i think because claps are so commonly used on beats 2 and 4, that even with no other elements to provide context it still feels like its supposed to be on beats 2 and 4.

@t1p1may0

Ай бұрын

This. Anyone who hears claps as being 1 and 3 needs to check themselves!

@klaxoncow

Ай бұрын

Yeah, it's how you separate the musicians from the non-musicians. Claps, snares and other "white noise" goes on the 2 and the 4. Bass goes on the 1 and 3. Obviously.

@unknownfeeling

Ай бұрын

@@klaxoncow Agree but I think even jsut careful listeners also would notice that claps are mostly used as a snare. Hmm, maybe we can separate people who have musical potential hah

@guanoApe

Ай бұрын

Claps ring in the range of snare like electric kits or midi options but when an audience claps along its usually in a folk or acoustic or maybe gospel setting likely without drums and they are encouraged to clap on beat

The song Veridis Quo is actually very smart play on words. It means ‘Where are you going’ in latin, but it also sounds like ‘Very Disco’ which is a pangram for ‘Discovery’ the name of the album ;). Clever, just like the intro

@Neorigg

Ай бұрын

an anagram you mean, coz a pangram is a phrase that features every letter of the alphabet at least once

@FrogFrogFrogT

Ай бұрын

That would be 'vadis', not 'veridis'.

@ButzPunk

Ай бұрын

The actual Latin phrase is "quo vadis" so the pun is a bit of a stretch. Interestingly, the change from "disco-very" to "very-disco" could be seen as an example of _verlan_ which is a French method of producing cant words where the syllables are reversed (e.g. verlan itself, which comes from l'invers), which might make it the only (certainly most famous) example of _verlanised dog latin_

@chitlitlah

Ай бұрын

It would be pronounced more like 'wery discwo'. The v can be pronounced like the English v if you want to sound like an old Italian pronouncing Latin, but the qu works the same in Latin, Italian, and English. Also what ButzPunk said. My dictionary can't find veridis as the inflected form of any word and Google Translate thinks it's an inflection of veritas (truth). Also, for the English translation of "Quo vadis?", I like, "Whither goest thou?" However, veridis looks more like vaditis to me, so maybe it should be, "Where y'all going?"

@crit-c4637

29 күн бұрын

​@@chitlitlah That is the transliterated spelling, so the v is pronounced as a v in English. Also the title is a reference to Quo Vadis, confirmed by the artists.

The best example pf a confusing intro i can think of is Everybody Want's to Rule the World. The misdirect isn't that long, only a couple of bars, but it misleads you on the tempo as well as the rhythym.

@studiodsr

24 күн бұрын

I like how later in the song you hear the opening keyboard notes again, this time with the rest of the band to let you know the correct timing

There’s a fun video of Harry Connick Jr. playing a solo and the crowd is clapping along, then his bandmates start laughing as he keeps playing. He had just played a measure of 5/4 to get the crowd clapping on the 2 and 4, and no one noticed but the musicians.

@Lotschi

29 күн бұрын

so cool!

@canadianbakn

17 күн бұрын

Great clip I found it today. You can see the drummer in the background raising his arms in celebration after the 5/4 measure and it immediately sounds much more swingy!

The bell ringing at the beginning of High Hopes by Pink Floyd is another one. It gets you nicely into thinking it's on the 1 but when the keyboard comes in you realise that the bell is not even ringing on the 2 and 4 but on the '2-and' & '4-and' - an eighth note behind the 1 and 3.

One of my favorite examples of a misleading intro is “La Mer” by Nine Inch Nails. The piano plays a 3/4 riff to start off the song. The drums come in playing 4/4 and the bass follows the piano in 3/4. It’s a really cool song!

@xubse

Ай бұрын

ooooo polymetres!

@grief8060

Ай бұрын

the most beautiful track trent has made

@cooperfuller9524

Ай бұрын

@@grief8060 I might have to agree with you there

@chrischurchill4978

28 күн бұрын

I think the cool thing about NIN using weird time signatures is that they groove so well you often don't even notice that it is a weird time signature - eg: The Becoming and Just Like You Imagined.

