌐■_■)
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Peace,
Adam
The keyboard EQ part is yet another example of "don't try to make yourself sound good, try to make the whole band sound good."
This really changed the way I approached production as well. Its kind of shocking when say a guitar tone sounds shit solo but is perfect for the mix.
you mean the thing most classically trained pianists struggle with when in a creative band setting? just because you CAN play fancy stuff, doesn't mean playing just a G3 the whole time won't be better.
I'm not the best at this, but I was told to "sit on my left hand and see what happens" while transitioning from playing mostly solo and off sheet music to collaborating with others
Just another great video :)
@@peterhardyburrell Interesting. My reaction has often been to move the left hand up, and just play fewer notes in general. I start working on coming up with "fills" I can play during times when the other instruments aren't playing, but otherwise being more basic with chording.
That said, I try to avoid going back so basic as some very piano-focused pieces that seem to be primarily repeated block chords.
@@ZipplyZane oh for sure, I think you worded what I was trying to say much better than I did. Don’t lay so far out that it’s useless to play at all, but leave space for other instruments
Whenever l sing off pitch I say I sing microtonally
I just say "wow" between lyric lines and then sing closer to the pitch.
You aren’t wrong per say from a certain point of view
03:00 I'd improvise in C
Pitch is a continuum. Less than five cents off and most people can’t even hear it. Up to twenty cents off and it seems like a chorus effect when done well. Perfect pitch control is an illusion. Record your voice and try to stay dead on any frequency. It can’t be done, every voice wobbles. Rule of thumb, if it sounds good it is good, and this song sounds great.
@@christiansmakingmusic777 "every voice wobbles" is something that doesn't get enough attention. There are physical processes in your body that cause you to be constantly moving, and those movements will affect the pitch of your voice. One thing I really notice when singing very low (like C2) is that my heartbeat raises the pitch a small amount. Singing solo without vibrato, it's quite noticeable. Add vibrato and context (or even better, other singers on the same note) and it fades away into the mix.
Vocalists who don’t use autotune: *exist*
Academic-jazz instrumentalists: “is this microtonal?“
Not commercially (at least not if music studios and advertising firms have any say in the matter).
Makes one wonder how many boring songs were actually quite exciting before some over-zealous producer autotuned the sh*t out of them.
Are we done with lame Exists comments yet? Feels like that's a 2012 gag far beyond its expiration date.
@@richsackett3423 you're a 2012 gag far beyond its expiration date
@@richsackett3423 I think "exists" has transcended being a meme and is now just kind of a conversational utility
I love watching Adam's videos while being musically illiterate because 1- he's objective and succint enough that I don't feel lost when he's talking about theory; 2 - I get to laugh hard whenever he goes "here's this bit pitch-corrected, and here it's the original sound, it's SO MUCH BETTER and more textured and nuanced" and I'm like "sheat, both sound exactly the same to me lol"
Truth.
great make out playlist
They sound the same for two reasons: his system is probably WAY better than yours, AND his ear (ability to discern subtle nuances) is WAY better than almost everyone’s.
same thing with me, but I have one more reason and that is if my mom asked me why I'm not studying I could go "no mom, you don't understand, I'm studying music can't you see?! This is music theory" even tho I don't even remember how to create a minor triad the second I close the video lmao
@@michaeltagor4238 4+5 🧸💕
The fact that people think this song is microtonal says a lot about tuned vocals being the new “normal”
Also says a lot about idiots thinking anything microtonal could sound good.
@@davidfaustino4476 thanks Mr brain
@@davidfaustino4476 You live in the western world and you think nothing exist outside of it. Please know that the modern piano is out of tune and thinking that 12 tones is all that there is is really wrong. Any music outside european/american music use smaller intervals than half step. Half a step is actually huge. Do you know that F# and Gb is not the same sound?
@@davidfaustino4476 You ever listened to King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard?
@@davidfaustino4476 Amazingly closeminded comment, congrats.
People are so used to autoTune that they think any variation from exact pitch is “microtonal” as opposed to just “human”
Technically it is microtonal tho
@@OoTZOMMMoO ratio
@@DroneCorpse doesn't know what ratio means 😂
@@DroneCorpse bruv
@@OoTZOMMMoO well, actually…..
It says a lot about the state of music today, when a singer like Adele who is naturally singing (not pitch corrected), inspires question of this music being "microtonal".
It says a lot about the state of music today, when a singer like Adele who is naturally using just intonation ("microtonality") is alleged not to be able to hit notes.
Yeah for sure, it says a lot about the state of mainstream sound which is just a characteristic of THIS current era. There is no "good" or "bad" thing about it. Some people like that flawless sound, while some like those little imperfections.
I personally like the imperfect version, but you can't really blame or think lowly about anyone who likes that heavily processed sound. It's upto taste and trends.
[Also I do believe this perfectly auto tuned sound is disappearing bit by bit as we move into the 2020s.]
I'm an artist and my husband is a chef. Sometimes we use musical terms to describe food... Like, "Oh yeah, if you toast the almonds before adding them it really gives a bass note to the dish" or, "The maple flavor will harmonize nicely with the pumpkin." I guess our brains scramble through our vast storehouses of experience when trying to find ways to describe the intangible?
