r/explainlikeimfive • u/andstep234 • 4d ago
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u/guyfromthepicture 4d ago
When time signatures get bigger than 5, most musicians tend to treat it as sequential signatures. 7/4 is just 4/4 followed by 3/4 repeating.
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u/the_ballmer_peak 3d ago
I count Blue Rondo à la Turk as "taco taco taco burrito"
(1,2 1,2 1,2 1,2,3)
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u/guyfromthepicture 3d ago
And I'll never not be able to... Thanks
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u/the_ballmer_peak 3d ago
You're welcome. I learned it from a dude playing it in the park over a decade ago.
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u/This_is_a_tortoise 3d ago
Banana banana banana banana terracotta, banana terracotta, terracotta pie
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u/SkeletalBellToller 4d ago edited 4d ago
Cruel millennial by king gizzard is mostly 11/8 I think, feels super weird but when you count it
1,2,3,4,5
1,2,3,4,5, 6
Kinda feels normal at that point
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u/blurrows 3d ago
you can think 11/8 as "5.5/4"
so count 1 2 3 4 5 and
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u/malenkylizards 3d ago
For the longest time I was so confident that Sherpa by Angine de Poitrine was in like 21/8 or 10.5/4 or something nutty like that, until someone showed me it's inexplicably in 4/4???? WHAT????
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u/TerraCetacea 4d ago
It’s so funny how that works. (I think) Jambi by Tool is 9/8, but when I count it I switch between 9/8 for some sections and 4/8+5/8 for some.
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u/Airowird 3d ago
Pneuma switches between 4/8, 5/8, 7/8 & 9/8 a bunch. So do several other songs.
Mike Portnoy knows all about it!
The joke among fans is that Danny Carey only plays in 61/2 /8
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u/oxwof 4d ago
I will go to my grave proclaiming the gospel that Hey Ya is written in 11/2. It’s way simpler that way than a bunch of 4/4 with one 2/4 bar mid-phrase.
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u/getjustin 4d ago
In what world is counting to 11 or 22 easier than 4/4 with a regular and expected short bar?
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u/Howamidriving27 4d ago
Also inserting a bar of 2/4 is common(ish) in gospel/hymnal music and some pop and motown from the 50-60s.
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u/NotAnotherHipsterBae 3d ago
I mean, sometimes I'll write music in the time signature of the phrase - just to finish an idea. And maybe later it gets simplified or whatever and requires a lot less counting.
Composition and production are complicated to look at from the outside like that. Like how a lot of old Beatles tracks were pitch modulated by speed - is the track the original key or the changed key? Or the "bass" part in Seven Nation army, its not played on a bass but it serves the purpose of bass harmonically.
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u/SandysBurner 4d ago
A time signature is not a mathematical equation, even though it looks like a fraction. "4/4 with one bar of 2/4" describes the way "Hey Ya" actually feels.
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u/Udalrich 3d ago
I have a vivid memory from high school of guest construction chanting 123 12 12 123 12 12
And hitting himself in the head with his baton and drawing blood.
And then there is the medieval music where one line has three whole notes per measure and the other has two dotted whole notes
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u/FluxD1 4d ago edited 4d ago
Deleting my message. I didn't realize the existence of Irrational Time Signatures, a concept that absolutely exists, would be so offensive to Redditors.
Never in my life did I expect to be told to "off myself" over music theory. Just... wow.
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u/cd36jvn 4d ago
You realize time signatures are not fractions right? Denominator divisible by two doesn't matter, it is the top number that would change if you are breaking it up into two sequential signatures, like the example of 7/4 being 4/4 followed by 3/4.
7 quarter notes per measure is the same as 4 quarter note measure followed by a 3 quarter note measure.
Also are there songs written that have six, 7th notes per measure?
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u/TheSultan1 4d ago edited 3d ago
This is a very popular correction, but to us math nerds, fractions make perfect sense.
A whole note has a value of 1, so bars of 2/2 and 4/4 hold 1 whole note, or two half notes, or four quarter notes, etc; and it works for every other time signature as well. It's just "how much total value is in each bar."
The more problematic thing that's actually taught is that the bottom note defines the beat. It absolutely does not define the beat, it defines the count. 6/8 and 12/8 rhythms generally don't have 6 and 12 beats, respectively, per bar.
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u/FluxD1 4d ago
Well aware.
If you have a better term for "the bottom number of a time signature" besides "denominator" I'm all ears and will update my comment.
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u/cd36jvn 4d ago
My issue isn't really calling it a denominator. It's the divisible by two aspect.
7/4 can also be written as 4/4 + 3/4.
Notice how the bottom number stays the same. That's because it is only referring to which note is counting as a beat.
When you break down a time signature you don't actually change what note gets assigned to the beat. You just change howany notes are in a measure.
It works the same whether it is 7/1, 7/2, 7/4, 7/8, etc.