@cooperfuller9524

28 күн бұрын

@@chrischurchill4978 sooo true. And even the songs where you can tell there’s some weird time, those songs STILL groove hard. “March of the Pigs” and “The Collector” for instance

Not first, but i'm the real downbeat!

@aa23music

Ай бұрын

lmaooo

@joshuaizly5502

Ай бұрын

Nice

@Trombonemusic765

Ай бұрын

No one like this, it's at 69

@Mighty_Atheismo

Ай бұрын

Wow..... well done.

@SonyaBladesBooty

Ай бұрын

More like the real deadbeat

Marc Cohn's Walking in Memphis always throws me off. Not just from the intro onward, but already starting there. Feels like the singing sets in on the wrong beat every single time, and then when the chorus hits I'm completely lost.

Also: the reason Car Wash is confusing is because the kick drum enters with the claps on 2 and 4. So even if you feel it correctly at first, it makes you second guess.

Rock and Roll by Led Zeppelin is one that even most drummers struggle to get right.

@ronmay9196

Ай бұрын

When I learned about this, it felt like the most enlightening thing ever.

Interestingly, I remember a time when Veridis Quo and Car Wash were new to me and I heard them the wrong way, but after listening to them so many times, I basically trained my brain to hear them correctly. Not an intro, but the middle 8 section of Lean On Me by Bill Withers is very metrically confusing, since I've never heard a single cover that does it the same as the original.

There is also Invaders Must Die by the Prodigy. the bass loop which starts the song basically begins on bar 4 of an incomplete 4 bar loop.

also david love your videos you got me into music theory, and i am about to do abrsm grade 8 because of you

@DavidBennettPiano

Ай бұрын

Well done!!

@aa23music

Ай бұрын

@@DavidBennettPiano thank you! :)

I've always heard "Veridis Quo" the intended way, but that's probably because I was already used to that kind of arpeggio in classical music, and I subconsciously ignored the offset bass notes.

@alexisbudzisz

Ай бұрын

Same

Alan Parsons Project - I Robot. The sequenced and quantized bass synth line comes in and it's so regularly paced... and because it fades in, the downbeat could be anywhere. Then finally the drums come in to give you the reference point for the 1, but they've got a shuffle groove to them, and suddenly somehow the synth becomes the off-beat part.

I really like your channel. I like that you seem to be throughout in what sponsorships you pick and that you put emphasis on teaching. Also, cool with Clap at the end

THANK YOU for including Car Wash. FRIENDS DON'T LET FRIENDS CLAP ON 1 & 3! I once had to stand my ground against six other members of the band, who insisted that I was out of my mind. (All professional musicians, too.) They had inserted an extra beat when the tune started to compensate for the mistake. But if you notice, the clapping keeps going throughout the rest of the song and it becomes obvious that it's on the 2 & 4. My bandmates tried to insist that Rose Royce "meant to do that". But I stood my ground and won out in the end. It was beyond frustrating for me as they were really snarky about it. Eventually they came round, but not without a fight. I was so sad that day, I'll never forget it. So now I feel validated! Thanks, David. You're the best. :)

I find a lot of genres where syncopation is a big component can be hard to count along to in the beginning. My favorite example is “The Impression That I Get” by The Mighty Mighty Bosstones. A Ska punk song where the first 4 bars are just the guitar and the rest of the band (minus the drums) is the next 4 bars. Then the drums come in and finally anchors the rhythm to the correct place.

@LoopyChew

Ай бұрын

It’s *only* the guitar for the first four bars and I think the sustains do a pretty good job anchoring the rhythm pretty early on. YMMV, naturally. The thing that blew my mind years down the line is that someone pointed out to me that there’s an invisible comma in the refrain: “I’ve neeeeeeever had to, knock on wood-“ which changes the start of the chorus from a declaration of autonomy to a statement of empathy for everyone who’s eeeeever had to do the things the verses ask about. Which is out of the scope of this video but I can’t believe I had to have that pointed out.

There are so many covers of Beetlebum on KZread that get the timing wrong. It’s easily done, I heard it the wrong way for a long time.