Was that bass a fish? :)
“This cheese is a little bit too sharp for my taste”
Me: "Waiter, the third of this soup is a little flat."
Waiter: "Do you want salt?"
Me: "It's not quite my tempo."
Waiter: "If you want to, I can bring you the salt."
Me: "It's a little pentatonic."
Waiter: "I'll bring the salt."
Me: "There is an enharmonic quality I'm missing."
Waiter: "Here is the salt, sir."
Me: "I feel that F sharp 7 add 9, maybe waltz."
Waiter: "Is this okay now?"
Me: "Ahhh, yes, very _allargando_ and 5/4."
Waiter walks away: "Just tell me you want salt, you pretentious knob."
Me: "CRESCENDO! CIRCLE OF FIFTHS!"
You guys rock!😆😁
Onkel, that's one of the funniest comments I've ever read!
That was, by far, the best pitch for Nebula yet. The "why" is so important!
Fell flat for me. Nebula is just a small TH-cam that hasn't been DMCA'd by the big three yet. Watch what happens when they are.
@Iambdaman Nothing that these creators do actually break copyright law as it falls under fair use, so I really don’t think they will be DMCA’d bc of how much Nebula cares about the creators. TH-cam demonetizes things automatically but Nebula is manual so I really don’t see problems like that happening anytime soon
yeah i was already considering getting nebula because of tom scott’s show (i like game shows, tom scott, and tom scott game shows), but now i definitely will
@@lambdaman3228 You’re missing the part where it’s owned by the creators and not corporate assholes.
@@tajbratton2961 Doesn't matter who you are, corporate or creator, when 200 lawyers with unlimited money and power smack you with a DMCA takedown, you obey or go broke.
4:20 That chord progression sounds like the perfect lofi progression, the song would just never end.
Still studying... calendar's last page is gone who knows how long ago... where is the coffee coming from? Wait, no, don't think about that, not in the syllabus...
One “1 hour long” TH-cam video coming up …
i think it sound a lot like the progression from National Park Theme from Pokémon GSC OST, which means you'll probably find lofi verions of it
@@ssatva JEE and NEET students be like
had this exact thought, made me think of lofi study music
4:38 the octave effect makes this improv sound so good, almost like there's a guitar too, which makes it sound like every note was written and deliberate.
It’s soooo good
@@cathybillington9192 It is! I wanted to listen to more!
Not exclusively related to music, but "harmony" and all its relative words come from the musical lexicon first - and then were applied to things working smoothly in tandem.
Yes. Also loud is specific to sound.
Question: did “harmony” the word used to describe music get used in that context before the “harmonic series” in mathematics was developed?
@@aimeeontheharp "Timbre" is also a word that seems specific to sound and music. The etymology all relates to bells or drums as well.
@@aimeeontheharp I've heard people use loud about colors as well, but that's very likely a newer thing.
@@theravenwizard Yeah, that's the opposite. Using a word that relates to sound to metaphorically describe color.
Interestingly, in the English bellringing tradition, in which the bells are tuned to the major scale, the highest bell is called 1, and the numbers ascend as the pitch descends. This makes sense as they start and end in 'rounds', ringing in sequence in a descending scale, but plays merry hell with any musicians trying to learn change-ringing.
I was just reading about the pelog scale on Wikipedia the other day, and apparently the note numbers are descending in Sundanese gamelan too.
Back in college I took intro to ethnomusicology to satisfy one of my diversity requirements, and I can't for the life of me remember which culture it was in particular, but they have the opposite definitions for low and high notes compared to those in the Western musical tradition, because our "low notes" are produced by taller instruments and our "high notes" are produced by shorter instruments.
@@sillybear25 That's really cool! Yeah, an ethnomusicology course is how I learned about gamelan. There's some really awesome stuff out there in the world of music if we stop focusing on Europe, haha.
i would consider that a challenge! but yes, i see your point..
Once had an outdoor gig at a pub… That clashed with the cathedral 200 yards away having a bell ringing practice session or something 😂. Every quiet bit during our songs all you could hear was Ding ding ding dong bing bong bong bong!
8:09 'Loud' and 'quiet' or similar words describing volume are pretty much exclusive to descriptions of sound. You can say an outfit is loud but I'd see that as applying a sound adjective to visuals.
Edit: 'shrill' is also a word that pretty much exclusively describes sounds
Yeah, while volume has those two (and also silent), there’s a good handful of adjectives for timbres. Shrill is one, but also muffled, squeaky, croaky, resonant, etc.
But, I can’t think of non-metaphorical adjectives for pitch or brightness (which doesn’t even have it’s own non-metaphorical noun)
Also, while these adjectives do describe music non-metaphorically, they don’t describe music exclusively.
Some adjectives that are exclusive to music though are: consonant, dissonant, polyphonic, and polyrhythmic.