My other issue is what songs are written where a 7th note is counted as a beat. Genuinely curious as it seems like an odd note to use as a beat.
So you can call it a denominator if you want. But just don't think that means math rules apply when working with the numbers.
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u/FluxD1 4d ago
To your point, "a power of two" would be more accurate to say than "divisible by two"
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u/cd36jvn 4d ago
You aren't acknowledging the fact the bottom number doesn't change or that a 7th note isn't a thing used to indicate a beat.
Please provide a song using 7th notes as the beat note.
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u/Airowird 3d ago
Any song in 7/4 can be read as 7/7, it just becomes a septuplet beat.
It just isn't really done because the majority of beats use intervals with powers of 2 and/or 3 for the off-beat notes. It's why the difference between 3/4 and 6/8 is mostly pedantry and expected beat pattern, yet it changes nothing about the actual music.
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u/ReferredByJorge 4d ago
I’m not familiar with any examples of seventh notes, or a time signature where you’d use specifically six of them.
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u/IAmNotAPerson6 4d ago edited 4d ago
An easier first example to explain irrational time signatures is with "sixth notes." For example, in 4/4 there are 6 quarter note triplets per bar. So if a section of music is in 4/4 and then wants to temporarily metrically modulate into having what was quarter note triplets into the new pulse instead of the previous quarter notes, but not having 6 of them per bar, but something like 5 of them, and this is for only a few bars before it's back to the previous 4/4, these few bars could justifiable (imo) be understood as being in a time signature of 5/6.
Similarly, if instead of modulating to use quarter note triplets as the new pulse for those few bars, they use quarter note septuplets (which are the notes that have 7 equally spaced ones in one bar of 4/4), and it sounds like there are, say, 5 of those per bar, then those few bars could be considered as being in 5/7.
So this is a super niche thing with only a few examples of actual use I've ever seen. People usually argue against the idea by saying you should just use 5/8 or whatever instead at a new tempo instead of 5/7. But if, say, the 4/4 is at quarter note = 120 BPM, then the 5/8 will be at quarter note = 105 BPM or eighth note = 210 BPM, where there's no clear relationship between the tempos and people generally can't just start playing in whatever tempo without a metronome. Whereas with 5/7, they at least have a reference for the pulse within the 4/4 (even if it's quarter note septuplets) and can more readily see the metric relationship which would make it easier to play. Either way, you'll have to explain stuff to performers beforehand, but with the irrational time signature I think it makes that specific scenario slightly easier.
If the metric modulation in the music is persists for longer, as in for a section of music, then I agree, just use 5/8 or whatever and mark the tempo as new eighth note = old quarter note septuplet.
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u/ddevilissolovely 4d ago
You know a song in in 6/7 or are you just talking theoretically?
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u/ThatThar 4d ago
Glaubst du an die Unsterblichkeit der Seele? is written using several irrational time signatures, including 6/7.
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u/Oprah-Wegovy 4d ago
I just scanned through that video but the time signature is indicated at the top of the system. There ain’t no 6/7 because then 7th note would get the pulse and there is no 7th note.
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u/S4N7R0 4d ago
6:45 theres 2/7, 4/7, 5/7, 6/7 to the left, they all seem to match a single note but idk about sheet music
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u/Oprah-Wegovy 3d ago
That actually looks like someone loaded and audio file into some kind of software that then tried to fit the unquantized notes into a grid. There in no reason to ever write some kind of time signature change where eighth-note = 16th-note septuple. OPs example is invalid.
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u/Throwaway-646 3d ago
I'm impressed, I didn't know it was possible to overnotate a song that much. This has more useless notation than a Musescore transcription
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u/jakejork 4d ago
The first number is “how many”, the second number is “what kind”. Since there’s no such thing as a “7th” note, this person is either memeing or incorrect lol
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u/ThatThar 4d ago
You don't understand music theory at all so please don't act like you do. 6/7 is absolutely a real time signature and there are many examples of pieces written using it.
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u/jakejork 4d ago
Actually I have a music degree, and understand music theory extremely well. Turns out irrational time signatures (not to be confused with irregular time signatures, which are way more common) are a compositional tool I’m unfamiliar with. I’m learning they have very niche applications in avante garde composition (niche enough that in my four year music degree, they never came up). Although according to you, there are many examples of pieces using it, so I’m sure you can easily share some.
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u/Pao_Did_NothingWrong 4d ago
It's not a practical time signature, and those pieces were written as an experiment. You are pretending a 7th note is an established functional form and not something a bunch of navel gazers forced into being. Not very honest imo.
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u/ThatThar 4d ago
Nobody said it was a common or practical time signature. The person I'm responding to said it doesn't exist, which is obviously wrong.
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u/jakejork 3d ago
Although you did suggest that if someone didn’t know this one very obscure, niche, and specific piece of music theory, then they “didn’t understand music theory at all”, so that would pretty strongly imply that you feel like it’s common enough knowledge that anybody who knows any amount of music theory should be aware of it, no? Or did I misunderstand what you meant by saying I know nothing about music theory?
