whenever it comes on, it makes whatever i'm doing feel unbearably poignant

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is what i said about jon brion's "phone call" in another thread. Alba says superpitcher does this to him. what does it to you? (maybe i should say "almost unbearably", but i think you get the feeling).

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:45 (twenty-one years ago)

"it's so hard to say goodbye to yesterday"

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:47 (twenty-one years ago)

As I say, Superpitcher, on my iPod (something like 'The Long Way' or 'Even Angels') makes me feel more godlike really, as though I am watching everything from an exalted position.

― Alba (Alba), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:48 (twenty-one years ago)

(it's quite rare for any piece of music to have this kind of effect on me with any real level of consistency, unless i'm very careful/lucky about when and where i hear it, and don't 'abuse' it as an emotional push-button)(which i don't ever not do)

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:50 (twenty-one years ago)

"renegade snares"
"girls just wanna have fun"

― g--ff (gcannon), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:52 (twenty-one years ago)

Steely Dan - "Razor Boy"

― o. nate (onate), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:54 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm being completely honest here, but listening to Ween's totally ridiculous "Pink Eye (On My Leg)" on headphones when in a somewhat populated setting seriously makes me feel extremely extra-terrestrial and edutained by humanity. Like it instantly kicks me into "laugh at the feeble humans trying to LIVE" mode, and also makes me feel like some kind of stoner superhero. Not exactly an example of that, but I thought a slightly different take on it than the emotional heft version would be neat.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:54 (twenty-one years ago)

Gymnopedie #1. The Cure's "The Funeral Party." Ellen Allien's "Secret."

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:56 (twenty-one years ago)

(I mean, surely Gymnopedie #1 is the all-time classic obvious answer to this question?)

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:57 (twenty-one years ago)

OH YEAH, Nabisco. YES.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 19:58 (twenty-one years ago)

emo fuckers.

― jess (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Just behind Gymnopedie #1 is Gymnopedie #3 and Brian Eno's "Ascent."

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:00 (twenty-one years ago)

it is a very good answer. but now when i hear gymnopedie #1 i feel like i'm being bullied into having that response (insofar as gymnopedie #1 can sound in any way bullying). though perhaps that's context-dependant.

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:00 (twenty-one years ago)

What exactly do they have in common? I know it's not some kind of mystical exalted perfection as much as a judicious choice of chordings etc.

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Yes, the Gymnopedes are good for this. Also, any version of "Moon River".

― o. nate (onate), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:01 (twenty-one years ago)

mentioned often on ILM, but aphex twin's "rhubarb" off SAW 2 can slow down and magnify any moment you put across it.

― bnw (bnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:01 (twenty-one years ago)

i don't think it's as simple as pushing a "poignant" button, but i don't think it's that much more complicated, either.

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:02 (twenty-one years ago)

If you're in the midst of doing something very athletic/active (biking, running, etc.), Amon Tobin's 'Get Yr Snack On' seriously KILLS, it totally like shifts me in my mind's eye from some corny ass suburban side street to DOWNTOWN-POST-APOCALYPSE-FLEEING-KILLER-ROBOTS-VILLE.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:03 (twenty-one years ago)

bnw: mm, yeah. aphex's "stone in focus", too. now i feel too easily manipulated by things that are slow and repetitive and resonant.

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:04 (twenty-one years ago)

The major-7th chord is the chord of bittersweetness. In a four-note chord, the first three notes make up a major (happy) chord, while the last three notes make up a minor (sad) chord. Voila: bittersweet.

The amazing thing about Satie is that he was putting major-7ths into his music at a time when they were still seen as "unacceptable" chords in proper composition. (I'm not sure why: they don't sound discordant AT ALL, but maybe they did to 19th C. ears.)

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:04 (twenty-one years ago)

btw my most recent answer to this is the screwed and chopped version of ugk's "one day" (which fits my above-mentioned requirements).

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:07 (twenty-one years ago)

Iron and Wine's "Bird Stealing Bread". God, as soon as that strummy bit comes in everything gets SOOOO HEAVY.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:08 (twenty-one years ago)

jaymc: well color me impressed

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:09 (twenty-one years ago)

(I'm not sure why: they don't sound discordant AT ALL, but maybe they did to 19th C. ears.)

This idea kind of blows my mind, actually.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:10 (twenty-one years ago)

Nick sooo OTM re: "Bird Stealing Bread."

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:10 (twenty-one years ago)

i suspect there's a lot of s&c stuff that i haven't heard that has that "living in slow motion, with every detail accruing new significance" feeling.

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:11 (twenty-one years ago)

"It Was A Very Good Year" by Sinatra

― Je4nne ƒury (Jeanne Fury), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:12 (twenty-one years ago)

J beat me to it. I sometimes fear that my tastes in music are built entirely and predictably around major sevenths. I'm also incapable of writing a song that doesn't substitute major sevenths for every major chord possible. It's pathetic. And yes, I've wondered forever how they were possibly seen as inappropriate all the way into the 19th century; I assume it's something to do with the beginning and end of the chord being only a half-step apart. (Which is also why, incidentally, I think they have the particular poignant effect that they have; someone said to me once that every song I write has the same monotonous quality of "longing," and I'm pretty sure the longing in question is the longing of that last note to push up one little half-step and become the root note.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:13 (twenty-one years ago)

i guess: major 7ths + spare arrangement + slightly halting, almost stately pace = poignancy

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:15 (twenty-one years ago)

i've got coldplay on line 1

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:16 (twenty-one years ago)

CMAJ7 FMAJ7 INFINITY

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:16 (twenty-one years ago)

I sometimes fear that my tastes in music are built entirely and predictably around major sevenths.

