Chord Progressions?

[Dispatik]

Ok so I understand what chords and chord progressions are. But I see alot of things saying dubstep songs are usually built around 1 chord progression. Is this true? and if so what does it mean by that? That everything follows those chords throughout the whole song? Like follow that chord through and only use notes that would be playing in the chord at that given time for all your basses and melodies(Not saying you have to play the chord throughout the whole song but everything u play follows that progession? If that makes sense

[Ocelots Revolver]

I think people are criticizing that during the drop portion of the tune, there is a bass patch playing just one note over and over with different effect automation and filter envelopes.

Its a phenomenon that is a "problem" across multiple genres. Look at Beatport's top 100 in the House genre nowadays, every drop sounds like that "Epic" tune with just one note being thrown through a choppy performer in Massive. Metal and hardcore is also guilty of having tons of tracks where during the "breakdown" the guitars chug on one note rhythmically.

I guess its a function of using your tools to achieve a certain purpose. A lot of dance heavy parts of tracks across many genres use tools we think are meant for melody, but use them as rhythmic tools instead. You'll notice no one complains when the snare plays one note the whole song, but thats because of the way its used and the role it plays

[Dispatik]

I think people are criticizing that during the drop portion of the tune, there is a bass patch playing just one note over and over with different effect automation and filter envelopes.

Its a phenomenon that is a "problem" across multiple genres. Look at Beatport's top 100 in the House genre nowadays, every drop sounds like that "Epic" tune with just one note being thrown through a choppy performer in Massive. Metal and hardcore is also guilty of having tons of tracks where during the "breakdown" the guitars chug on one note rhythmically.

I guess its a function of using your tools to achieve a certain purpose. A lot of dance heavy parts of tracks across many genres use tools we think are meant for melody, but use them as rhythmic tools instead. You'll notice no one complains when the snare plays one note the whole song, but thats because of the way its used and the role it plays

Ok so for the intro is everything following this progression? Like pads and melody and is it unlikely to have more than one chord progression? I'm just trying to figure out why most people say they start writing a song with drums and a chord progression. Thanks for the input.

[Ocelots Revolver]

Wow I'm sorry I actually read your post carelessly.

If you know what a chord progression is then it should be quite easy to know what people mean when they say they begin a track with drums and a chord progression.

[Dispatik]

Ok so is more than 1 chord progression common? Sorry about all these noob questions and I am a beginner and I watch alot of the online courses dealing with music production and just about everything with EDM. The only thing you can't do is ask questions.

Anyone else have any input?

Thanks!

[SunkLo]

Who cares, make music you like. There's some producers that have pretty much no harmonic movement in all their tracks and some that do tons of modulations and progressions. If you feel your chords are getting stale, switch em up. If not, don't. There's some hiphop tracks that are literally the same loop over and over the whole time because it's just so damn tasty and doesn't get stale. There's many ways to create variation in your tracks, progression changes are just a tool in the toolbox.

[alphacat]

A chord progression is simply a patterned series of chords [or possibly intervals being transposed] that usually serves either as a 'bed' (background ambience) or a motif (a melodic hook) or both.

But the stuff about dubstep et al. having one-note this or repeating lines - that's sort of a different, larger issue with dance music at large since - well, some would say the advent of samplers, others would point to superminimal repetitious hooks in stuff like James Brown or Parliament - whatever. In the context of your OP, it's people coming up with one chord progression and repeating it and occasionally dropping it out of the mix with no other progressions or even other "musical" parts.

Putting it in historical context: think about "classic" pop/dance songs from decades past - rock n' roll, R&B, etc. - and they usually had a verse, chorus, bridge, sometimes other parts like a coda, what have you. These were all usually progressions (although sometimes not chorded, ie polyphonic - a monophonic melody line would be single notes.)

---

What does it all add up to?

I think that given how many uninspired one-note bassline, single progression tunes are out there - it'd be easy to stand out a little bit with interesting, viable changeups in melodic progressions in the song, even if it's not strictly verse-chorus-bridge. I like to hear tunes that leave me feeling transported in some way, like it's taken me to a different place than where it started. That's not the most common thing in a lot of pop music in general these days though. And the opposite extreme is math rock wank shit where it's all about "watch how many progressions I can blaze in 2.7 seconds, yo!" - the guitar solo mentality. You want to avoid that too.

When you come up with a melody line, play around with it. See where it goes. If it wants to try on other little themes and go other places - and it's interesting/moves the song forward, then do it.

[topmo3]

even though alphacat, as per usual, cleared the table quite comprehensively i have my doubts that OP will be yawning through the first paragraph

therefore to answer the OP:s question; what they mean by that is that most dubstep like some other electronic dance music genres is usually built from harmonically very simple ingredients and do not usually contain too much harmonic variation, such as modulation or changes of chord progression.

and the fact that the bass or whatever notes have to relate to the chords used in the track is just a musical prerequisite, if you'd place out-of-key melody, bass or whatever on top of the chords, it'll probably sound horrible. it's the same thing in all music, not just dubstep

the thing to remember though is that don't think about chord progressions too much. if you're just starting out i'd suggest you listen as much as possible to the tracks, listen how they're built and pay attention to the sound design. for some reason i've always thought about chord progressions when making my own tunes regardless of the fact that there's a shitload of amazing tunes that have little tonal or harmonic elements, or are based on one-chord / scale basslines etc...

that or even just really good drum programming and sound design. a clever drum / percussion pattern with the right use of effects can be a better hook than any chord progression. on the other hand u can make a simple chord progression so effective with the right sound design.