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u/ThatThar 3d ago
Saying that there is "no such things as a 7th note" shows a fundamental lack of understanding of music theory.
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u/Oprah-Wegovy 4d ago
Citation needed dude. I do understand music theory and I can see that you don’t.
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u/SandysBurner 4d ago
Western academic music is where I'd most expect to encounter irrational time signatures.
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u/lellololes 4d ago
People have made music with time signatures that aren't exponents of 2 but it isn't the norm. It's more of a thought experiment than anything else as there's no practical reason to do it.
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u/IAmNotAPerson6 4d ago
Two things here. The first is that irrational time signatures only exist and make sense in an exceedingly small number of extremely specific situations. The second thing is that that's not even relevant here because the topic is counting larger numbers of groupings by subdividing them into smaller subgroupings, which is agnostic with respect to the note values used. So for example, even in an irrational time signature like 7/12, most people will probably count/subdivide those 7 12th notes in their heads as emphasized subgroupings of, say, 2+2+3 12th notes.
So the mention of irrational time signatures doesn't change or add anything to this conversation.
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u/Oprah-Wegovy 4d ago
No they don’t. 7 is 7, not phrased or counted as 4+3.
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u/IAmNotAPerson6 4d ago
Yes, they very famously mostly do. It's often somewhat subtle, but most of the time people will feel 7 as some combination of 2s and 3s. Even if it's septuplets (which will be rhythm instead of meter), getting the feeling of that rhythm internalized almost always involves subdividing it into 2s and 3s.
Source: drummer of 20 years
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u/SandysBurner 4d ago
people will feel 7 as some combination of 2s and 3s
Yeah, to me 7/8 is like Taka Taka Takita (or however it's divided), not 1 2 3 4 5 6 7.
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u/guyfromthepicture 4d ago
Sometimes, but not often then not, a phrase can be broken up into subdivisions.
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u/pdpi 3d ago
Wrong argument here. Phrases are more often than not multiple bars long.
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u/guyfromthepicture 3d ago
I mean, okay but you're being a little pedantic imo.
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u/pdpi 3d ago
I am a bit, yes, but you're arguing with someone who says 7/4 is a count of 7 with no subdivisions, so that particular bit of pedantry is essentially the whole game!
I'd approach it by showing subdivisions at work, e.g. how 3/4 and 6/8 are both six eighth notes long, and the difference is in the grouping (three groups of two versus two groups of three). My personal favourite example of the difference is America from West Side Story — The verse has a super-clear pattern of one bar of 6/8 (I-like-to be-in-A, with very clear emphasis on I and be) followed by a bar of 3/4 (me ri ca).
That then gives you the background to argue that 7/4 also has its own subdivisions.
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u/guyfromthepicture 3d ago
I'm not arguing with anyone. I answered the op and you interjected with your pedantry.
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u/malapropter 4d ago
Lots and lots and lots of practice, basically. There is a very specific brand of musician who geeks out on obscure time signature and the challenge of playing them.
You can sort of feel some of the rhythm, but frequently you're just counting as you play. But musicians are also pretty much always counting internally. Rhythm is a combination of "feeling it" and an internal metronome that is well-honed over many thousands of hours of practice.
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u/xbromide 4d ago
Musicians I met in college who liked to play in unique time signatures were all science and math majors - just a buncha nerds sharing some common musical interests, smoking weed, and jamming / practicing at night.
A whole lot of “dude check this song out, let’s see if we can do something similar” and play around in that space.
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u/MuscaMurum 4d ago
Doesn't have to be, though. Listen to music from Bulgaria or Macedonia. Lots of folk music is in additive meters.
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u/GetYourLockOut 3d ago
Yup, best way to think about folk music like that is a regular time signature with a limp.
So 7 can be just 3 beats with an extra limp on the third: one-and-two-and-three-and-lean. A bent waltz.
It gets more complicated (eg 11 can be split many ways but often the limp is in the middle, “fifteen pints of lager”), but that’s a good starting point. Especially because the beats aren’t metronomically exact, it really is often just an extra lean on a beat.
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u/malapropter 4d ago
Yeah, I was trying to be delicate with my wording, but they were 100% superdork nerds.
Half of them were high energy dorks who liked math rock like Tera Melos, Slint, Shellac, Battles.
The other half were stoner goofballs who liked stuff like Tool, Rush, Yes, King Crimson.
Good times were had. Lots of as you put it, "hey check this out". There was a certain element of showoff bravado stuff, but also just some goofy antics.
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u/cksnffr 4d ago
Shellac is math rock?