Colors could be loud or quiet, granted borrowed language via sound
So I looked it up and it turns out shrill was originally not just descriptive of a sound but of a sharp taste also, which again is yet another sense used to describe sound
“loud” is used in cannabis terminology
Adam, I've just downloaded ALL of your 443 videos from TH-cam because where I live I do not get fast Internet speeds. I am going to binge, and learn, for months to come. You're videos almost took up 1TB of my 12 TB hard drive. That's an insane amount of work and knowledge you've given away.
How much of that is the lick for 6 hours
Funny how in Spanish our metaphors for pitch aren’t even related or “opposites” by definition:
High pitch/note: “agudo” - acute/pointy (as in geometry angles 📐)
Low pitch/note: “grave” - serious/hard (makes no sense lmao)
Same in Italian. Never thought about it. Maybe there's a second meaning
Yes, but it makes sense in Spanish, not translated to English. Hola y ciao, a portuguese :)
maybe heavy, as in “gravity”?
@@katiefrisk980 the Spanish word for heavy is pesado
Of course it makes sense. When you are grave and serious you speak with a lower voice.
In my japanese anthropology class we talked about anthropology of the senses and mixing senses. Super interesting to realise that not all cultures have 5 senses, some have 3, or even 7, really makes you wonder what senses actually are. We like to think of certain things as objective truths while very often our perception of reality is culturally informed and therefore not so objective after all. Love your channel because you often go into these things!
That's awesome
Can you give examples of cultures with 3 or 7 senses?
@@tontin150 In recente times and scientific occidental culture they are often considered to be 7, regular 5 + balance and proprioception. You can go even up, just because we cluster together texture, temperature, pain and pressure as touch even if they're different sensations and mostly different sensory cells. That's to differentiate them by organs, but you can do that with kinds of informations and include internal states or indirect cues from multiple senses, like spatiousness from sight and hearing.
@@tontin150 "The cultural contingency of sensory taxonomies becomes even more apparent when the wisdom of other traditions is factored into the debate over categorization. For example, the Hausa of Nigeria distinguish between gani or “sight” and ji, which includes “hearing, smelling, tasting and touching, understanding, and emotional feeling, as if all these functions formed part of a single whole” (Ritchie 1991: 194). In classical Indian philosophy (the Brhadaranyaka Upanishad), a list of eight senses is given:
“(1) prana (breathing organ, i.e., nose; also ‘breath of life’); (2) the speech organ; (3) tongue (taste); (4) eye (color); (5) ear (sounds); (6) mana (thought, mind, inner organ); (7) hands (work); and (8) skin (sense of touch)” (Elberfeld 2003: 483)."
www.sensorystudies.org/sensorial-investigations/the-expanding-field-of-sensory-studies/
This section is taken from this page, its really interesting if you want to have a look into anthropology of the senses without needing access to academic books and journals. Check it out! :)
In Steiner education (Free School in the Netherlands), we distinguish 12 senses in children. Strange maybe, but I suppose even the word "sense" can be interpreted depending on your culture
The fact that people immediately jump to "Is this microtonal?" or "Is something wrong here?" when hearing a human being singing without autotune really makes me worried. I hope more singers and producers in the pop world get inspired by Adele's success and stop overdoing it with the pitch-correction.
Capitalism, baby! The unreachable standards of the beauty industry has reached the music industry!
"Money degrades all the gods of man and turns them into commodities." - K. Marx.
@@caramelldansen2204 this is sort of a dumb way of looking at it, people want to get better and more efficient in creating their art, maybe this would happen slower in a less money hungry system, but it would still happen just more slowly. Unless you'd rather we live in the woods and forsake all but acoustic instruments, if that's what you want then no shade but its not capitalism imo.
Yeaa, i got mixed feelings about the autotuning. I think it will hit a critical mass where the masses will disconnect mechanical perfection, from virtue. For the time being we will have to abide
@@noahleach7690 If money wasn’t an issue, what do you mean by ‘efficient’?
I disagree that ‘efficient’ in terms of speed or time is necessarily a given, except when considering money or limited resources.
@@oldvlognewtricks I’m a music producer, now that auto tune exists many artists don’t want to spend 100 hours seeking the perfect take, trust me.
When I was in college (Art Major) I did a show under the pseudonym of Lester Schlock. The idea was to make the worst art possible.
What I learned that BAD - totally bad - was as hard as GOOD. It really helped me think about what I was doing in a whole new way.
Also ... BASS!
I love the part about metaphors in music. Metaphors are everywhere! I wrote a research article (that isn’t published yet cause reasons) about metaphors in science and I came to realize that there’s so much that we can’t even *think* about without metaphors let alone communicate to others. Very interesting stuff.
An on from there, we can't think at all without reference to where are bodies are at. If you want to stave off dementia, don't do a crossword, hang out some washing!
The general public: Adele lost weight
Musicians: *M I C R O T O N A L I T Y I N P O P*
Also kinda proud that I didn't hear any musician focus on Adele's weight loss at all. We're just here for the nerdism and Adele's very awesome voice.
No auto-tune = Microtonal somehow? lol
440th like 👀
Both bad takes based on not accepting the humanity of an artist/celebrity. Funny how that goes.
