Just whipped out Projector..

[stizzleomnibus]

It's really easy, in the guitar driven world of metal, to pick up on awesome guitar work, but rhythm is absolutely critical. Even if you don't notice it, it still blows your mind.

I blame the lack of creative rhythm work on Ringo Starr. If you ever read a bio, you'll read something about how he "parleyed his weak left-hand technique into a simple, but effective rhythm." That's a bullshit way of saying that he built his entire career out of the beat which is the first that any new drummer learns. One of the things that you have to love about metal is the use of compound time (most metal bands do this. Listen: Dobermann and the chorus from The Sun Fired Blanks). In the barren world of mainstream music, however, it's all 4/4. It's all dance-able.

These rhythmic choices, along with a lot of high-speed shredding, are what makes some DT songs so hard to head-bang to. The examples that I gave in my last post are good starting points. At Loss for Words uses a slow 5/8 after the first chorus, and Feast of Burden uses 7/8 starting at the keyboard break and in all of the choruses. You can also find some good 7/8 work all throughout My Negation (this one is tricky, since they don't really play it up, but try to count the beats in the breakdown; listen for the drums to skip the last eighth note in a measure).

And on the topic of the bands technical merits: you can easily hear the awesomeness of the guitars, but drums are trickier. Jivarp lists Mike Portnoy (Dream Theater, Liquid Tension Experiment) and Neil Peart (Rush) as two of his influences. These are two of the greatest living musicians. The great thing about DT is that it never approaches the same technical level as a lot of progressive bands. I think it keeps the music interesting, but the technical aspects never override the music. If you never noticed the things I'm talking about, good. You heard the final product that you were meant to hear. Of course, if you're going to listen to something a million times and appreciate it, you might as well look at the finer points.

I'm on my way out the door, but would you guys like more examples later? I really appreciate a good discussion on the technical merits of a band that most people I know would dismiss as "that screamy shit."

 

[Siren]

I'm on my way out the door, but would you guys like more examples later? I really appreciate a good discussion on the technical merits of a band that most people I know would dismiss as "that screamy shit."

Yes, please. I really like this discussion, i find it very interesting. Unfortunately i don't have much time now to read it in detail and listen to the songs and understand what you're talking about, but i intend to come back to it in a few weeks. Please feel free to explain in as much detail as you want, i'm musically illiterate and it takes an effort to decipher all this.
Also feel free to comment on Nether Novas, it has one of my favourite moments at around 4:59, a little before the scream, i'm talking about the part with the weird (awesome) drum beat and the guitar.

edit: I just listened to On your time again, very interesting, i had never noticed that moment before. It's also one of my favourite songs.

 

[Dark_Silence]

speaking of rhythm... when i played guitar, and invented a riff, my teacher was always trying to make me play it in a "conventional" time signature, like 4/4... i used to play in totally weird time signatures, and he said that if i didnt correct that, i wouldnt be able to find a band because we wouldnt be able to play together in rhythm because of my weird time signature habbit...

 

[stizzleomnibus]

<megapost>
Here is a closer look at On Your Time. The song begins in 5/8; as this is not a very common time signature, it is very convenient that the band has provided the drums as an intro to help you. Listen the the section before the guitars come in a few times, and make sure that you get your head or your entire body into the rhythm. I played drums for several years as a young'n, and I cannot understate the importance if inviting the beat into your body. Really, isn't that part of the reason that we listen to metal? That primal connection is why percussion is the oldest form of music. Try counting the 1 2 3 1 2 3 1 2 1 2, where the one is always the accent. If you're not sure that you're counting the right notes, count all of them. You should be counting too fast to do it out loud.

*Musically, an accent is a strong beat: This is the beat upon which your head goes down. An accent is not necessarily a downbeat, but it is a strong one.

0:00 - The beat, soon enhanced with a primitive version of the riff. At 0:10, the guitar begins playing the accents in the rhythm.