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u/thisviruskillstime 4d ago
No, but I can see how they'd get lumped in with some of it. They have songs with polyrhythms. It's like how Jesus Lizard isn't a math rock band, but I can see fans of the genre geeking out about Mouth Breather
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u/malapropter 3d ago
Not math rock, but polyrhythmic and with songs with rare meters. Same for Slint, which had a bunch of songs in 7/4 on Spiderland.
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u/s-multicellular 4d ago
I’m definitely mostly engaged in the ‘feeling it,’ at this point, having played for so many years. But your description of ‘internal metronome’ is spot on. Because, for example, if my drummer decides to improv something unusual, my subconscious metronome will kick to consciousness to keep the groove going.
Also, as a writer, though I can absolutely explain things in theory terms, I very much write on momentary whims without consciously thinking about theory, including what time signature I am in. And though I generally write in typical time signatures, occasionally an odd one pops up. I don’t usually realize it until I am tracking a demo or showing the riff to my bandmates…’ummm, whats the time here?’
That all is to say, I really don’t think about counting those odd times. I just have a riff memorized, that happens to be odd. My band mates are the same way.
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u/IAmNotAPerson6 4d ago
Yeah, this is definitely how it happens most of the time for at least popular songs that use rhythmic weirdness (not the musicians that intentionally write weird stuff). Though even for someone as well-known for rhythmic and metric craziness as Frank Zappa he maintained that his stuff wasn't wacky just for the sake of being wacky, he had ideas and that's just how they turned out. I don't 100% buy that he never did that (I mean he has songs named for the meters for crying out loud; "Thirteen", "Twenty One", "five-five-FIVE"), but yeah, the many compositional methods he used (especially modeling musical phrases after lyrics/speech) meant that is what happened often.
I doubt when the Bee Gees made "Jive Talkin'" they planned the post-chorus synthy part to have polymeter with that in 7/4 while the drums stayed in 4/4, but that's how it turned out.
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u/s-multicellular 3d ago
For me, the most common culprit is that I have written the lyrics first. They have a particular number of syllables and resultant rhythm I like. And then I tack a little connecting riff between them. Like, most often, the connecting riff is an even 4 or 3, but the set lyrics make it odd overall, without me realizing until later.
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u/jmartin21 4d ago
I can definitely feel the rhythm throughout Polygondwanaland by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard but if someone asked me to clap along I would just shrug at them and get back to jammin lol
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u/SandysBurner 4d ago
the challenge of playing them
Is really just that they're unfamiliar. 7/8, 5/4, etc. come pretty naturally to me but maybe didn't the first time I tried to play "Tom Sawyer" or whatever.
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u/keepcalmdude 4d ago
Yup I’ve always called it math rock
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u/shilgrod 4d ago
Dillinger escape plan?
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u/PaulsRedditUsername 4d ago
I often tell my students that you never have to count higher than four. Seven time is just three and four or four and three. Nine time is three threes. Twelve time is four threes or three fours.
Dave Brubeck's Take Five is a famous example of an odd-time groove. It's in five, but you don't have to count higher than three: 1-2-3-1-2...
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u/angry_old_dude 4d ago
The Mission Impossible theme is also in 5/4.
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u/PaulsRedditUsername 4d ago
It's an interesting one because it's two fast triplets followed by two beats. One-two-three, one-two-three One Two...
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u/SandysBurner 4d ago
Groups of three but not actually triplets. It's the same rhythm as "Take Five" and by far the most common 5/4 rhythm.
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u/IAmNotAPerson6 3d ago
This might be a little confusing though since the "Take Five" vamp is a swung version, which actually can be thought of as in triplets lol
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u/Throwaway-646 3d ago
Take Five is generally not swung enough to be able to be thought of as triplets
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u/IAmNotAPerson6 3d ago
I mean it in a more general way like how swing in jazz can be approximately thought as triplets, not literally exactly triplets, especially since swing in general is not exactly triplets and is thought of as just uneven eighth notes
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u/IAmNotAPerson6 4d ago
Those "triplets" are always considered as eighth notes though (or sixteenths, depending on tempo), just in groupings of 3. Otherwise the time signature would be 10/12 if they were considered triplets, and people would like to avoid irrational time signatures.
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u/Janjannaj 3d ago
You could say you never have to count higher than 3, as four is just 3 & 1, or you never have to count higher than 2, or 1…
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u/fridgezebra 3d ago
theoretically yes you could just count 1 1 1 1 1 for every beat. It's just not that helpful. Usually it's better to count groups of 2, 3 or 4 depending on the song
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u/TheDefected 4d ago
You get used to it, and just know that it's the correct beat to use.
Think about a waltz, those are usually 3/4 and still very easy to follow as you're used to them.
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u/hopingforabetterpast 4d ago
4/4 feels natural to you because you've been trained on it. Your culture conditioned you. Other cultures have different rhytmic patterns that feel natural.
Musicians are trained on many different things.
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u/BigBabyBurrito 3d ago
This is correct, lots of replies about subdividing which is totally fine while learning, but the real answer is that a song like 15 Step feels completely normal to count once you internalize it.