@@Pericles777 skin.boisturizer here, I was the person who asked the question. It was more of a topic/conversation starter, never really expected to get picked but when I first listened to the song i heard the in between note as a Bhalf-flat. anyways just thought it was a cool sound
2:00 genuinely love that progression so much, something about the walk downs of 3rds really stood out to me, like the second the Bb hit, blew me away
Really wanting someone to turn it into a backing track, I want to jam on it
@@aarons3166 Adam literally did lols
@@allisonbishop er like, a full length one so I can play with it haha
@@aarons3166 it would take you five minutes to make - convert this video to MP3, go into audacity and isolate the loop, loop the loop, then save as new track
I love what you did with the chord progression. What a wonderfully thorough way of interacting with a viewers question. 👍
Please man don't stop these videos they are SO USEFUL
The amount of hours I spend re-editing a video to minimize or completely avoid a copyright claim is insane. I'd love to be able to join the Nebula family to be able to produce more of my content and not have to worry about the copyright stuff. Yeah I'm small time and not even able to monetize on YT, but the struggle is still there to try and avoid copyright claims on my bigger topics
Just continue making content! You'll blow up in a bit, I'm calling it.
@@loopyzreal thank you! I appreciate it. I will always of course have more big ideas in the works and won't stop making videos any time soon no matter what
Glad to find your channel here!
A super useful tip that saves a lot of time that I have, as an editor for multiple big channels, is to export the video as an mp3 file, and render it on a separate project where it's just a very low quality black screen, you will be able to render AND upload it in seconds just to check if there's any claims, and if there is, just edit those parts on the actual full quality video :)
@@LastPrismAlex oh that makes so much sense! Thank you!
Hey, Adam. I hope you have the motivation to keep creating this kind of work. You're exceptionally good at teaching -- a good orator that can break down complicated concepts into digestible parts and explain them in a way that can be understood by just about anyone with an interest in music -- and that is a rare combination of talents. I appreciate what you do, and you should always do what's best for you, but I lament the day you hang up your TH-cam hat for greener pastures.
Amen to that
I did not expect the spread triads to sound so bloody good on the bass! So nice!!
Do you think it’s possible that “high” and “low” notes are called that because of how we produce them singing? High notes resonate higher in the body and low notes resonate lower. Never really thought about this before…
It’s a description of frequency… High frequency notes resonate more in your head because it’s a smaller space and low frequency notes resonate more in larger areas like your chest
@@JeatBunkie I think it's the other way round. We've always had voices with their placements. Frequency as a description came later when observing the speed that a string would vibrate.
I am not a native English speaker, but I would certainly say that "higher" notes have a higher - not "more" - frequency, e.g. C5 having 523.something Hz compared to a lower note, e.g. A4 at 440 Hz
@@johannesdhali7193 But then it's a question of why larger numbers are higher.
@@iosefka7774 Aha, yes, true! To compare numbers one might say greater/bigger/higher vs less/smaller/lower... So the notion of "more" being higher and larger seems generic. Makes sense somehow, a mountain of 1000 rice grains will be higher than one of 100...
10:39 It's actually worth adding that ancient Greeks - from whom we westerners took a lot of our basic music theory processes since the Roman age - wrote down scales from high to low notes. That seemed to have changed after the rise of Christianity, and I found some time ago some explanations for this, which I'll report.
It seems like the Greeks thought of music as a "gift" from the gods, the good guys who lived high in the Olympus, and as such they thought of notes as descending from high (the gods) to low (the people). This changed in Christian times, when music was considered a way to elevate to God, and as such the notes of the scales went from low (the people) to high (God). I'm not sure if this is right or not, but it certainly looks fascinating. What's known for sure though is that Greeks actually conceived scales as descending, so it's at least interesting to notice this. Also there are other cultures that do the same thing, like in Sundanese gamelan (albeit not always)
So interesting! Where'd you read this?
Greeks usually had theories about music that could be somewhat divorced from phenomenal reality, and you can see this continue in medieval times. But perhaps they really did feel the gravitational power in musical notes. They weren't looking at it analytically
@@forgetful9845 I believe I found it while searching for ancient Greeks modes and genera in some specific blogs, though I'm not sure which blog was anymore. I'll post the link here if I find it 😃
I thought it's because of vocal warmups (working your way up to the higher registers)
I'm Sundanese and I can confrim. We even use "da mi na ti la" as our solfege syllables, with da as the highest note, instead of do re mi.
Edit : Even the musical "cadence" in gamelan music usually consist of descending pentatonic scale, and it all ends with a very low sound of gong.
The chord progression reminds me so much of Aphex Twin: Flim. Especially the way Adam played it with that jazzy drumloop!
Thanks for what you do here on TH-cam… I really appreciate learning from you Adam!
OH MY GOD I JUST REALIZED YOU WERE A VOICE IN “OPULENCE” (I’m watching it again rn)
These are like 2 completely different worlds this is incredible to me
That progression and soloing is super tasty. I love working with ambiguity in chords and finding just the right moment to add some punctuation and tension towards a chorus, and use the ambiguity to contrast with those moments.
0:57 I'd argue that that really sharp trill probably avoids lots of the friction between the Bb and the A of the chord, almost like a sharp eleven but not quite because it still somewhat sounds like a Bb. Love it !