@MorzakEV

28 күн бұрын

Yeah, that always confuses me when I hear it. I feel like Damon’s singing shifts from slightly earlier in the intro to the verse as well, which means you re hear the “wrong” timing even when you know the song.

@flowwersxoxo

23 күн бұрын

i think the confusing thing is trying to count the guitar part as quarter notes. to me it's always been pretty clearly eighths.

I need a part 4 of this great series.

Two songs that always come to mind are Cups by Underworld (which is pretty cheeky about tricking you at the beginning) and Swap Meet by Nirvana. Now that my ears have figured out what's going on in Swap Meet, I actually have a hard time not hearing it the right way, and honestly I kind of miss how my brain used to interpret the intro. It's like a black/blue-yellow/white dress situation.

Some more great examples! 😀👍 Another one of many is Rush's song 'Stick It Out', in which it becomes clear only once the singing starts how to count the beat 🙂

Enjoyed David!! Next installment please!!

For me a better example for Daft Punk would be Daftendirekt. Veridis Quo didn't give me trouble when I first heard it, but for Daftendirekt my first listen was great because the beat came in and established in almost a goosebumpy way after the low-pass filter was effectively off

Now matter how many times I listen to Beetlebum and figure out the right rhythm, it always trips me up the next time!... Great video, David, as usual!

I hate when this happens lol you are bopping your head then all of sudden a different count comes in lol

@snazztacular

Ай бұрын

I kinda love it. For me it has the same impact as syncopation; it feels lively and unexpected in a sort of satisfying way

I never would have imagined that one could count Beetlebum the wrong way. As a guitar player, it always seemed natural to count the muted strings intro as counting 1, 2, 3, 4.

Just what I needed

Nirvana - Swap meet, to me the riffs "totally changes" when drums come in, but is the same riff with another "1"

2 songs come to mind. Tell Me Something Good by Chaka Khan and Nautilus by Close to the Sun both have decieving intros. Tell Me Something Good presents an up down pattern with a mute on the downbeat but starts on an offbeat tricking you into hearing the mute as an offbeat, and Nautilus has a sonar ping on the and of 1 but the beat doesn't come in for 10 measures. The bass and keys do come in hinting at its true spot in the beat, but until the drums come in there's no confirmation until then

Ay, first music KZreadr I've seen to cover my fav daft punk song, so ty for that

Nice Vid, David. I think about these types of intros a lot, too. Some that spring to mind are: Pistol of Fire - Kings Of Leon still gets me every time and I actually can't unhear the wrong counting, only by the time we're in the chorus Razz - KOL is off the same album and also has a weird intro, very cool though First thing I thought you'd mention btw was drive my car, but I believe you already touched on that in another video In rainbows also has two cool ones bodysnatchers - Radiohead Videotape - Radiohead - this is really weird, there's a video essay out there about this - basically every chord is on the eighth note before the downbeat but it never really gets into that feel ... Looking forward to the next video!

Another big example of confusing intro is the instrumental “I Robot” From The Alan Parsons Project. It seems the synth starts on the downbeat, but when the drums comes in everything changes!

Two different songs by The Cars - "Since You're Gone", and "Just What I Needed". I can usually latch on the second or third time around, but they always get me on the first listen, especially "Since You're Gone".

I definitely hear Beetlebum a different (the 'correct') way to you. Was so confused by how you were counting it.

Identikit by Radiohead also messed with me when I first heard it!

@aperturius

Ай бұрын

The Butcher still messes me up every time.

Learned so much from you again. Hooktheory is really helpful too

Love it. Great video. More please.

I’ve listened to Beetlebum approximately a billion times probably and I’ve never noticed this lol

@stevenking4617

Ай бұрын

Yeah, I don't even know the song but I struggled to hear it "wrong." Same with Car Wash.

@nautje

7 күн бұрын

Yeah, for some reason I never heard it “wrong” either

Gratitude by Oingo Boingo. The synth woodwind intro sounds normal but when it comes back in later it shows that it’s a half beat late

Beetlebum always got me until recently when someone told me it was on the 1, even now I need to retrain my brain it still doesn't sound natural!

