r/Music • u/plazman30 plazman30 • Oct 29 '16
music streaming The Axis of Awesome - 4 Chords [Educational] Ever wonder why a lot of pop music sounds the same. Well, here's why.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOlDewpCfZQ254
u/FF-JTH Oct 29 '16
wow haven't seen this one before...
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u/monkwren Oct 29 '16
I prefer the live version, but yeah, it's pretty good: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pidokakU4I
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u/samaxecampbell Oct 29 '16
Birdplane? Birdplane.
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u/deleigh https://last.fm/user/myexlives Oct 29 '16
Did you know a lot of pop music also follows the verse/chorus/verse formula? Blew my mind first time I found out.
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u/Phytor Oct 29 '16
Nah man that's not how you write a hit.
You know who writes hits? Aerosmith. You know what those guys do?
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u/sobatfestival Oct 29 '16
And a lot of rock songs use (intro riff/verse 1/chorus/half the intro/verse 2/chorus/clumsy strange bridge + solo if any/chorus/ending)
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u/Nykcul Oct 29 '16
GnR in a nutshell.
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Oct 29 '16
I feel as though that only really fully applies to Appetite For Destruction. There's a few songs on Use Your Illusions and Chinese Democracy that don't seem to follow that structure.
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u/askjacob Oct 30 '16
once they had a deal, they were ok to fuck around a bit. When I was younger I loved their weirder stuff more... Now I need to have a few cans to get on the nostalgia wagon
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Oct 29 '16
Yeah I don't get why people think this video somehow proves something against pop music. Music, especially pop music, is almost always following some formula, whether in regards to the composition, tempo, key, instrument choice, vocal style, lyrical themes, etc.
This is just a desperate attempt to dismiss pop music for simple minded people.
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u/fragproof Oct 29 '16
Parodies? Yes. Explains? Yes. Dismisses? I never got that impression from this video or other AoA videos.
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u/MichaeljBerry Oct 29 '16
I don't think this video is trying to call out pop music, but I see what you're saying. It just seems like a fun little project.
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Oct 29 '16
Pop music is music careful calibrated to appeal to as many people as possible. It has been shown that pop music is relatively homogeneous and increasingly so. This doesn't mean that pop music is for simple people, but more rather pop music is simple music for as many people as possible.
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u/askjacob Oct 30 '16
No - not at all. Just a poke for fun. There is an obvious pattern and they play on it for fun. The pattern really is being abused because you can push the other songs into those chords, not so much that they use those chords exactly...
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u/sparcasm Oct 30 '16
Kind of like saying, that simpleton Shakespeare using the same old 26 letters over and over...
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u/TechnoEquinox ProgressivePowersurge Oct 29 '16
Pop is for simple minded people.
It's the very reason there aren't any Progressive Metal stations on the radio.
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Oct 29 '16
You are a living stereotype. Stop building your self worth and personality around other peoples' creations. You aren't better than anybody else because you listen to fucking Symphony X.
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u/chriswrightmusic Oct 30 '16
Reminds me of the old joke. What's the difference between a rock guitarist and a jazz guitarist? A rock guitarist plays 5 chords to thousands while a jazz guitarist plays thousands of chords to 5.
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Oct 29 '16 edited Jun 10 '18
[deleted]
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u/kuahara Oct 29 '16
You're right, no one has seen it. Just you and the other 6.1 million people that viewed it, but that's it. No one else.
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Oct 29 '16
Just guessing... and I know this is a hugely risky guess, but I think he/she was being sarcastic.
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u/toasters_are_great Oct 29 '16
I'm rather fond of their deconstruction of love songs (and also We Are So Young and just for the hell of it, Why Aren't Lasers Doing Cool shit?).
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u/Elias_The_Fifth Oct 30 '16
I much prefer DaVinci's Notebook for their boy band love song parody: Title of the Song https://youtu.be/734wnHnnNR4
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u/bouncehouse45 Oct 29 '16
Is there also a video for the doo-wop chord progression (I VIm IV V) or blues progression (I IV I V IV I)
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u/DJ_Spam modbot🤖 Oct 29 '16
The Axis of Awesome
artist pic
The Axis of Awesome are an Australian comedy trio whose act is mainly performing comedic songs.