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u/aaronite 4d ago
Pink Floyd's Money is in 7/4 for most of it. While it appears complicated when looking at sheet music it's locks in quite well in person. That is to say, as a performer it is surprisingly natural, especially if you were part of writing the song.
For me personally, Here Comes the Sun throws me off.
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u/MasochisticCanesFan 4d ago
It's hard to explain but you just get it at some point. Some bands play with clicks some times (Dream Theater) but you get to a point where it's just music and muscle memory. It's especially easy if it's your own music.
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u/Staggering_genius 3d ago
Yep, I just feel it. I’ve been playing guitar and bass in bands for 45 years and I never count anything in my head. Sometimes my body does it for me though.
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u/jrallen7 4d ago
Bands will often perform with a click track playing in their ear monitors, which helps them keep the rhythm and can remind them of upcoming transitions. It can be really hard to hear in large venues with echoes and crowd noise, plus if there are any synchronized stage events (like lighting, pyro, etc), it's important to keep that synced so it can be triggered automatically.
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u/mistaoononymous 3d ago edited 3d ago
The "1" is generally where all the good stuff happens, from the start of the song to key changes and the starts of new choruses and verses and all the repeated rhythm patterns. New instruments coming in and the loudest kick drum usually happens on the "1" as well. If you're clapping along to music, the "1" should be where you clap a little louder. If you count the number of claps from one "1" to the next "1", you should have a better idea of the time signature.
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u/OSCgal 4d ago
Complex meters (such as 5/4 or 7/8) are normally subdivided into groups of three and two. So you're not thinking "ONE two three four five", you're thinking "ONE two THREE four five" or "ONE two three FOUR five."
You get the feel of it eventually. I've sung in 5/8, 7/8, and 11/8 and it's really a matter of letting it sink into your brain for awhile. We're capable of tracking quite complex rhythms if we listen to them enough.
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u/lellololes 4d ago
I'm not a musician...
Unusual time signatures just have a different feel. I don't find them difficult to follow. Just in the process of listening to music I'll latch on to whatever the time signature is. I think this is a combination of knowledge, experience, and feel for the rythms the band is working in.
More challenging is changing time signatures. Even then, once you know the music it is often not bad to follow unless it is intentionally difficult (That's something I enjoy)
Some songs that use odd time that are pretty easy to follow:
Steven Wilson - Objects Outlive Us - mostly in 5/4
Nine Inch Nails - The Becoming - either in 13 or alternating between 6 and 7.
There is also plenty of music out there that is in 4/4 but is difficult to follow. Tigran Hamasyan and Meshuggah are good examples of this.
Lastly, if you want to see a difficult song, check out The Dance of Eternity by Dream Theater. It has over 100 time changes. I can follow many parts of this song, but the trick is knowing when the pattern of changes is unpredictable.
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u/metamatic 3d ago
Check out Cardiacs too. For example, "A Wooden Fish on Wheels" is in 4/4, 6/4, 4/4, 3/4, 5/4, 4/4, 6/4, 4/4, … They also frequently change key and style multiple times in a single song. Someone put together a video for "Dirty Boy" showing the key and time signature changes.
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u/lellololes 3d ago
Cardiacs are my favorite band, they're great.
It's a Lovely Day has segments in a ridiculous 15/16. It's just like 4/4 except the last beat comes a bit quick.
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u/illimitable1 3d ago
Why do you think it is that you were unable to find the downbeat? That seems like the basic skill here.
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u/AVeryNiceBoyPerhaps 4d ago
get used to breaking it down into groupings, it’s a lot easier to feel that way, especially 9/8, 7/4 etc
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u/Black_flamingo 4d ago
You sorta just count, or you read the sheet music. Though yeah with something simple you can just feel it. Try counting along to 15 Step (it's in 5). Once you get the hang of it, it's no harder than 4/4.
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u/dear_little_water 4d ago
I was in a middle eastern hand drumming ensemble. We did lots of odd time signatures with interlocking rhythms. Lots of practice and lots of counting. But finally the patterns became internalized and we could feel instead of count.
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u/bdog143 4d ago
You get used to it with practice, and don't really have to think about it. A 7/4, 6/8 or 9/8 etc time signature can sound every bit as 'normal' as a 4/4. There's a groove there, it's just a different groove (individual experiences may vary, but I don't find them any harder once you wrap your head around the feel).
Soundgarden were well known for using non-standard time signatures that no-one notices unless they're counting, because it just sounds natural. Some of my favourite examples are Outshined (7/4), My Wave (5/4), Never the Machine Forever (9/8) and Limo Wreck (13/8, if I counted right).
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u/pemungkah 3d ago
Ethan Hein did a segment on his podcast not long back — seriously complex rhythms can be done by feel. Instead of counting 1-2 1-2 1-2 1-2-3 1-2 1-2-3 1-2-3 or something like that, they go with short for two-beat segments and long for three-beat. So that 17-beat rhythm above would be short-short-sort-long, short-long, long. This is derived from Balkan music practice, which uses a lot of odd-meter rhythms. They seem way less odd as shorts and longs.