Here in Mexico 🇲🇽 the song with the "most confusing" intro 😅 for bar bands is 'sex on fire' by kings of lion... if drummers really knew how to count they would know that the 4th measure of the intro is played in 5 /4 and not in 4/4. Another very confusing song that I would love for you to analyze is 'rabbit in your headlights' by UNKLE. A jewel! Greetings David!

My personal favorite example of this is Behold by Joey Fehrenbach. The synth line that fades in at the beginning leads the rhythm, and even when the drums come in, they still feel like they're on the offbeat. I'm not even sure if it was intended or not, but the synth has such a strong presence that you can flip whether it or the drums are counting the 1 and it works either way.

thx for finally clearing up beatle bum in my head

I've always loved this effect. I'm not sure if you mentioned in your previous video, but I think I've heard a term for this in the past, either it's something like implied metric modulation, or rhythmic displacement, or metric displacement? Whatever it's called, it's a great trick! Yeah as a drummer myself Car Wash doesn't throw me, I immediately think of claps on the 2 & 4. When the kick comes in layered with it, I hear that as that kind of reggae style rhythm where kick is often on the upbeat too.

hey, david. fantastic series. don't tread on me by metallica is a favorite that comes to mind. thank you for your consistently excellent content.

Here's a very obscure (and very subtle) example of a song with a confusing intro: "Black Rose", from the cult GameCube psychological horror game _Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem._ The intro is sparse, consisting of four bells tolls, each two measures apart, and ambient rain and thunder sounds. Once the guitar and synths start coming in, you (might) realize that not only are the bells _not_ sounding on the downbeat, they're a _sixteenth note_ before beat 2 (the "a" in "one-ee-and-a").

This is one of my favourite arrangement tricks. It's harder than it seems to incorporate it into your own song. The absolute best example of this I've heard in years is Time & Place by Queens of the Stoneage from the latest album.

Thank you.

In the Meantime by space hog is like this. The loop that opens the song sounds like it has a pickup, but its actually on the beat. And you can't tell until the band comes in. No matter how many times I hear that song it always sounds off.

A song intro that always tripped me up was Introducing Palace Players by MEW. It really gives the feeling of being lost before the song finally starts.

darn it, I listened to Verdis Quo so many times, that I did not notice the beat beating off, but it's a very instresting way to introduce a song to people and tbh before, this video I haven't even noticed this confusion even once.

"Veridis Quo" is used as opening to the swedish TV-series Supersnälla Silver-Sara & Stål-Henrik!

Gary Brooker's "No More Fear of Flying" intro has a nice intro hiccup that always puts me on the wrong foot.

I love blur 🙌🏻

Another confusing one is the beginning of the song "Lights Out" by Royal Blood. It's difficult to directly feel the pulse when you're listening to the song and not playing it. The idea is simple, just constant sixteenth notes with a rest on beats 1 and 3. Mike Kerr even pick the first note of the pattern with a downstroke when it would be more comfortable to start with an upstroke!

@iliketrains3495

Ай бұрын

Yep that's another great shout, that one has always stumped me

Beetlebum definitely! I even thought that slide is not on a beat - but it actually is. So, funny enough, the first strong sound (the slide, which is actually even more clear in the original) is really the first. And the singing/phrasing does help at all.

Another great example is "The Red Baron" by Sabaton, or "No More Tears" By Ozzy Osbourne

@Alex-wx4bz

22 күн бұрын

Damn you beat me to it on "No More Tears." If we're going hair metal (sort of), what about "Kickstart My Heart"?

I love "This Is Your Life" by The Killers in this context. Always heard the voicing intro out of time.

@luke5100

Ай бұрын

Yes! Also “On TOP” by them. The synth riff sets up a pulse that totally fakes you out

Another example: "The Impression That I Get" by The Mighty Mighty Bosstones The intro is guitar-driven and misleads you into thinking it's not syncopated, with a little tom-crash on drums and the first bit of bass also being on the accent; even the sax line doesn't foreshadow the actual 1 until the full arrangement kicks in. The actual first played note of the song is the only clue in the intro for where the 1 is, but is easily overlooked in place of the accents.