3:10 the G7 here feels like a V of V so home would be F to me
I heard the chord progression as a variant of 2-5-1-6 in Bb (in reality it was 4-3-1-6 but you can kind of think of it as a 2-5-1-6) and also as b2-1-6-4 in d minor. Hearing it in d minor required a conscious brain effort, but Bb was the easiest to hear as the tonic
@@denisarharov7832 Yes! I heard it the same!
@@denisarharov7832 I think the G7 doesn't make as much sense in my ear if I'm trying to hear it as a V of ii. I'm really hearing that "Isn't she lovely" color in there
@@Ian_Standley I mean that's technically what it is but there's a reason why I deliberately did not use that term = the fact that it's probably not how that note was apprehended in the first place
@@Ian_Standley half sharp 11th is about 1 cent off from the 11th harmonic... sooo
These videos are gold. Seriously.
Wow! I am in love with the sound of that progression!
Adam, there's a book by Lakoff and Johnson, "Metaphors we live by" where they explain how metaphor is a tool that enables people to use what they know about their experiences to understand and communicate more abstract things like work, time, etc... And in this case, music!
According to the authors, metaphors "from the real world" shape our language and phsyche to comprehend more abstract and complex dimensions and phenomenon.
Yes! This! It is really important what you are saying, because the words we use to describe music are not *merely* a matter of convention but deeply engrained in our experience of having a body and interacting with the world. Thank you for the comment!
I never thought I would live to see Lakoff and Johnson referenced in a youtube comment. Awesome!
A got a small but very real sense of satisfaction when I said to myself about the rate-that-chord-progression "it sounds like its ending on a question" and to hear you validate that was cool. I feel like a real musician for at least this moment lol.
If you play music, you’re a real musician.
@@estebanb7166 I definetly agree, but knowing that you are a musician and feeling like you are one are quite different lol
really nice q&a, luv it
Long time gone, missed the last 600,000 new subscribers. Congratulations Adam, great channel.
10:39 Music tends to value ascension more than descension because the foundation of it all is the fundamental and the overtone series above it. When you play a note on the keyboard you’re creating an ocean of overtones above it, but nothing below it. So of course going up feels like diving into the ocean while going down feels like retreating from it. (Or it can feel like “I’m gonna build a new ocean to swallow the old ocean” but that’s a bit more complicated than just going up)
technically undertones or subharmonics DO exist, but you have to kind of produce them in odd ways via secondary resonances rather than as a normal output of the audio source. these can happen unintentionally in an electric system or as a result of specific playing techniques or instrument design.
The Bbmaj7 sounds closest to home to me. I could literally end the song on that, after a given number of loops, and it would feel completely resolved to me.
When I wrote the chord progression, it ended on the Bbmaj7 so it makes sense, I added the G7 a few days later because it felt even more like home to me
@@twal734 It's one of those things where you can deliberately readjust your perception. Like the Laurel/Yanny thing, except there's no real answer. My initial instinct is to think of Bbmaj7 as home, and the G7 as means to revving back up to the start. If I force myself to see G7 as home, everything shifts and eventually starts to feel right again. Ultimately the way you craft a piece with this, what you do with melodies an voice leading on top, and with the structure over time, will help things lean one way or another. It'd be interesting to alternate between these two in different sections of a song.
P.S. Now that I think about it again, the two chords are almost in a relative major/minor relationship to one another, especially if you play G minor scales on top the way Adam did. Then at the resolution on the G, you shift into the major for a more majestic, uplifting feeling. And the 7th interval still voice leads back to the start. You could even omit it until the second half of the bar, to make it clearer that you're not staying on the G, that you're giving it that "question mark".
i feel Cm the most tonic although there's no Cm in that chord progression
I’ve got the Dm7add4 as the start of the progression. The G min he was improvising sounded great over too
You nailed the tumbnail on this one! Really cool.
you’re incredible. new subscriber! I get so excited and motivated when I watch your videos! thank you!
"Mum, why do I only see dad on weekends?"
"Track 5"
Lol, this meme
volume - loud / quiet is exclusive to music/sound
also high and low is probably closer to high frequency and low frequency and thus just as correct as your more/less labeling
i've heard clothing described as 'loud', ie a loud shirt is quite colourful and eye-catching. by extension 'quiet' could be the opposite
Loud is also use as slang for describing the smell of weed.
But to be fair, loud in reference to sound came first.
still high and low to describe the magnitude of frequency is a metaphorical depiction of the number line as larger numbers having a 'higher' position on the number line
Volume also describes the amount of space something takes up.
Ahhh fascinating, all the things! Loved that insight about descriptive terms for music. Also I've been trying to remember the term for spread triad but kept coming up with nothing, so THANK YOU!
Hi Adam, I'd just like to say that I've been watching your content for a few years now and I'm always happy to see when one of your videos comes out. It helped me to think about music and general content in new ways, and entertains me a lot. Don't ask me why I feel like writing that today, I just do lol.