0:15 - This is the 5/8 riff fully compiled, its most common form in the song. Note that the snare drum continues to play the same accents as earlier, with the bass drum filling all of the notes in between (in typical death metal fashion). For an advanced exercise, try digging out the sound of the ride cymbal: these are the actual five eighth notes that define the time signature, though their importance is diminished by the syncopated rhythm.

0:25 - The song kicks into 4/4. This is the first time change, and it's one that took me a while to notice. The guitar riff is very similar to the one immediately before it, in that it uses mostly the same pitches, and it is also syncopated. However between the first accent and the second, there are a few more repetitions of the note that is used as "filler" between the accents. By filler I mean the "machine gun" notes that typically define "shredding." Now, the riff, along with the rest of the arrangement, requires eight eighth notes, instead of the five in the preceding riff (4/4 is identical to 8/8, unless you're an asshole with a fetish for semantics). I should mention that this time change is extremely difficult to pull off.

0:41 - Back to 5/8. You should remember this riff. At 0:51, the ride cymbal keeps the rhythm during a short fill.

0:56 - I've never looked closely at this part of the song before now. As near as I can tell, it's in 5/8. Since the guitar part goes for a while before it repeats itself, it might be more proper to call it 10/8 (which is the same, but twice as long; I suggest it here since it is typically "improper" for a melody to overrun the measure in which it begins.)

1:12 - We return to 4/4, but this time the music is at half the speed that we used at 0:25. (Music very easily multiplies and divides by two. These techniques are known as double- and half-time, respectively.)

1:44 - No time change here, but listen to the drums. Simple and unobtrusive, but the elegance and agility show through. And the riff! Continue in 4/4.

2:48 - A quick fill in 5/8. Remember, those time changes are hard.

2:50 - Back to 4/4. This returns us to the speed used in the first 4/4 section. *Time changes are still difficult.

2:58 - Back to 5/8. *Still hard.

3:08 - Back to 4/4. *Sigh* This is half the speed of the last 4/4 section, the same as the last clean-vocal section.

3:25 - Again, this is not a time change, but listen to the drums. From here until the of the line 3:55, marvel at all of the different sounds that are used to create the beat. This is one of the hallmarks of progressive drumming, and it's one of the band's greatest strengths.

3:40 - I should note that while this is still in 4/4, the tempo is half that of the section before, and therefore a quarter that of the first 4/4 section in the song. It's so slow relative to the rest of the song that it seems to drag for a moment...

3:54 - The drums walk you back up to twice the tempo as a moment before, which is, again, the "clean-vox! tempo.

4:28 - This is where your brain melts. The drums and guitars enter together at 5/8. The rhythm might be hard to catch, since hi-hat accents are always a bit subdued. At 4:33, the bass drum comes in to show you were those accents are if you couldn't hear them before.Megapost

4:38 - The reckoning. The guitars continue on at 5/8, but the drums move into 2/4. 2/4 is half the size of 4/4, and they sound the same. The math in this section is a little odd, so I use 2/4 because it fits better.) You can also think of it as 4/8. I should mention that the 5/8 we've been using all along is an uncommon time signature, as it is asymmetric (note the odd number on the top). 5/8 is longer than 4/8 at the same tempo, since it has an extra eighth. Therefore, the drums will not synchronize with the rest of the arrangement. Further fucking your brain, the drums don't even attempt to mimic the syncopation of the guitars. Here's what happens:

Guitars - 4 measures (4 times 5 eighths each = 20 eighth notes.)
Drums - 5 measurs (5 times 4 eighths each = 20 eighth notes. They occupy the same space.)

This is probably the most technically difficult part of the song.

4:43 - The crash cymbal begins a repeat of the earlier section. The band was making sure that you listen to it a second time, in case you survived the first time.

4:48 - Marked by another crash cymbal. The drums here resemble the last section in the general form of the beat, but notice that the combination of snare and bass drum notes return to the original rhythm: 5/8 and syncopated.

4:53 - Drums change again. This closely resembles the part in 0:15, in which the bass/snare play the accents, but the hi-hat (in place of the ride used earlier) actually plays all five eighths, instead of the rhythm played by the other drums.

4:58 - You should recognize this section from earlier.