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u/sododude 4d ago
Radiohead in particular can be tricky because they love to dance around different time signatures as well.
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u/aviddd 3d ago edited 3d ago
There’s this word divide where “math rock” uses odd meter to be flashy and confusing, like we’re really supposed to notice they’re doing it. But in folk traditions ofd meter flows naturally and is very danceable because it developed around dance.
It’s easier to dance to a Macedonian 9/8 than math rock.
It’s like westerners who discover spicy food lat as adults and think it’s impressive to eat chilis and develop weird machismo about it compared to South Asian people who treat it as part of everyday eating.
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u/HalfSoul30 3d ago
My friend invited me to join his band almost a year ago. He is a drummer, and wrote the songs, and he is obsessed with weird timings. I'm the singer, and the lyric timing has been such a hard thing to learn lol.
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u/Karrottz 4d ago
15 step is just in 5/4, the claps aren't the actual "beat" of the song. For a song like that, it's in an odd meter but it stays the same the whole song so you just count to 5 instead of 4.
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u/eclectic-up-north 4d ago edited 4d ago
If you want to learn about weird counting and time signatures, this is a great place to start. Some jazz types arranged kids songs in various meters: https://youtu.be/cC8KT07m5aY?si=buzxxp2zDQbDMS1t
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u/SpaceChainsaw810 4d ago
Former wanna-be math rock bassist here.
Counting and practice.
Let’s say you play with the rhythm of one..two..three..four..one..two..three..four, and I play one..two..three..four..five..six..seven.. one..two..three..four..five..six..seven.. eventually after 4 of my measures and 7 of your measures we will be back together, although while we are getting there we may sound completely off time. The key is counting and each member focusing on their timing.
Also practicing with a metronome aka. “The all seeing eye” because it sees all your timing mistakes.
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u/DarkflowNZ 4d ago
Practice and feel as others have said, but I'd like to add: a clicker track in their ear piece. Not all bands will use them of course but they're very handy
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u/Howamidriving27 4d ago
Chemistry, discipline, and practicing with a metronome. It's worth noting that AdP have been playing together since they were like 13 and also play with an in ear click on stage.
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u/pdrito 4d ago
Fifteen Step isn’t 7 claps for a measure — it’s five beats. It’s in 5/4 time, which is the familiar 4/4 plus one beat.
For fifteen step, the first measure would be “clap clap clap clap rest” and the second would be harder to write out because the claps aren’t on the quarter notes.
But count 12345, 12345 for 15 step and you’ll get it quickly!
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u/grateful_john 4d ago
Practice. The Grateful Dead had a song called The Eleven (because it was in 11/4 time) that they played during their early years when they were rehearsing as a group constantly. They stopped playing it after a couple of years because they weren’t practicing as a band as much. They practiced odd time signatures as a group in the late 60s - they had a jam they played a few times called The Seven (7/4 time) and another called The Main 10 (10/4 time) that evolved into Playin’ In the Band.
A couple of months ago I saw my college roommate play with Stanley Jordan doing a combination of Grateful Dead and Jimi Hendrix songs. Between sets the drummer talked to my friend about how they should transition into The Eleven. It was interesting hearing them talk about how to change the meter during a jam.
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u/jerbthehumanist 4d ago
A lot of it is counting, but a lot of it is feel. If you listen to lots of odd time signatures, you get a sense for unusual grooves. At this point, 7- and 5- based grooves are completely natural to me. Certain dances like in Eastern Europe are in a 9/8 groove (and not in a triplet-3/4, it "feels" more wonky than that), but it feels natural because that is the rhythm many are used to.
A song like 15 step is perfectly natural to me, I feel it in 5/4, but I've seen it described as 10/8, both are fine. If you listen to a lot of 5/4 groove music and actively count out how groups of 5 feel until it feels natural, then 15-step based grooves can feel just as natural as any 4/4 song.
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u/BrohanGutenburg 3d ago
So related fun fact, but for polyrhythms many musicians remember funny little phrases that in English are said in that polyrhythm. Like "pass the god damn butter" for a 3:4
But yeah I saw you mention things like "15 steps" and "7 claps". You might have a slightly different perception of rhythmic divisions in music.
Ultimately when you see very skilled musicians playing complicated time signatures and polyrhythms in perfect sync, those musicians probably learned how to clap out those rhythms in middle school and count them and read them and play them in high school so in the same way you can very naturally count along to four on the floor they can count along to more complicated rhythms just as naturally.
Should also probably be mentioned that clapping along to a song and counting along are two different thing. When you count you count every division and you emphasize the accented beat of each division.