sry for rambling it's late

[alphacat]

even though alphacat, as per usual, cleared the table quite comprehensively i have my doubts that OP will be yawning through the first paragraph

therefore to answer the OP:s question; what they mean by that is that most dubstep like some other electronic dance music genres is usually built from harmonically very simple ingredients and do not usually contain too much harmonic variation, such as modulation or changes of chord progression.

and the fact that the bass or whatever notes have to relate to the chords used in the track is just a musical prerequisite, if you'd place out-of-key melody, bass or whatever on top of the chords, it'll probably sound horrible. it's the same thing in all music, not just dubstep

the thing to remember though is that don't think about chord progressions too much. if you're just starting out i'd suggest you listen as much as possible to the tracks, listen how they're built and pay attention to the sound design. for some reason i've always thought about chord progressions when making my own tunes regardless of the fact that there's a shitload of amazing tunes that have little tonal or harmonic elements, or are based on one-chord / scale basslines etc...

that or even just really good drum programming and sound design. a clever drum / percussion pattern with the right use of effects can be a better hook than any chord progression. on the other hand u can make a simple chord progression so effective with the right sound design.

sry for rambling it's late

tl;dr.

[Dispatik]

When you come up with a melody line, play around with it. See where it goes. If it wants to try on other little themes and go other places - and it's interesting/moves the song forward, then do it.

Thanks a lot for this I tried this and got very interesting melodies. And what I did was lay out a chord progression and then took that and cut it into a one note melody over the chords and used the chords for a pad. As I went on I just chopped up the melody arranged it different ways and got cool results.

I Appreciate your input guys.

[Dustwyrm]

Ok so I understand what chords and chord progressions are. But I see alot of things saying dubstep songs are usually built around 1 chord progression. Is this true? and if so what does it mean by that? That everything follows those chords throughout the whole song? Like follow that chord through and only use notes that would be playing in the chord at that given time for all your basses and melodies(Not saying you have to play the chord throughout the whole song but everything u play follows that progession? If that makes sense

Honestly I start most my tracks with a melody that is progressing nicely. So i guess that's chord progression. I run a basic kick snare to keep the beat, but I typically program the beat more intricately after. Creating a melody is the most important and first thing i almost always do, because i mainly write melodic music.

[Dodecadylan]

I think people are criticizing that during the drop portion of the tune, there is a bass patch playing just one note over and over with different effect automation and filter envelopes.

Its a phenomenon that is a "problem" across multiple genres. Look at Beatport's top 100 in the House genre nowadays, every drop sounds like that "Epic" tune with just one note being thrown through a choppy performer in Massive. Metal and hardcore is also guilty of having tons of tracks where during the "breakdown" the guitars chug on one note rhythmically.

I guess its a function of using your tools to achieve a certain purpose. A lot of dance heavy parts of tracks across many genres use tools we think are meant for melody, but use them as rhythmic tools instead. You'll notice no one complains when the snare plays one note the whole song, but thats because of the way its used and the role it plays

despite how irrelevant to the OP that post was, i enjoyed the insight, an interesting thought.

makes me want to write a song using snares for melodies and reeses for rhythm

[Ocelots Revolver]

“I never ruled out melody completely, but I did go to great lengths to take away the element on which people normally hang their hats, and to see if I could recreate it in other ways. I wondered, would it be possible to create a sequence of low‑register sounds with sharp transients that would be catchy? Could I make bass lines that were catchy? Is it possible to make beats that are catchy? Are there other ways than overt melodies to make people latch onto a track in an instantaneous way? So in a way I was doing research. I was using a lot of foggy, jazz‑influenced harmony and electro‑acoustic sounds, thinking that this maybe offered a different way of doing things. On Go Plastic, I approached the question from the angle of digital processing, and wondered whether there was a way of making that so visceral, so aggressive, so exciting, of injecting so much adrenaline into the music that it was possible to do away with melody. Could the music still communicate, and if not in the same way, could it at least offer a parallel way of doing things?”

[Ataxia]

Honestly I start most my tracks with a melody that is progressing nicely. So i guess that's chord progression. I run a basic kick snare to keep the beat, but I typically program the beat more intricately after. Creating a melody is the most important and first thing i almost always do, because i mainly write melodic music.

This.

I find getting the creative part out of the way first can really make arranging + fine tuning the elements less of a headache.

[bassinine]

yes, a lot of songs are built around 1 progression. does that mean you have to, or even SHOULD, use only one progression? no, shit no, man. i mean, in blues songs it's almost always 1-4-5.. but there are plenty of change ups and creative differences in the composition (this is the difference between the great and mediocre).

one of the BEST things a musician can do is learn common chord progressions - not just simple, standard, progs... but how to use dimished/transition chords, borrowing, etc.

but, learning the rules is not so you can follow them strictly, it's so you know how to BREAK the rules.

[alphacat]

yes, a lot of songs are built around 1 progression. does that mean you have to, or even SHOULD, use only one progression? no, shit no, man. i mean, in blues songs it's almost always 1-4-5.. but there are plenty of change ups and creative differences in the composition (this is the difference between the great and mediocre).

one of the BEST things a musician can do is learn common chord progressions - not just simple, standard, progs... but how to use dimished/transition chords, borrowing, etc.

but, learning the rules is not so you can follow them strictly, it's so you know how to BREAK the rules.

I have said literally the same thing for years, props. What's funny is hearing twats argue about this. "NUH UH! I dun hafta lern nuttin blud, I be breakin' rules every time I load up a preset yo!"

One of the tricks I discovered that accelerated understanding of this stuff VASTLY is dissecting MIDI files if you're not music-tablature-literate. Bear in mind that a lot of these files were put together by fans so they're usually not 100% accurate recreations, but nonetheless you start to see musical things emerge from the DAW perspective - esp. arrangement, key changes, whatnot.