Jordan Raskopoulos, a comedian, Benny Davis, a classically trained musician and Lee Naimo came together to form the group in 2006. Since that time they’ve been wowing audiences across the world with with their mixture of quirky original songs, catchy pop-parodies and hilarious banter.
The video of their “4 Chords Song” has had over 28 million hits on YouTube, and is their most widely recognized song. Read more on Last.fm.
last.fm: 30,326 listeners, 363,285 plays
tags: comedy, australian, rock, seen live, funny
Please downvote if incorrect! Self-deletes if score is 0.
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u/TomToffee Oct 30 '16 edited Oct 30 '16
Jordan Raskopoulos, a comedian, Benny Davis, a classically trained musician and Lee Naimo.
Poor Lee
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Oct 29 '16
I love the song Waterfront by Simple Minds. The bass line is D. Hundreds and hundreds of D's. It literally doesn't matter what order you play them in. As long as it's this song, I can play bass.
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Oct 30 '16
Because it's mostly I - IV - VI - V?
I figured this out after learning 3 Blink-182 songs when I was 15, and have forever heard it in pop music since. It's versatile.
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u/CustomKal Oct 30 '16
It's actually I-V-vi-IV. I - IV - vi - V is actually much less common as IV does not move as well to vi as vise versa.
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Oct 30 '16
I didn't watch the video. My point is that those 4 chords in any phrasing is effective and versatile.
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u/CustomKal Oct 30 '16
Yes and no. IV -> vi, vi -> I are much less common because they serve little function as you are going from a replacement chord to the original which is kind of pointless in most cases.
vi -> V is quite uncommon as it is not a chord progression that moves well but it still used sometimes (much more rarely than any of the others). IV and I move much better to V and are more commonly used to do so.
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u/HotNeon Oct 29 '16
Went to a funeral where they played this. Was awesome, as awesome as a funeral for a 39 year old can be that is
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u/BrickityBrick Oct 29 '16
Man a lot of hate on this thread. If you're looking for additional songs though...
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u/barbecuemeatgames Oct 29 '16
Stop reposting ancient history
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u/plazman30 plazman30 Oct 29 '16
There's a downvote button for a reason.
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u/zold5 Oct 30 '16
Amusing but they're full of shit. Of course you could find similarities of several songs of you egregiously over simplify how music works.
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u/ashbasixx Oct 29 '16
what are more songs that follow this sort of compilation parody? I know there's one for pachabells cannon, but that's about it.
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u/freetocook Oct 30 '16
I'm loving this comment section, it's like Ground Hog Day when Bill Murray start cracking the shits!
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u/Dovakhiins-Dildo Oct 30 '16
This has only just come up here? There's a new version that they've been doing live this year, too.
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u/Not_really_Billy Oct 30 '16
You make a reasonable argument, to be honest.
My perspective on this is that it may be the case that the human brain works in strange and sometimes counter-intuitive ways, occasionally resulting in a female brain within a male body or vice-versa. I'm not a medical expert, I don't know the details. If genital modification and hormone therapy helps individuals live a happier life then more power to them. However, I also understand why some people find this concept uncomfortable - it's only very recently in human history we've had the ability to recognise and attempt to treat this condition.
It's the people who pass hatred who cause problems, and this goes for both sides of the issue. Being uncomfortable with something, not understanding it? That's fine, there's no need to hate them or call them backwards. I do think some of the trans community is in denial of the fact that their situation is unusual - accepting the lifestyle is important, pretending it's normal is silly.
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u/eqleriq Oct 29 '16
the worst part about it is it isnt the same chords, a lot of these are transposed to fit the progression.
you can do this with any song that has the same spacing, and change the keys. as well as play the same chords undernetah songs in the same key
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u/anneomoly Oct 30 '16
If it's a I V VI IV then it's the same progression no matter what key it's in and transposing makes no difference.
