Deconstructing Songs

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dbfuru

New member
Hey guys. I've been studying music theory and composition and have read that it is good to deconstruct songs to get in the heads of other producers and refine your own skills. The tracks I have made end up sounding corny and in my opinion not very good. They are in tune and all but as a composition lack any interesting properties. Music is my first ever creative sort of endeavour and I've only been at it for a few months so perhaps I am being too self critical.

Anyway back on topic -

Does anyone here deconstruct songs at all? I was wondering if anyone had any tips they could share. I tried deconstructing a beat I like for the first time this evening, Moodolude 04 by Evil Needle, which can be found here: Moodolude 04 | HW&W Recordings

I will post my deconstruction notes too, so that they can be critiqued and so you guys can tell me if I am going about it wrong etc. I'm not an expert at musical theory or composition and am a beginner so I fully expect to have made mistakes in my first deconstruction, I'm a bit wary about the outro as it kind of fades from the verse to the outro so I might have gotten the measures wrong. Anyway, here are my notes:

Evil Needle - Moodolude 04


Intro - 4 measures

Harmonic rhythm
Chord stab every 2nd and 4th beat

Verse 1 - 4 measures

Harmonic rhythm
Chord stab every 2nd and 4th beat
Chord "pad" change every 2 measures


Verse 2 - 4 measures

Melody

Phrase 1 - 4 measure long - Skeleton of phrase 2
Built from structural tone possibly extended chord

Melody starts on 2nd beat. Unresolved tension at end of phrase.

Harmonic rhythm
Same as verse 1

Bridge - 4 measures
Same as intro


Verse 1 Repeat - 4 measures

Verse 4 - 8 measures


Melody Phrase 2 - 4 measures long, repeats.


Similar motif to phrase 1, more fleshed out than phrase 1.


The phrase creates tension midway through and resolves at the end and loops back to repeat.


Harmonic rhythm as verse 1


Verse 4 (repeat) - 8 measures


Fades into outro


Outro - 8 measures


Intro repeated twice
Click to expand...

My ears aren't trained so I couldn't map down the melody lines so I tried to best describe the attributes of it. Same as the chord progression I can't identify them by ear so I just put down when the chords change.

Thanks for looking, and happy new year!
 
Do lots of ear training: go to teoria.com

Identify basic pulse and grouping will hep to determine a possible time signature

Recognising basic tonality/modality (major/minor/dorian/phrygian/lydian/mixolydian/locrian/modes of the harmonic and melodic minor)

Recognising pitch movement (Step, jump, large jump/up or down or stationary)

Recognising chord tonality major/minor/aug/dim/7ths of all types/higher extensions

Recognising instruments used

Recognising structural ideas such as verse/chorus/pre-chorus/bridge/intro/outro/tag/end/etc and counting the number of bars in each section

Estimate tempo based on time elapsed and bars elapsed (tempo (bpm) = 60 X (bars X grouping unit/time in seconds) - grouping unit is how many beats in each bar)

I teach this stuff starting in grade 7 (would probably do it earlier if I worked in a primary school here in NSW)

It takes a lot of time to do this well

I have some structured sheets that allow you to do some of the above if interested.....
 
bandcoach said:
Do lots of ear training: go to teoria.com

Identify basic pulse and grouping will hep to determine a possible time signature

Recognising basic tonality/modality (major/minor/dorian/phrygian/lydian/mixolydian/locrian/modes of the harmonic and melodic minor)

Recognising pitch movement (Step, jump, large jump/up or down or stationary)

Recognising chord tonality major/minor/aug/dim/7ths of all types/higher extensions

Recognising instruments used

Recognising structural ideas such as verse/chorus/pre-chorus/bridge/intro/outro/tag/end/etc and counting the number of bars in each section

Estimate tempo based on time elapsed and bars elapsed (tempo (bpm) = 60 X (bars X grouping unit/time in seconds) - grouping unit is how many beats in each bar)

I teach this stuff starting in grade 7 (would probably do it earlier if I worked in a primary school here in NSW)

It takes a lot of time to do this well

I have some structured sheets that allow you to do some of the above if interested.....
Click to expand...

Hey Bandcoach, thanks for the advice.

I am most definitely interested in these sheets to help out.