Anyway, you do what you will, i'll be there listening, thanks for that
When you mentioned that we use a lot of words that are related to other senses when describing music, I remembered that back in my music school days, where we spoke Spanish, often we would use other words related to taste; like 'acid' to describe harsh, sibilant high-end equalization, or 'sweet' when it was the other way around. I always found it relatable but not used too often on other languages. I like the color related ones though: a 'brown' sound is when you're very invested in low mids, a 'yellow' one on the high end, and 'blue' on the low end. This might not relate to something scientific like the sound spectrum but for sure we can all understand it!
Really great to hear your take on the perfect "imperfections" of Adele's voice is incredibly tempting for producers to go autotune with it. Producers are so into "producing", they sometimes fail to see that the original line was produced perfectly. Fortunately, this producer knew when to take his hat off and just enjoy :)
I love these videos! Thank you Adam!!
This channel is extremely good thanks a lot!!
Adele has always preserved such a beautiful natural tonality and that is one of the reasons her songs are so powerful and draw in crowds!
More likely an average vocalist with millions of dollars spent on PR. Advertising draws in those crowds.
@@lambdaman3228 lol. you don't have to like her, but you can't come here and pretend she's not a great singer with a great voice.
@@lambdaman3228 She was signed to an indie label.
Rolling in the deep is considered one of the best pop song of 21st century which is both loved by critics and public. No one can spend money to get both critic's and public's adoration,
@@dixego Great compared to what? To the average person? Yeah, she's great. Compared to top talent in the world? She's average at best, but marketable. Welcome to pop.
@@takemyhand1988 > No one can spend money to get both critic's and public's adoration,
Hahahaha, you sweet sweet summer child.
Adam Neely is my favorite due to his honest engagement with musical philosophy.
What I mean is that his thinking is not limited to Western music theory, or musical conventions or his own experiences, but he understands that there are a multitude of ways to describe music both in terms of theory and in terms of metaphors.
I have learned a lot watching these videos. Thank you Adam!
The phrasing on your improv was amazing Adam.
good stuff as always!
That chord progression really reminds me of the outro to Warning Sign by Coldplay, just that unfinished feeling while still lulling you into the motion of it
once i was on brass recording session. that was in my acadamy, my teacher was sound engineer and he taught us that brass instruments sounds better if recorded in "live spaces", with furniture and stuff... he recorded 2 takes, one in record room and second in room we usually was taking coffee breaks. and what do you know, second take was so much richer in sound, so much warmer.
Hmm, I take that it is because the various resonances of the room, right? I started playing trombone fairly recently, and I've really noticed how much certain notes make things in the room resonate.
@@Aurora-oe2qp look like it. but i think this have more with "color" of brass instruments, additional resonance highlighting exactly that... or something like that 🤣
Adam, I think you might be right about us using "other sensory descriptors" when trying to describe how music sounds, except maybe when it comes to dynamics and volume. Interesting stuff. I love your videos, you're so talented. Thanks for producing such great content. Take care.
9:36 Minor iv in a major key gives me that exact same feel, like you've finally grasped something that's been out of reach. Orgasmic.
To my ear it is clearly in Bb major, with the Dmin being a relative minor of the V Fmaj, and the G7 being a parallel major substitute for the vi. Soloing in G minor makes sense because it fits over Bbmaj while targeting that G. It also fits the ‘four chords’ theory when broken down this way, as it goes 4-5-1-6, just with some tasty substitutions
I was thinking the exact same. It would be much more obvious if the first chord was a Eflat6 or something so the b natural led to a C, but I can still hear it either way really.
I hear it as F major, to me the B natural in the final chord really sticks out as a chromatic note.
That Ebmaj7 progression reminds of a 4 chord progression I was playing with recently with a descending third change - Fmaj9 Dm9 Cmaj9 E/C
Loved everything about the spread triad section
You changed my whole outlook on how I play piano. Thanks
10:39 I would argue that with strings, you can always make them shorter (and go up the scale) but can't make em longer (and go down). Therefore it may make sense to start at the bottom
Hear me out Mr Neely: You can sing the roots of a ii V I to Bb over those chords. Then the G7 is a VI. I think it's just an interesting reharmonization of a ii V I VI. I guess I'm just trying to explain why I hear it as the I chord but I think it's a pretty solid theory... I'm curious if you can hear it that way too.
thank you Adam
Adam is the only person on this planet that can spoil the answer (of the title question) in the thumbnail or description and still make it interesting
Using a dominant seven in substitute of a root minor chord to "resolve" back into the minor iv or major VI is such a great device, one of my favorite examples is "Touch Me Touch Me" by Norma Sheffield where it gets used sparingly for section changes. And using Gm pentatonic over G7, that's just the blues.
Hit Like on your comment first
Spend the next 2 weeks to understand what you mean.
@@Avacado721 So "Touch Me Touch Me" is a really simple progression, it's iv, v, i in F minor so it's Bbm, Cm, Fm. Sometimes that Fm at the end, the root chord, is subbed out for F major.
F major (F, A, C) is the major V in relation to Bb minor (if we viewed Bb minor as the root), and so the A in the F major chord becomes the leading tone that resolves back to Bb, the root of the iv minor chord at the top of the progression, makes it circle back in a sweet sounding way. (Could also be viewed as a Picardy third resolution.)