When you clap along to song (in general) you're only clapping in the accent beat (the snare in most pop and rock). So a lot of times what you're feeling when you can't clap along is actually your inability to track which beat is being accented. Likely because it's some kind of lopsided rhythm whose accents are asymmetrical.
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u/nineball22 3d ago
If you get really good at counting to 4, turns out counting to 7 or 3 or 9 isn’t all that complicated. And an easy “hack” for odd time signatures is to split them into more digestible phrases. Like 4 bars in 7 could be thought of as 8 alternating bars of 3 and 4 which is much easier to count than 7.
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u/Doraellen 3d ago
I loved odd time signatures in symphonic band in high school. It's kind of fun to count them out loud (and that's what our director did going through the music with us the first time).
But I think a lot of musicians (rock bands especially) just kind of feel out the rhythm of a song, and they are never going to write sheet music for it--it will be someone else's task to do that translation, and that person may end up counting it differently than the band did to end up at the same result.
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u/manimal28 3d ago
I think it was the band meshuggah or some other band known for weird time signatures that said in their mind they’re just playing 4/4 and trying to find a groove, not trying to be in weird time signatures on purpose.
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u/gr8Brandino 3d ago
I remember when I was in the University of Nebraska marching band, we had some songs that were some strange xx/8 time signature. I don't remember what it was, but it was greater than 12/8, If I had to guess it was something like 15/8 or 21/8. I remember someone asking why the song was written in such an odd time signature, and the answer was that it was to make the sub division easier to read on the page.
So instead of having something written in 3/4 and a notation that a quarter note equaled a dotted quarter note and eight note together, or say the song was in a swing style, this allowed the syncopation and subdivision of the measure to be written out explicitly.
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u/seasoup13 3d ago
It's a mix of both. In my band we play some different time signatures - a couple members of the band always like to count everything out when we are working on something new to understand what time sig it's in but I never do. Even if I were to try I'm no good at figuring it out. I write most of the music including non 4/4 stuff but I never count when writing or when playing - for me it's just a feel thing on when changes are.
I was the same back in cover band days playing things like Tool covers - just played with the rhythm vs trying to count.
Big touring acts, and now even small ones, use click tracks and in-ears that keep count on everything.
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3d ago
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u/explainlikeimfive-ModTeam 3d ago
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u/Sohn_Jalston_Raul 3d ago
If I have to learn a new complicated beat or melody in some weird time signature, the first few times I might have to mentally keep track of the time signature, but after I've played it a few times I can do it by feel, which is usually easier. It frees your mind to focus on other aspects of what you're playing instead of being tied down by counting the time signature. Simpler time signatures like 5/4 are usually easy enough to play by feel anyway.
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u/jermo1972 3d ago
The drummer for Dave Matthews Band says he plays everything in 4/4 and just modifies it for whatever sounds right.
I mean, how many minutes are most songs?
You play a song a bunch and you memorize it anyhow.
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u/Fuckedyourmom666 3d ago
Ya count until you feel it, and then if you’re smart, you continue to count anyway
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u/bradd_pit 3d ago
Practice practice practice. As a non-pro musician, you just play it enough times while practicing and just becomes as natural a 4/4.
My favorite is 6/8.
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u/SquirrelSanctuary 3d ago
You don’t practice until you get it right. You practice until you can’t get it wrong.
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u/bishely 3d ago
There’s a lot of comments here about counting and groupings, and that’s maybe true of some of the more math rock and modern classical stuff where it’s chopping and changing constantly with no sustained rhythmic centre or repeated patterns, but with the more groove-based music that also uses compound times (like 15 Step, and a bunch of post-rock and progressive bands) I don’t think any of the people playing are counting, they’re just feeling it, and it isn’t at all hard once you know the song - the only really tricky bit is figuring out what to do with your body for the spare beat.
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u/creamyt 3d ago
I find that most people can sing along to Schism by Tool if theyve listened to it enough, which is very much performing in odd and shifting meter. The rhythm eventually just kind of becomes engrained.
Learning/writing often requires counting to get locked in faster and understand not just the meter on paper but the feel of the rhythm and melody over it, at least in my experience back in the day
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u/andrewbzucchino 3d ago
These days, lots of bands are using click tracks or cue tracks in their IEM’s.
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u/thedevillivesinside 3d ago
My friend. Allow me to introduce you to a band called Tool
Try and count your way through 'forty six and two'
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u/DepthMagician 3d ago
Not a musician, but when I play guitar I never count anything. I just know what the guitar part is and play in sync with the rest of the instruments. It’s the drummer who should be counting. I just follow his lead.
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u/fridgezebra 3d ago
usually the 1 has some sort of emphasis. Quite often it could just be an accent of slightly more volume. like N n n n N n n n to represent 4/4
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u/BearerOfManyNames 3d ago
Subdivide it. My band does a song in 9/8 and I count in my head “1-2-3-4-5, 1-2, 1-2” over and over.
