Non-proggy odd time songs! GO!!

[Flamateur Hour]

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard does some odd time stuff across multiple genres too:

Shanghai is (I believe) 19/8 and 4/4 polymeter which is fun sounding.

Gamma Knife has lots of 11/8 in it AND a drum solo (and a spinny nauseating video lol)

Crumbling Castle has... a lot

Venusian 1 has some 15, some 9, and other stuff.

What I appreciate is their ability to use polyrhythm to mask time signatures in a way that makes it float, while still making the odd time things apparent.

 

[drums1225]

No one mentioned Possum Kingdom yet, which is a bit surprising. To me, at least.

THAT one is in 15!! 7+8.

The main riff in Possum Kingdom is a 4 bar phrase consisting of bars of 4/4, 3/4, 4/4 and 4/4. It adds up to 15 beats, but no one in their right mind would consider that 15/4 time.

 

[nlabodin]

Hanging Tree by Queens of the Stone Age seems to be in 5/4 by my count.

 

[larold]

PJ Harvey - Water (verses in 5/4)

The Byrds - Tribal Gathering (5/4)

XTC - English Roundabout (5/4)

XTC - The Man Who Sailed Around his Soul (verses in 7/8)

 

[larold]

Stereolab - Motoroller Scalatron (7/8)

 

[larold]

Syd Barrett's Late Night has a few bars in 5/4 ("Inside me I feel / Alone and unreal")

 

[Steech]

The main riff in Possum Kingdom is a 4 bar phrase consisting of bars of 4/4, 3/4, 4/4 and 4/4. It adds up to 15 beats, but no one in their right mind would consider that 15/4 time.

I’ve always heard it (and played it) as a bar of 7 followed by a bar of 8. And since the entire riff consists of those two phrases, I see it as a slow 15

Also, I don’t think I’ve ever really been in my right mind, so it’s all good from my standpoint!

 

[Steech]

Syd Barrett's Late Night has a few bars in 5/4 ("Inside me I feel / Alone and unreal")

Nice! I’m a huge Syd Barrett fan.

 

[bpaluzzi]

Another crazy one. This song is probably getting close to "Prog", but I definitely wouldn't consider DMB a "prog" band:

Here's a chart:

Dave Matthews Band - Rapunzel

Download and print in PDF or MIDI free sheet music of rapunzel - Dave Matthews Band for Rapunzel by Dave Matthews Band arranged by Greg Markman for Drum group (Solo)

musescore.com

5/4 for the intro / interlude
4/4 with HEAVY syncopation for the verse
6/8 for the b-section

But a ton of little breaks / hits in various permutations:
2/4
3/8
7/8
7/16
11/16
13/16
14/16

Absolutely WILD to be the first full track on a pop album.

 

[Steech]

Another crazy one. This song is probably getting close to "Prog", but I definitely wouldn't consider DMB a "prog" band:

Here's a chart:

Dave Matthews Band - Rapunzel

Download and print in PDF or MIDI free sheet music of rapunzel - Dave Matthews Band for Rapunzel by Dave Matthews Band arranged by Greg Markman for Drum group (Solo)

musescore.com

5/4 for the intro / interlude
4/4 with HEAVY syncopation for the verse
6/8 for the b-section

But a ton of little breaks / hits in various permutations:
2/4
3/8
7/8
7/16
11/16
13/16
14/16

Absolutely WILD to be the first full track on a pop album.

Holy Smokes man!! That is awesome! I’ve never really been a DMB fan, but I love this song.

And it’s reminding me of something else I liked in the past but for some reason I can’t think of what that could be. It’s gonna bug me now, damn.

 

[5 Style]

I bet you never thought you'd get a bit of ska. Check out the dropped beats in the chorus here. The Selecter - On My Radio.

I'm admittedly not all that great at analyzing music from a more structural type perspective, so though I really dig this song, I never thought about those "dropped beats." Now that I think about it though, those really odd rhythmic shifts that happen in key points of the song and are such a big ingredient in what makes it so cool - are strategically placed odd time measures. Cool!!!

 

[Diles Mavis]

Zappa is prog?

I get this might be a controversial topic.

It seems many consider Frank to be some sort Father of Prog.... Frank, on the other hand, absolutely didn't agree. With Frank himself even questioning if much of prog itself was even progressive. But I digress....

IMO Frank is so much, much more than prog.... Did he influence some progsters? Apparently. But I would never slap that label on him.

(But again, I'm not a big fan of these labels - as often as not, they don't clarify anything, just make things less clear. Again, my opinion).

Zappa is completely sui generis to me, but he was definitely a big and wide influence on the various European progressive/experimental rock scenes in the late '60s/early '70s. Both for general avant-garde weirdness and the actual meat of his compositional stylings. A lot of the more complex bands that were further on the fringes of commercial success than the likes of Yes/Genesis wouldn't have got going in the way they did without albums like Uncle Meat, Weasels, Burnt Weeny, and Hot Rats. The whole approach that later became known in the record collector circles and eventually on the websites that catalogued all this stuff as "avant-progressive" definitely wouldn't exist in the same way without Frank (with Henry Cow being the other big trailblazer), which is probably where any "father of prog" sort of thing came from.

But that's going beyond the concept of prog as "a small group of mostly English bands that sounded like Yes/Genesis/ELP/very early KC" that the later English-language music press eventually solidified the name as identifying with, and often in a derogatory way. From a fan/player perspective it was always a big, broad tent at the time, more describing the spirit of a large part of rock music in those years than anything else...which, as said, probably wasn't very helpful in the long run other than as a handy, quick tag for part of the era or the sound of a few bands and their derivatives.