@@Avacado721 The other thing, G minor pentatonic over G7.
G7:
G, B, D, F
G minor pentatonic:
G, Bb, C, D, F
Three shared notes and the only difference is an altered third. Here's the thing about that: in the blues, where this device comes from, thirds basically don't matter. The entire microtonal space between "just sharp of A natural" and B natural is a valid third to play melodically overtop of a dominant chord, and that's a lot of what people pay to hear in blues lead guitar playing. But skipping over microtonality and tl;dr this basically means that you can play Bb or B over G7 in western pop music and nobody cares, especially because it's so deeply ingrained.
@@j.p.8811 I mean in the context of the song I've listened to it a thousand times and things that are out of tune I hear really closely and they bother me, but Adele singing that song, it just sounds like she's singing the melody, idk how that note could bother anybody. It's not even a strong note in the melody, it's a passing tone, if I was listening to Adam correctly.
Isn’t “dissonance” a non-metaphorical word we use in music? “Twang” would be another one right? What else could you call “twangy” other than sound?
"dissonance" can refer to any two elements that clash or are in disharmony with one another. for example, bright fuschia text against a bright red background would be considered dissonant, unpleasant to most people's eyes.
twang is kind of an onomatopeia, in a sense, or an imitative word at least, so it's kind of like the word "ping" or "ting" or "meow". it's used to describe music mostly but i don't know if it's exclusive or that we wouldn't call it a metaphor for the sound that we're hearing. i think this gets more complicated the harder you think about the question, though, because a loooot of words in the english language could debatably be like that :')
I asked a Brit what he thought spoken American English sounded to him. He said, "A bit twangy."
"How about English spoken in the American South?" I continued.
"Bad beyond reform."
@@ZuzannaFavesDie I'd argue that dissonance is a specifically musical term (or at least an acoustical one) is that "son" means "sound" in French. Dissonance literally means "unsoundlyness" 😜
Twang is onomatopoeia
The Space Shuttle had a massive twang! th-cam.com/video/xmLeGBIj6kw/w-d-xo.html
Although my theoretical knowledge of music is thin and I can sometimes barely follow I really love the way you put things in perspective. Your explanations really help me understand why I'm responding to music in a certain way. Thnx Adam!
Always amazes me how so much subject matter knowledge can be so readily present in someone's head. Impressive.
That 4 chord progression is quite interesting. I also defaulted to hearing the g as the tonic in a super weak way.
I heard the D as tonic, like if the song stopped, I would be unhappy if it stopped on G but happy if it stopped on D.
@@user-et3xn2jm1u Really? Eb and Bb both felt quite strong to me, and D felt really weak, and G less weak, but still not strong.
When you take autotune out of the equation and you have a talented singer like her you end up with absolute magic.
Great tips!
it's cool how you make the advertisement part of your video actually meaningful
honest question: can you guys really hear difference between pitch correction and no pitch correction at 1:28 ? I listened to it so many times with a good headphone on and I swear it still sounds the same to me.
I can hear it on my iPad - most significantly on the very first note.
I can barely hear it only because I’m specifically listening hard for it. If someone didn’t tell me they were different I’d never spot it on my own.
Not at all. I listened to it half a dozen times and can't tell the difference. Those notes go by so quickly, to my ear it's more like vibrato than a sequence of notes.
Thank you for this comment
I thought something's wrong with me, re-listening it again and again and hearing no freaking difference!
@@SomeRandomPerson163 видимо, в его реальности любое отклонение - микротональщина))
The Bb Adele sings that is not aligned to the grid of the normal scale sounds pretty similarly in tune to the 11th harmonic of the harmonic series - it could be that when she trills the pitch is being changed by a specific value (like number of hertz)? Either way the expression found in it is great!
I learned so much from this one video.
I always miss the Q+A things but I really want to know your fitness routines.
For 10:38, I'd argue that we use low to high because of string instruments. We start on open strings and then place more fingers to go up the scale. The only way to start from higher notes, would be to play the highest note possible(which usually doesn't sound as good) and move down the neck of the instrument.
Imagine you’re sitting in a chair. Point in the direction of up. There is a cello in front of you. Point in the direction of “up” the neck to get “higher” notes. We use those words by convention, but they don’t reflect the actual spacial relationship.
I think it might be an easier for both string and woodwind instruments. For a beginner, the scale gets progressively harder as you put more fingers down, and it’s easier to correct as you go up.
“Loud” is a word that is principally acoustic and only used metaphorically elsewhere, and I'd argue the same for “rhythmic” (moreso if we admit dance as adjacent to music). More technical terms, such as “sforzando” and ‘heptatonic” don't even seem to see much metaphorical use. It's just a property of language that when people can't think of a perfect word, they use another one that seems (to the speaker) adjacent. What was the point? :)
I'd say that loud applies to any sound, not exclusively music. And I think rhythmic would apply to movement as well, it's more a property of frequency of occurrence rather than rhythm of music per se.