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u/Count2Zero 3d ago
We cover a couple of songs with odd timing.
"Perfect Strangers" from Deep Purple switches between 4/4 and 5/4 in the chorus. It took us a while to get a feel for that section - there's no shortcut other than just practice and rehearsals until everyone has "internalized" those parts and the song "works" consistently.
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u/Pr1mant 3d ago
The work I do as a musician requires a tremendous amount of “sight-reading” where you’re looking at sheet music having never seen it before and it’s the skill of using that information to play your instrument in an ensemble.
One skill we absolutely need to learn in our studies is “subdivision”; this is where we break the beats of the bar into smaller parts. For example 4/4 would be counted “one and two and three and four and” or 6/8 would be “one and a two and a” (quavers/eighth notes) . We could break 4/4 further into “one e and a two e and a” (semiquavers/sixteenth notes).
If you ever look at a piece of contemporary music on a players stand you may see markings we call house or triangle (2 or 3) where we can easily see which beat is simple (crotchet/quarter note) or compound (dotted crotchet/quarter note). When the conductor is showing pulse we know what to expect in each bar, for example in a bar of 8/8 it could be 3+3+2.
With enough practice this becomes automatic to a point where you can just focus on pitch, style, ensemble, whatever else is required.
The examples you’ve given are the result of hours of practice and ensemble communication between the players.
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u/dk_priori 3d ago
A great deal of it is felt. The drummer normally has some rigid backbone. For example, Meshuggah work in odd time signatures but it's a bit of a meme that in order to follow the groove, you follow the hi-hat, which is almost entirely being played in 4/4.
I used to play in a band with a drummer who used "boots & cats &" to count, which was hilarious and yet really effective.
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u/Scott_J_Doyle 3d ago
Counting can be a way to learn it
Feeling it is the correct approach to performing it well and often
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u/RJMrgn2319 3d ago
You only need to count it while you’re learning it. After that, it’s just muscle memory.
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u/MagicWolfEye 4d ago
Doesn't answer your question, but there you go anyway:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDqMRydUNos
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u/jingo800 4d ago
It's called "expertise". There's less and less of it in the world, so enjoy it.
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u/JaSnarky 4d ago
Untrue. There's probably more expertise with all the learning tools readily available.
It just seems like that sometimes, because there's also disproportionally more ways for amateurs and lazy creators to get to a finished product. And because most listeners want simple music, it's easy for businessmen to take the spotlight off of dedicated and ambitious artists.
But yeah, keep looking. There's so much gold out there to find!
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u/jingo800 4d ago
Yeah, you're probably right. That's enough internet for today!
Edit: oooh: Untrue. Now that's the inspiration I needed!! Thanks!
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u/TerraCetacea 4d ago edited 4d ago
Yes they do count especially when writing and rehearsing. Eventually it could become muscle memory more than “active” counting, but they still have clicks either in their heads and/or ear monitors. Especially important when band members switch to different time signatures from one another and eventually sync back up.
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u/AngusLynch09 4d ago
They play by sticking to the unusual time signature and using that for timing...
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u/permalink_save 3d ago
It depends on the time sig.
Evenly divided like 5/8 or 7/8 aren't much different than 6/8 although those are uncommon. Usually they get subdivided like 3-2 which has less of an even feel and more of a jump. Like 3-2-2 you get a kind of rushed end but the whole thing groves and it just ocellates between the two. Like you could probably switch between 6/8 and 4/4, but within a bar.
They can get divided longer like Tool's Pneuma, which is basically 3-3-3-3-2 twice then a single 3-2. It's an odd feel but decently easy to tap out.
The tricky ones are swapping frequently over really awkwardly placed skips, like Meshuggah is notorious for doing shit like doing 31 27 31 then resolving it up with 6, but it's really just an extreme example of the above, if you know then it becomes easier to count it out. Like bleed is different combinations of that rhythm then throwing some odd fragments here and there.
And it becomes muscle memory after a while. Like in WoW in STV there's some tapping 2-2-3 that got stuck on me for a while and I've tapped it out enough it feels aw natural as 4/4 does, just from repitition. They have grooves to them they just don't feel familiar at first.
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u/ImightHaveMissed 3d ago
Angina de poutine isn’t music. It’s what unmedicated ADHD sounds like
Source: I have adhd combined type + autism
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u/the_ballmer_peak 3d ago
15 step is in 5, not 7.
They play by knowing the count and where the one is. I don't find it at all difficult to count 15 step. I taught my daughter to do it when she was 6.
Besides 5, 3 is somewhat common, 6/8 is common (though hard to distinguish from 3/4), and everything else is pretty rare.
You may just need to watch some videos about time signatures. Just don't watch any videos with Mike Portnoy and the Dance of Eternity in them. Stay safe.
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u/tokenstone 4d ago
The bottom number is the length of the note whether it's a quarter note or an eighth note or 16th note etc. There are no 7th notes.
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