Metal music theory

[death metal black metal]

Good definitions.

Maybe "non-cyclic structure" is a good term; I always liked "narrative" because it suggests the usual artistic motive for writing in such a way.

After weeks of classical listening, rock/jazz really do sound repetitive.

[Ergriefer]

a whole lot of black metal stays in minor keys, with occasional chromatic variations for emphasis.  in most cases, they stay rigidly enough in minor keys to just be classified as diatonic.

your best examples for metal as chromatic music would be Slayer or some Blut Aus Nord albums, I guess.

[Goluf]

Bump. Did this come to anything? This project seems to have dropped off the face of the earth once people got too ambitious with their plans, but I'd like to see some follow through.

I think I still have all the edited musical examples on my computer if someone would be willing to write some code and an accompanying explanatory document so that they may be hosted on the site...

And to all who did or will criticize the project as being trite, childish, not extensive enough, etc., I say:  The only way anything gets done, here or elsewhere, is if it snowballs. Start modestly within a flexible framework, and then add progressively.

[aquarius]

Interesting project and it would be great if this ever came to fruition. One thing I wonder about though is how bands came to use this theory, I mean do they consciously know what chord they're using or is it largely subconscious i.e. they transcribe the melody they're thinking of into a riff.

[Bondage]

Bumping this for two reasons,

1) It sucks that nothing came about from this.

2) There was a link in this thread that brought me to this course thing and I just want to say thank you very much. It was immensely informative.

[Iron]

Bumping this for two reasons,

1) It sucks that nothing came about from this.

2) There was a link in this thread that brought me to this course thing and I just want to say thank you very much. It was immensely informative.

I think that informative, though-inspiring threads like this should be stickied. There's another metal music theory thread floating around in the pile, somewhere, too, which I also think should be stickied. Or maybe they should be merged. There are a few gem threads in the mix, particular ones that are chockful of cool reference/educational material. Just a thought.