I've got two from Traffic - Tragic Magic (on Shootout At the Fantasy Factory) has a percussion lead-in that'll throw you *two* beats, and Light Up or Leave Me Alone (from The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys) has that, but with a lead electric guitar, where a certain bridge is 6/4 rather than 4/4 - you'll hear it. Also - for interesting use of the off beat, go listen to the title track of that latter album - and ditto with Rock and Roll Stew, you'll hear an off-beat clap in certain parts of each song.

I was sure the daft punk one was gonna be Voyager ^^ it has the same anticipated chord pattern. I listen to this album hundreds of times so I actually got quite surprised when you counted the beat on that!

Meshuggah - Combustion Starts with a straight forward 4/4 riff and an off-beat hi-hat count in. If you shift the first note by an 8th, the hats land on beat. You can count the song either way, from start to finish.

"AH, YES! I'M IN TIME!!" So relatable...

beetlebum is really cool since they have elements of both counts going at the same time. i think it's fair to say, for the first part, where the 1 is, the correct answer is "yes" by "split vote". only on verse two is the vote tiebroken

My favourite example of this is "Much against everyones advice" by Soulwax. Probably not well known, but definitely worth a listen

@JBDazen

Ай бұрын

I love that one :)

@KusacUK

Ай бұрын

Oooo not heard that for ages! Straight off to Spotify I go… thanks!

With car wash, it’s that second bar that reinforces the illusion for me. It sound good in the ‘wrong’ counting, but awful in the ‘right’ counting

the guitar intro of "southern part of texas" by the "War" drives me crazy!! 😂

I was LITERALLY about to suggest Beetlebum right before it came up, the transition when the full band joins has always confused the hell out of me

Lonely Boy by Andrew Gold is an example. I love when songs do this. It’s like a little musical prank on the listener that I always find amusing.

Take it easy by The Eagles starts on 4&, but the drum fill after the first chords is leading so smoothly into the full instrumentation that it is barely noticeable if you are not counting along.

I feel the right beat on Veridis Quo from the beginning, but I'm sure that's just because I've heard the song so many times, I can't imagine the drums coming in any other way.

I am white. Went to a Historically Black College. Was the only caucasian in the University Choir. Had a blast. It is a common, and often very correct stereotype, that white people clap on 1 and 3. Black people clap on 2 and 4. The latter being correct.

Funny, I’ve never heard Veridis Quo the way that David is counting it out. I always hear it with the beat placed as intended by the band

A song that I find has a confusing intro is Walking in Memphis by Marc Cohn. At first, it seems like there is a chord change on every 1st and 3rd beat (with the first chord of the song starting on the 1 &). But once we get to the chorus, to me at least, where the downbeat falls starts to become ambiguous, and once the drums enter, it becomes apparent that the chord changes actually happen on the 2 & and 4 &.

Saw daft punk in the thumbnail and assumed you were covering the intro to “Give Life Back To Music”. That one always confused me until I realized the actual pulse

The Rasmus - In the Shadows intro also misleads you as a listener, thinking that this alarm sound is on the place that the kick normally plays, while it's on the place of the snare drum

I’m the same way with Car Wash. Once you have heard enough of the beginning and especially the guitar high note “and” it’s easy to hear that from the start.

I went and listened to all of these before watching the video, just to get an unbiased first impression of the timing. Only one i actually heard the correct way immediately was "Beetlebum"

Beetlebum is such a great example! I always try to play along with the song and I get confused lol

Van Halen Panama is another one. It's so weird, I think even the band themselves didn't know how it went, because the riff and the beat change on the second time around.

