By Barbryn
Apart from a few excursions into 3/4 or 6/8, many artists – and indeed whole musical genres – never step outside a basic four beats to a bar. When I suggested last week’s topic, I was worried there might not be a great response. I was wrong. Should have known I could count on you lot. So let’s see what happens when we count past four…
5
Everyone knows Dave Brubeck’s Take Five and the Mission Impossible theme (both chosen for previous topics, as was Nick Drake’s Riverman), but 5/4 time crops up more than you might think. If you’ve switched on BBC 6Music in the last week or so, chances are you’ve heard Friend of a Friend by The Smile – one of my songs of the year to date. The odd time signature shouldn’t be a surprise given the band comprises Thom Yorke and Johnny Greenwood of Radiohead, no strangers to odd time signatures, and Sons of Kemet drummer Tom Skinner.
On Alive and Brilliant, Australian singer Deborah Conway uses 5/4 to brilliant effect – “One step forward, two steps backward” she sings in the chorus, which is just how the rhythm feels. PJ Harvey rocks a 5/4 riff on Water, a standout track from her debut album (she’s experimented with other metres since).
Elephant Gym, a trio from Taiwan, mix five in a bar with some measures of six just to throw you off – but Ocean in the Night flows beautifully.
7
Seven in a bar might be my new favourite time signature. You can even dance to it, though you may end up with an extra foot.
Georgie Fame takes a Willie Dixon blues number, speeds it up and drops a beat – Seventh Son, see? – and it’s an absolute bop. You can practise counting to seven on Eras by Juana Molina (12, 12, 123), but you’ll have to be quick to keep up with Pachora on Drifting.
Yusuf/Cat Stevens pays tribute to his Greek heritage on Rubylove. In rembetika music, 7/8 is a common time signature, and it sounds just right on the bouzouki here.
9
I wasn’t going to do 9/8, which – though fairly rare – is usually just three groups of three (Rocky Road to Dublin is a good example). But things are different in the Balkans: Planxty play a traditional Bulgarian tune called Smecano Horo in 9/16, where the beat moves all over the place (I often found myself wanting to clap on 8).
10
Considering humans count so many things in tens, it’s surprising how rarely it crops up in music. Playing in the Band by the Grateful Dead (who could fill up this list on their own) is an exception. There’s a clear count of 10 here, and it sounds easy as anything – you’ll be tapping along when it comes back in after the guitar noodling.
11
Sufjan Stevens is another artist worth a whole playlist of strange time signatures – someone on Reddit has compiled a spreadsheet. Two of the standout tracks from his classic …Illinoise album were nominated minutes before the deadline. I’ve gone with The Tallest Man, The Broadest Shoulders, which goes up to 11: 11/8 to be precise (try counting 123,12,123,123), before shifting into 4/4 towards the close.
Aaron Parks plays a lovely loose liquid 11/8 on Attention, Earthlings! You can count 123456,12345 for most of it, but towards the end it morphs into 1234, 1234, 123. (For contrast, Jazzanova on the B-list also begins in 11/8, but divided as 123,123,123,12 – you can do a lot with 11.)
15
First performed by Uakti, Águas da Amazônia (Waters of the Amazon) was composed by Philip Glass for a Brazilian ballet company. Amazon River is in 15/8. Count it as 1234,123,1234,1234, getting faster.
17
Björk has no fewer than three songs in 17/8 on her Biophilia album, because she’s Bjork and she can do that sort of thing. On Crystaline, I can just about manage to tag along (8+9) until it turns into a barrage of machine gun fire.
I think that’s as high as I can count. After that, you’ll either want to go and listen to some Ramones, or brave the utter madness of the B-list...
Alternative Alternating Arrhythmic A-List Playlist:
The Smile - Friend of a Friend
Deborah Conway - Alive & Brilliant
PJ Harvey - Water
Elephant Gym - Ocean In The Night
Georgie Fame – Seventh Son
Juana Molina – Eras
Pachora - Drifting
Yusuf/Cat Stevens – Rubylove
Planxty - Smeceno Horo
The Grateful Dead – Playing in the Band
Sufjan Stevens - The Tallest Man, The Broadest Shoulders
Aaron Parks - Attention, Earthlings
Uakti/Philip Glass – Amazon River
Björk – Crystalline
Mind-Boggling Beats B-List Playlist:
Good luck trying to count along with most of these…
J.S. Bach (played by Murray Perahia) – Goldberg Variations, BWV 988: Var. 26 (two hands doing very different things)
Yes – The Fish (Schindleria Praemeturus) (7/8, surprisingly funky and short for prog)
Airto Moreira - Tombo in 7/4 (you’ll probably recognise the riff – which isn’t in 7/4)
Don Ellis - How's This For Openers (25/8, apparently)
Jazzanova – Hanazono (11/8, at least to begin with)
Bill Bruford – Beelzebub (getting devilishly complex now)
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Gamma Knife (nominator Nicko quotes a Reddit user called Narrow-Metal-8470: “starts with 2 bars of 11/8 and then does 14 bars of 12/8 and then 5 bars of 6/8 and then 4 bars of 11/8 and then 15 bars of 12/8 and then 6 bars of 6/8 and then 4 bars of 11/8 and then 1 bar of 12/8 and then 27 bars of 11/8 and then 4 bars of 12/8 and then 3 bars of 6/8 and then 2 bars of 4/4.”)
Dream Theater – The Dance of Eternity (another Reddit user has worked this one out: 4/4, 7/8, 3/4, 13/16, 15/16, 17/16, 14/16, 5/4… well, you’ll pick it up…)
Tricot – 18, 19 (that’s the title – I haven’t tried counting…)
GoGo Penguin – Reactor (Nilpferd says: “It depends whether you listen to the bass, the piano, or the drums here as the accents are shifted between the instruments, but I think there's an underlying 27 beat pattern split into 4's, 3's and 5's.”)
Avishai Cohen Trio – Intertwined (Nilpferd again: “seems to be working a 19/16 base … but for me their proficiency is such that the time signatures hardly register outside of the "feel" of the music, their playing is so organic.”)
Don Ellis - Bulgarian Bulge (33/8 – normal for Bulgaria)
Shakti – La Danse Du Bonheur (if you’re a master tabla player, you can probably recognise the patterns – the rest of can just gasp along in awe)
Guru’s Wildcard Picks:
Taylor Swift – Tolerate It
The world’s biggest pop star managed to smuggle two songs in 5/4 onto her Evermore album. “Closure”, and this one – which co-writer Aaron Dessner says is actually in 10/8 (it’s easier to count that way).
The National – Demons
More Aaron Dessner, this time in 7/4.
Lamb – Soft Mistake
Hardly any electronic dance music mentioned this week, which is hardly surprising. Lamb’s album Fear of Fours, which eschews 4/4 entirely, is a rare exception, and includes this in 5/4.
…. or get in T-shirt time
These playlists were inspired by readers' song nominations in response to last week's topic: Just count on this: songs with unusual time signatures. The next topic will launch on Thursday after 1pm UK time.
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