5:09 - The technique used by the drums here is very common in metal (DT uses it a lot in their speed metal sections, such as the opening to "Empty Me"): The bass and ride (or hi-hat) play every eighth, while the snare plays every note in between. This is significant in that the drums are actually using the "secondary" notes from 0:15 and 4:53. The syncopation is nowhere to be found in the drums here. (It is however, pretty easy to synchronize this with the guitar part.)

5:27 - I can't really tell what's happening here. Metal is hardest to decompile when it's really fast. And I'm a really drunk.


I've tried to catch every time change and technically significant portion of the song. I'm probably out of synch with the published version of the music, but only on paper and in semantic areas. I hope that you can understand what I've written above, which half technical and half "explain it to them that aren't." I hope that you can hear the things that I describe, and I hope that you realize that you are listening to the Greatest fucking band in the world. I'll gladly answer any questions.

I just hope that the people who wrote this song don't come to this board.
</megapost>

 

[Siren]

@stizzle: Thanks for taking the time to write down all that. I have one question though, what is syncopation?
As for the band coming to this board.. we can pretend they don't.

 

[stizzleomnibus]

Syncopation is when the music uses an irregular beat. For example, the opening of On You Time contains four accents, but the first two occupy a space of three notes each, while the second two occupy a space of two notes each. If you stand up and move your hips side-to-side in time with the music, you'll definitely feel the irregularity. (I don't actually do this, I suggest because someone more comfortable and effeminate might get something out of it.)

The place least likely to use syncopation is anything written to dance to, where the counting is 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +, where the numbers are the beat on which you hump your partner. The beat is perfectly even, and it never throws people off.

 

[DisplayofCharacter]

@stizzle: I am impressed. More so about your writing ability than the technical aspects; I don't mean to say that technically speaking you weren't superb, but the way you went about it was enthusiastic and enjoyable, as well as informative. I was afraid it was going to be very dry, and it wasn't (because I've noticed in other occasions that when "virtuosos" try to explain technicality, they use a lot of math, and are very vague otherwise). Examples were excellent as well, and it didn't feel condescending at all, which is great.

I guess I just gave your writing a review. Kudos anyway man. I wouldn't expect one for every song DT ever wrote, but would you mind doing a couple more in your free time, for songs that you enjoy or find to be particularly challenging? It would be appreciated.

 

[stizzleomnibus]

it didn't feel condescending at all, which is great.

Full disclosure: I was a music major in college for a semester before I washed out. I don't want you to go thinking that there's any scholastic authority in anything I say. Of course, if I say something, and you listen to the song, understand it and agree...

The reason I didn't do so well was that I didn't do the work, and the reason I didn't do it was because I was discouraged. I had the world's worst instructor. My hard-earned tuition dollars turned into weekly, hour-long sessions about how I should choose a different major and career; she'd barely ever heard me play. She was too busy being...well, you know. Granted, I had only been playing the piano for a year and a half, and she was a two time Fullbright Scholar, but still, you can't discourage people who are on a different level than you on one particular subject. If they care enough to do something, or even read about it, there's only one thing to do, especially if it's something that you enjoy.

Anyway, I'll gladly write more, but it would probably be worth a new thread, since it won't necessarily be about Projector. Don't take this the wrong way, but most of the band's songs don't have this much going on. They tend to stick to a single time signature (which most bands do constantly, without ever crafting a gem like this), and they usually don't swap back and forth a thousand times in a single song. Of course, listening to their catalog in chronological order, you can hear the band improving technically in a lot of ways, and charting new musical territory. Doesn't mean that they're not interesting, especially compared to what most people call music.

Full disclosure: I believe that this is the single greatest band in the world. You know, if I sound biased at any time.

 

[Siren]

@stizzle: Feel free to open a new thread. Besides, you don't need to only analyze the time signatures of full songs, but you can also point out other technically interesting things, if there's any you want to talk about. By the way, i never understood what "charting new musical territory" means.
As for your instructor, it sucks. I don't know how it works there and what other alternatives you had, but if you liked it so much you should have given it a try, perhaps with someone else.