@lovelylemonfactory

Ай бұрын

Yes and it has drums from the start which makes it even more confusing

OMFG - Ok Also surprising inro :D

Hey David, did you do Hendrix version of All Along the Watchtower? That intro always throws me off Also I’m Free from The Who is a good one to review (The bloody Hoo)

The guitar riff oh Shallow by Porcupine Tree seems to start on 4 but it's actually the 1 and it's clear when the drums kick in. We Are by Karnivool is confusing because it's a 3:4 polyrhythm and it soundss like it starts on the offbeat of 3 but it actually starts on the downbeat of 1 and it's 4/4. The floor tom and snare pattern make the polyrhythm stand out, but the song it's actually in 4/4

It happens from time to time, that I switch on a random radiostation and jump into some song I barely know, could be a dance track with poly rhythm or a rocksong with a lot of stuff going on. And it can happen that I am "on the wrong track" and for that getting really confused. The interesting thing now is that my brain seems to refuse getting on the "right track"... rebelling subconscious ... difficult to explain that 😅

On the last one I felt the right beat, on the Car Wash one I felt the wrong beat. Cool stuff.

Another song that has a confusing intro (though it may not be the kind your looking for) is My Curse by Killswitch Engaged. Not only does it start in 3:4 time which can throw some people off. The guitar playing the picking pattern plays the "melody" for lack of a better term on the up beat and a "root" tone on the down beat, with the second guitar strumming chords being the only thing that tells you when the first down beat actually is. So for some (like me) figuring how to count that gets confusing very quickly at first.

"Invaders Must Die" by The Prodigy was the first song that I remember noticing this kind of ambiguity in.

My favorite example of this is Jethro Tull's Rainbow blues. It isn't really about misplacing the downbeat like most of the examples in these videos. I count it in 12 with some pick up notes. After the intro it just go straight to 4/4.

“Introducing Palace Players” by Mew. Intro is a total mindf**k

Canonball by the Breeders and There She Goes by the La's also have confusing intros in which they change our perception on how we hear the drums You should cover those as well!

Probably most famous is Watermelon Man by Herbie Hancock (but I think you did a video on that) and a beautiful song that does this is ‘Earth Song/Turn the World Around’ by Harry Belafonte that’s best when done with the Muppets. Oh Baby and Home by LCD Soundsystem pull this trick too. You get so into the sequencing of the synths and percussion that when the drums come in you’re a bit lost for a minute, especially as you’re probably having a bit of a boogie.

oh mannnn, veridis quo gets me EVERY time

I think that a point of ambiguity that can be brought in is that, while it's easiest to notate these confusing intros as having the offset be at the start, so that the meter is consistent and any odd notes are in a pickup bar, it would be just as technically valid to have a single measure of an odd time right before the beat solidifies. For example, if there's an eighth note pickup, a bar of 7/8 could account for the half a beat that "feels" lost in the shuffle. There are several reasons this isn't done usually (I already mentioned keeping a consistent meter, but often the actual part doesn't change any when the beat comes in, so in those cases having an odd measure before that would make the existing part fall in a different part of the bar than before the shift), but it would still _technically_ notate the song correctly. And there are times when that sort of trick is pulled in a less ambiguous context, so even as much as people would probably scratch their heads at music being notated that way, they probably still have a sense for how that works intuitively whether they know it or not. That said, in these ambiguous situations, the simplest notation is probably the best, but it's still a point worth acknowledging.

That's great stuff David! Most of the time I step on these landmines, but the very next time I get the counting correctly. But, there is a song which always bothers me. It's from a series called Nashville (maybe you've heard of it). It's called Moving on never felt so good, sings by the actor Chris Carmack. The song starts with guitar and vocal with a seemingly straight forward beat, even when the bass comes in, but the drums mix it. It is so confusing, but maybe it's just me. What do you think?

Queens of the Stone Age - Song for the Dead is such a satisfying one with the guitar and drums interplay. I consider myself a medium-trained musician, but at some point it gets almost impossible for me to keep counting.

‘Bom feeling’ by Sara Tavares led to entire discussions on where the one is between me and my musician mates. The effect extends quite a bit into the song as well.

Several songs by The Kinks did this (You really got me, Set me free, Tired of waiting, All day and all of the night...). And the theme song from Beverly Hills 90210 😅

First time I've felt the right beat right in one of these, the blur track felt really wrong the way you initially counted it. Subjective indeed

I’ve heard Cliff Richard say there’s a time signature change in the intro to Move It.