I have already bookmarked teoria.com as I saw you mention it in another thread, I just have to get around to knuckling down with it. I have been looking at your website and have found it quite helpful so far, but I have had a couple of issues with some of the links not working, for instance theory 04: How many instruments should I use? and theory 05: Devices for Melodic Development give me a 404 error. Not sure if you're aware of it but I thought I'd mention it.

I wish I had taken music in school but I only got interested some months ago!

Thanks for taking the time to help, now that I have some good starting points I can focus my study.
 
dbfuru said:
Hey Bandcoach, thanks for the advice.

I am most definitely interested in these sheets to help out.
Click to expand...
listening grid
I have already bookmarked teoria.com as I saw you mention it in another thread, I just have to get around to knuckling down with it. I have been looking at your website and have found it quite helpful so far, but I have had a couple of issues with some of the links not working, for instance theory 04: How many instruments should I use? and theory 05: Devices for Melodic Development give me a 404 error. Not sure if you're aware of it but I thought I'd mention it.
Click to expand...

those two segments are only meant to be on my internal site at the moment as they are still being developed converted - an error in the live index file which I have fixed

I've been using teori.com and the program that came before, teoria since 1999 - it is a really good way to improve your skills.

I remember having a fight with my year 10 class in 1999 about why we did so much aural training: I responded by getting them to transcribe the bass and the chords for Harry Connick Jrs "I just whispered your name" as a class (the transcription was needed for an upcoming concert with our stage band - think rock band plus horns) - when we had finished, they all understood why we did it and there was no more resistance to the aural work.....

Gotta say that anyone who claims to be a musician and can't transcribe songs, even if only onto their own instrument, really isn't a musician yet, they are aplayer - aural recognition of the elements and the ability to play it or write it down is one of the true hallmarks of a musician
 
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Thanks for your wisdom. You are a saint.

I am thinking about purchasing a piano to actually learn to play. I have a midi controller and after using it a lot I have become inspired to actually learn to play the piano. I mucked around on my girlfriends piano just playing chords in my left hand and melodies in my right just improvising and had the time of my life. So those resources will definitely help me and I imagine regular piano practice will help me train my ear.

Thanks for the listening grid, I am going to try to use it next time I attempt to deconstruct a song, even if I can't get everything just yet.

Have a great new year.
 
Deconstructing a track is extremely useful if you have the knowledge to handle such a task. It will show you perspective on what you CAN do (as others have) but it will answer few questions for you ; Because if you can remake it , you could have made it in the first place. I remade trey songz 'Hail Mary' for a client, it was my first remake and it was fun and took about 4-5 hours. It's fun and good way to practice your skills and play around with what you have in trial of achieving the original sounds.
 
bandcoach said:
Do lots of ear training: go to teoria.com

Identify basic pulse and grouping will hep to determine a possible time signature

Recognising basic tonality/modality (major/minor/dorian/phrygian/lydian/mixolydian/locrian/modes of the harmonic and melodic minor)

Recognising pitch movement (Step, jump, large jump/up or down or stationary)

Recognising chord tonality major/minor/aug/dim/7ths of all types/higher extensions

Recognising instruments used

Recognising structural ideas such as verse/chorus/pre-chorus/bridge/intro/outro/tag/end/etc and counting the number of bars in each section

Estimate tempo based on time elapsed and bars elapsed (tempo (bpm) = 60 X (bars X grouping unit/time in seconds) - grouping unit is how many beats in each bar)

I teach this stuff starting in grade 7 (would probably do it earlier if I worked in a primary school here in NSW)

It takes a lot of time to do this well

I have some structured sheets that allow you to do some of the above if interested.....
Click to expand...



This is pretty musch the gist of really learning music. Bandcoach is the authority when it comes to really useful musical expertise. If your looking to get into advanced stuff, try transcribing a simple blues/jazz solo....that like doing pushups for your ear.
 
I concur.

Final year of my composition degree as an ear training exercise we had to transcribe all of the guitar parts and solos from Lionel Ritchie's "Running with Night". These Were played by Steve Lukather of Toto fame. I went one step further and also played them. This is when you really know that you have your game happening
 
OP,

I started doing this a little while back...I actually keep a notebook with all the lil formats I have collected...It is nice to have if you work with artists cause most of the time they want something like they have heard before and If you already have the format plus an outline of the instruments used and where they are used the only thing left to do is to build the beat...Eventually I got them all memorized, It has taken hours out of my process because I don't get stuck for 30 minutes thinking "hmmmm what else could I add"...
 
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