@@AboutThings_byTarif I won't say you're wrong, but if we are applying our criteria _that_ strictly, I doubt there is a single word that applied to any art meets your bar.
A piece of art visual art that is overly busy, is "loud"
@@Calamitous I think that's a metaphorical use of the word. It's "loud" because it overwhelms us in the same way loud noises do
At 5:01 when you said "I only know the opening riff", I felt that
Very tasty playing on the Bright Side cover Adam. That was wonderful. And I didn't even talk over it.
The sharp Bb approximates a just 11:8 ratio very well! Adele is employing 11-limit harmony and I love it!
Wow, she’s doing way more thinking than most artists.
@Rob Ert 11 limit harmony is just using just intonation ratios that can use numbers up to 11
@Rob Ert Since you ‘doubt she’s thinking that’, can you ‘see inside her mind’?
Odd to try and claim a monopoly on inferring intent.
@Rob Ert Neither was the original comment addressed to you. I’m glad we’re both well aware how public forums work.
@Rob Ert *means nothing _to you_
A whole lot of languages and technical terminology are relieved to note that meaning can exist whether or not you personally understand it.
Edit: What are you googling? If you look for ‘harmony ratios’ you get all kinds of examples of this notation, and Pythagoras was using harmonic ratios thousands of years ago - predating equal temperament by many centuries.
Weird to double down on not knowing some basic acoustics.
Adele was consciously singing the 11/8 tritone interval, singing an F major sharp 11 chord tuned the harmonic series. No one can convince me otherwise. is miCrotnAl
These days, if anyone could pull that off w/o Autotune, it'd be Adele.
I agree with the interval, not sure if it was conscious.
Yeah, that's pretty near an undecimal fourth, and it'd be more obvious if the thirds were pure in the accompaniment
Sería completamente genial que tu contenido tuviera doblaje al español, ya que mucho público de habla hispana podría disfrutarlo y aprovecharlo
I love how Adam unpacks the metaphor of high + low pitch as just that. I find myself using 'active' for notes too sharp (more intensity) and 'passive' (the opposite) for flat notes. But, that's still a metaphor! Gah!
Also, practicing scales from top to bottom is very fun!
after listening to that chord progression - I find no flaw with your assessment but personally I gravitate towards the Bb being the I as if it were a IV V I with the G7 used as a turnaround chord (would usually lead to the ii but ii and IV are often interchangeable). The Eb acting as IV, the notes from the D chord could also represent an F9 with 13 (no 7), and the Bb as I to jump to the G7 as a secondary dominant for the Eb (substitution for Cm).
Just my thoughts, open to your ideas? ;)
Yeah sorry I’m retarded
Personally, I heard Eb being the 1 after letting it play for a bit. And I think that's kinda why that progression feels so satisfying. It feels a tad "open eneded', due to that G7 sounding like a question if that makes sense
@@tapdaddy69 completely know what you mean, I felt the G7 as the questioning chord as a VI but your assessment also makes sense. Could work like a minor V-i but instead of the i they put its relative major (eg. E7 to C as opposed to Am).
Am I on the right track? - let me know what you think;)
Serious question regarding sponsors - what's the difference between curiosity stream and nebula, and e.g. why not just put your non-YT content on Curiosity Stream?
Amazing!
What I love is when we mix senses, like "bright" vs "warm" to describe tone.
"Dièse" et "Bémol" respectively mean "Sharp" and "Flat" in French. Interestingly enough, "Bémol" means "Mou" (= Floppy), but "Dièse" directly refers to "half-step" in Latin. :)
Thank you so much for allowing me to learn about my own language
@@marmite-land pareil
same in russian
Same in Italian. What does Mou mean? I think it's a candy
That chord progression is beautiful, may have to workshop that into something at somepoint, i love how it sounds
Same
Ok, it was really great to hear a little bit about nebular and it's construct. Keep going, you have my interest.
Been watchin AN for a couple, three years or so or more. Watchin' him jam over that weird progression at 4 minutes is my favorite of his playing in all that time. I'd like to see more of that.
Others have mentioned loud and quiet, but something along the lines of reverb-y or echoey might work too?
I thought of Loud. But that also could be used to describe a brightly colored shirt 🤔
@@jgpix1 The term originally described sound, though, rather than being borrowed from elsewhere as a kind of metaphor for sound.
For me, it felt like that chord progression you analyzed wanted to resolve to an F major chord. Super cool and ambiguous without it.
The one at 2:13? If so, I felt like it wanted to resolve to Bb. I see it as, functionally, a ii-V-I progression with some deceptive diversions. IV in place of ii, iii-7add4 as V, then I, with a V/ii turnaround.
@@markharvey2916 I agree. ii - V - I with a few substitutions in there. Even on the first listen, my ear was already expecting the resolution to Bb.
G min pentatonic would be great to play over the first three chords with an emphasis on B natural when the final V/ii comes around.
Same bro
@@markharvey2916 I can definitely see that as well! I’m not sure why F felt right to me too. Must be like a weird musical version of “is the dress blue and black or white and gold”
I don't know why but the Dm9 felt most at home to me
Thanks for the saturation tip, thats really helpful.