I think a lot of subgenres, especially of rock, are like that...often a journalistic or fan/collector-based thing that gets solidified after the fact and often doesn't match up that well with the musicians experience of making it in the first place, yet they end up hanging around as basic reference points. The whole Post-rock in the 90s came about because the journos that started it later admitted they needed something new to describe these quite complex, experimental rock bands they liked without using the progressive label, which was decidedly uncool.

As for Frank's own thoughts on these sorts of bands, I think that's pretty hard to be sure of. He did have that interview in particular where they specifically spoke about the term, then gave him a list of bands (some that would eventually get put under New Wave, if I remember correctly) to assess if he thought they actually lived up to it, and he mostly replied with very short one-word answers of "sometimes" that gave little away as to how familiar he was with them. But he also often made a point of how, by the '70s, he didn't really keep up with current music outside of his contemporary classical loves and didn't really listen closely to much new rock music.

 

[Croatian Man]

Some of you may know that I love old prog rock.

And that means I love odd time.
And that also means I love anything in 7. And yes, anything in 5, 9, 11, etc too for that matter.

But I really do love 7s.

But I don’t recall hearing a lot of that in the general pop/rock/indie/etc world.

So I’m kicking off this non-proggy odd time songs thread with the one and only Linda Ronstadt and “Get Closer”. As an aside, she had some serious pipes, too!!

Would anyone like to share any more odd time songs on this thread?

Tip of the hat to @Houndog for reminding me of this one!

Linda Ronstadt is The Original DIVA of Rock and Roll (an all Inclusive list for sure). When i was circa 18 -19 in the late 60s entering the 70s I had a Huge Crush On Her. She was a Babe with a Fantatstic Voice!! FWIW, I play along to her music pretty frequently as a retired guy Hobbyist Drummer at home. I need listen closely to this one for its Oddity beat!

 

[Croatian Man]

I'm reading this waiting on a service call for my car. Do some Tunes by The Cars and Talking Heads qualify for this Thread as Odd Time songs?

 

[Steech]

I'm reading this waiting on a service call for my car. Do some Tunes by The Cars and Talking Heads qualify for this Thread as Odd Time songs?

Yes!

I remember the Cars doing some cool timing tricks in a few songs, like dropping beats etc.

 

[Jay-Dee]

Great topic Steech.

Australian band Baby Animals who some of you might have heard of. This song Stoopid is a rock song (definitely not prog) in 7/4. Extra bonus points as drummer Frank Celenza very coolly plays straight four under the seven in the guitar solo towards the end.

Australian singer/songwriter Deborah Conway who most of you won't have heard of, the song is from the nineties called Alive and Brilliant in 5/4.

Australian band Midnight Oil (I know Houndog knows them), a song called Read About It. The main riff is in 7/4, choruses in 6/4 but otherwise mostly 4/4.

 

[Croatian Man]

Huey Lewis, Yes!

I remember the Cars doing some cool timing tricks in a few songs, like dropping beats etc.

i'm solely a Player of Drums at 73 YO, having resurrected playing in 2019, after a 50 Year Hiatus {1969] . I'm not adept at the desription of the Beats : 5/4 , 7/4, 4/4 etc. Mostly a Player By Ear, the Off beat Throws me a Curve Ball.... but I try to learn them best I can. Referring to the Cars, I knew that in a couple of songs I was off. My typical repetrois of MY MUSIC is primarily Classic ROCK, Folk Rock, Country Rock , etc. ( Petty, Mellencamp, Clapton, Beatles, Stones, Eagles, Cars, Talking Heads, Huey Lewis, Steve Winwood, Springsteen, Bob Seger, Dire Straits, etc. to name a few that I play along to.

 

[Steech]

Great topic Steech.

Australian band Baby Animals who some of you might have heard of. This song Stoopid is a rock song (definitely not prog) in 7/4. Extra bonus points as drummer Frank Celenza very coolly plays straight four under the seven in the guitar solo towards the end.

Australian singer/songwriter Deborah Conway who most of you won't have heard of, the song is from the nineties called Alive and Brilliant in 5/4.

Australian band Midnight Oil (I know Houndog knows them), a song called Read About It. The main riff is in 7/4, choruses in 6/4 but otherwise mostly 4/4.

Cool songs, @Jay-Dee !!

I’m linking the Baby Animals clip here, or at least trying to, as the one you linked is unavailable

 

[Steech]

i'm solely a Player of Drums at 73 YO, having resurrected playing in 2019, after a 50 Year Hiatus {1969] . I'm not adept at the desription of the Beats : 5/4 , 7/4, 4/4 etc. Mostly a Player By Ear, the Off beat Throws me a Curve Ball.... but I try to learn them best I can. Referring to the Cars, I knew that in a couple of songs I was off. My typical repetrois of MY MUSIC is primarily Classic ROCK, Folk Rock, Country Rock , etc. ( Petty, Mellencamp, Clapton, Beatles, Stones, Eagles, Cars, Talking Heads, Huey Lewis, Steve Winwood, Springsteen, Bob Seger, Dire Straits, etc. to name a few that I play along to.

Just BTW - how the Heck did DFO turn my reply to you into Huey Lewis?

 

[drummertom]

Great topic Steech.

Australian band Midnight Oil (I know Houndog knows them), a song called Read About It. The main riff is in 7/4, choruses in 6/4 but otherwise mostly 4/4.

Love that Midnight Oil song. Played drums on a recording of it that friends did a few years back. Great tune. And it has cowbell!