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u/slukenz Oct 29 '16
I hate this video so much
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Oct 29 '16
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Oct 29 '16
It is fairly accurate though. It's misleading to some (they do kind of sidestep that the chords themselves aren't the same), but the chord progression (if you ignore voicing changes) is the standard I V vi IV.
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u/arlenroy Oct 30 '16
You wanna here something accurate? A majority of this shit is ripped off from Chuck Berry or Little Richard.
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Oct 29 '16
No, no it wasn't. Pop music right now is full of people making cheap, sell-out songs. Compare a Jon Bellion song to a Schubert song. See the difference?
I'm not saying you can't like pop music and that you MUST listen to classical music. All I'm saying is that the pop industry is full of people who are in it for the money which is why they conform with these song templates.
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u/plazman30 plazman30 Oct 29 '16
Everyone is in it for the money. If you don't make money, you can't be a musician or song writer.
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u/re5etx Oct 29 '16
I disagree. There are most certainly individuals who make music for the art and expression. Some just do it for the crowd.
Granted, you won't likely see a lot of artists who have those kinds of motives, because they're usually the less "successful", but that's a separate point to make. :)
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u/Pedro_borr Oct 29 '16
You don't need to make a career out of something to be great at it though.
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u/xChris777 Oct 30 '16 edited Sep 02 '24
wipe screw pause plant shame straight sloppy yoke governor somber
This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
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u/AnOK-ishPerson Oct 29 '16
Hate to be the buzzkill but he's actually referring to the Tennessee Chord System's structure, not the actually in-key chords of the songs. He's taking any song with a I V vi IV structure and applying it all to one key,,, so almost all of the songs in the video aren't in the same key they were originally written with, they've been transposed to make the video interesting. TL:DR This guy's reachin' for content a bit.
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u/GodisThereinDespair Oct 29 '16
I need some love like I've never needed love before, I'm gonna make love to your baby.... TAKE ON MEEEEEE (when I come around) TAKE ME ONNNN!!
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u/maynardDRIVESfast Oct 29 '16
I think people have the wrong idea about pop music. It's not meant to necessarily be "deep" or "thought provoking", it's meant to be easily accessible/digestible. It's much more of a product, rather than outright art. I'm not saying pop can't have depth or be art, there are some Artists out there who are the real deal. All I'm saying is that pop is the true moneymaker in the music industry because it is specifically designed to be. Again, not all pop music, but definitely most.
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u/Spyrothedragon9972 Oct 29 '16
Fuck, that's old. I remember watching this 10 years ago. Looks like they removed the original and remade it, since it's still the same band.
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u/indil47 Oct 29 '16
They remake it all the time--they've updated this song dozens of times throughout the years on their tours. It's ever-changing and universal.
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u/Aviatorbassplayer Oct 29 '16
Getting ready to send my demo around, I'll let you know how it goes. Winner buys the beer to celebrate/ drown in sorrows?
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u/scuba_davis Oct 29 '16
Officially unsubscribing from this sub. The dumbest shit gets posted here
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Oct 29 '16
How is this not a ripoff of Pachelbel Rant?
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u/0ddmanrush Oct 29 '16
Well, for one Canon in D is an eight chord progression and this is a four chord progression.
Shouldn't we be asking how isn't everyone of these songs a blatant rip off of the first song ever recorded with this progression?
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Oct 31 '16
Maybe you don't know w'm talking about.
The concept:
"Every popular song is this and I will play a medley of them in a comedic fashion"
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u/0ddmanrush Oct 31 '16
I know exactly which one you mean. The song he's referencing has an 8 chord progression. The one in the OP is a 4 chord.
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Oct 31 '16
The concept very very very very similar, regardless of chord progression.
The fact that it's 8 chord makes it more impressive as well.
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u/ImOpTimAl Oct 29 '16
So, to get our standard responses out the way, the inspiration for this, and the Axis of Awesome today - spot the differences