You and me both, dude. Sometimes I'll hear a song in a genre that I don't usually like (like, say, hardcore) and find myself unexpectedly enjoying it -- and then I realize it's because it's using major-7ths.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:16 (twenty-one years ago)

mitch i kiss you

― jess (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:17 (twenty-one years ago)

you all would love geechie wiley

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:19 (twenty-one years ago)

yeah it's wierd, maj7 = pastel, dom7 suddenly brash & guttural (hidden in the dom7 is a tritone, oh no!!)

― g--ff (gcannon), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:20 (twenty-one years ago)

Debussy's "Clair De Lune" for me. Also, on a much lesser scale, Coldplay's "In My Place". Mitch, transfer that call over to me.

― David R. (popshots75`), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:20 (twenty-one years ago)

Three Dog Night - "I'd Be So Happy"

and damn, I wish I knew music theory / chord identification now.

― Joseph McCombs, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:22 (twenty-one years ago)

(yeah, i was about to say that this is one of the relatively few times that i wish i knew even the tiniest bit about music theory and such)

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:23 (twenty-one years ago)

min7 just makes you sound like sting

― g--ff (gcannon), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:23 (twenty-one years ago)

Wiley's masterpiece, Last Kind Words, played in the key of E, is one of the most imaginatively constructed guitar arrangments of its era and possible one of the most archaic. Although the lyrics date it to the late World War I era, its eight-bar verse structure appears to be older. The opening A minor chord that leads directly into the same A riff employed by Texas artists is unique, and the thumb rolls in the B7th part echo Charley Patton's Green River Blues.

― amateur!!st, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:24 (twenty-one years ago)

Plastikman -- Closer (my urban decay/isolation album)
Tindersticks -- Tindersticks (see above)
Slowdive -- Here She Comes

― Barry Bruner (Barry Bruner), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:24 (twenty-one years ago)

The Pet Shop Boys on headphones tends to do this quite a lot. 'Don't Know What You Want But I Can't Give It Anymore' is a good one. The bit in the video where they walk out onto the street and everyone is a weirdo blonde clone coincides with the slightly dissonant ascending thing that becomes the big chord for the last chorus, and it gives the whole thing this bizarre boost of semi-appropriate pathos.

(This thread is making me want to find out what a major 7th chord is. I probably already know without actually Knowing.)

― Fergal (Ferg), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:25 (twenty-one years ago)

'ice rink', on the other hand, is in the key of the "B" button

(sorry)

― m. (mitchlnw), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:26 (twenty-one years ago)

three six mafia - they bout to find yo body

― jess (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:26 (twenty-one years ago)

Seriously, the maj7 effect requires very little musical knowledge to figure out, as evidenced by the fact that I know a damn thing about it. At its most basic, it's just ... play a note on the piano. Then move your other hand up an octave, but instead of playing the same note, move one key down. Play them both at once, and you've pretty much got the center of the maj7 thing.

I've got a second for Slowdive (also frequent users of maj7s and their guitar variants); weirdly, the songs on the three albums all seem to go poignant in different ways. "Here She Comes" vs. "Blue Skied an' Clear" -- not sure which wins for me. Similarly, on the first Boo Radleys album, is it "Does This Hurt?" That one that goes "Caroline, Caroline" all over and over.

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:32 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh, yeah, that's what I would have guessed. I gravitate towards that sort of thing a lot as well.

― Fergal (Ferg), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:36 (twenty-one years ago)

Deborahe Glasgow - "Fantasy Becomes Reality"

― Paul (scifisoul), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:37 (twenty-one years ago)

Anyone know a good website to explain chords and scales etc?

― Mediawhore, Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:38 (twenty-one years ago)

if u have a guitar:

A maj7 (the passive aggressive pastel chord)
e: 0
B: 2
G: 1
D: 2
A: 0
E: x

A dom7 (the bluesy chord)
e: 0
B: 2
G: 0
D: 2
A: 0
E: x

a min7 (the sting chord)
e: 0
B: 1
G: 0
D: 2
A: 0
E: x

― g--ff (gcannon), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:42 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.looknohands.com/chordhouse/piano/

― Melissa W (Melissa W), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:43 (twenty-one years ago)

(sorry to derail this poignant thread with my massive dorkery, but i live to serve)

― g--ff (gcannon), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:45 (twenty-one years ago)

(Mel's link rules.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 20:50 (twenty-one years ago)

Doesn't "Something" by George Harrison pretty much move through the 7ths like maj-maj7-dom7 in whatever key it's in? I think it might. I think a lot of his songs do that, "Peace on Earth" too maybe?

And of course to really bring out the "bluesiness" on that Adom7 that Geoff posted is strum it with a little pull-off on the 3rd fret of the high-E. Is there a name for that?

― Monetizing Eyeballs (diamond), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 21:00 (twenty-one years ago)

(Mel's link rules.)

OMG yes.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 31 August 2004 21:12 (twenty-one years ago)

Van Morrison: Cleaning Windows

― jim wentworth (wench), Wednesday, 1 September 2004 01:34 (twenty-one years ago)

five years pass...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPluE34pkGg

― by another name (amateurist), Sunday, 8 August 2010 05:58 (fifteen years ago)

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