Why two chord songs work – Aimee Nolte

[Mark H]

Here’s a perfect antidote for “doom scrolling”.I really enjoyed this video.
Aimee Nolte was new to me, she really knows her stuff!

I had not really thought about this topic in such depth before.
I mean from the compositional aspect and why so few chords can really work.
The 33 minutes includes many well chosen examples.

It made me want to make a mix tape, remember mix tapes?
What would you add to her list? Echo Beach / Martha & The Muffins comes to my mind.

[charjo]

I came across “Heaven” by Los Lobos such an upbeat major sounding song, I think it was E and F#m for the verses.
John

[JoLa]

Did you mean Los Lonely Boys, John?

🎸JoLa

[charjo]

I stand corrected👍.
John

[John H]

You are one sharp cookie JoLa 😉

[JoLa]

Haha, thanks John 🥰 ☺️
I just happen to really like the band 🙂

🎸JoLa

[Mark H]

I must check that one out, Los Lobos are cool, but frustratingly patchy to my ear.

There are a few Neil Young numbers over represented around campfire circles. I’m guilty of starting Down By The River occasionally when all else escapes me. Donovan’s Season of The Witch (I dig the Brian Auger / Julie Driscoll version), and probably a dozen or more songs and jingles from JJ Cale.

Dylan’s original All Along The Watchtower on the John Wesley Harding album only had two chords IIRC, I seem to remember Jimi threw in the passing chord between the two main chords in his cover. Bob said Jimi’s version had blown his mind, “transported” the song to another world, and he began playing it that way himself.

Good one chord songs are also a lot of fun. Hubert Sumlin’s finger style riffs on Howlin’ Wolf’s “Smokestack Lightning” help glue the whole thing together, it’s great to have it in the repertoire.

[Werner]

I´m not sure if that fits in this topic. But the Challenge 8-21, my first one, was/is all about two chords.

have a nice weekend

Werner

[sunjamr]

You could ask the same question about 1-chord songs.

Then on the extreme other side, I wonder what song has the most chords?

Sunjamr Steve

[Bill]

Interesting thought experiment Steve. There are 12 notes per key, each one could be major/minor/dom/diminished. So 48 chords per key? Then 12 keys gives us 576 chords. Then it’s just a matter of modulating. 🙂

And I guess we’d have to define “song”. Like a lot of Classical pieces had a lot of harmonic movement, key changes, etc, but not what we think of as a song today.

I bet some of those 70s songwriters would get a nod…50 Ways to Leave Your Lover, Operator, Witchita Lineman….lots of chords.

[John H]

A lot of jam bands adopted this approach. The Dead, Allman Bros, Mark Whipple and the Dreadnaughts…

John

[Bill]

Western Swing Classic “Stay All Night”…a 1-5 progression. A lot of those old fiddle tunes are two chords.
The interesting thing as a guitarist is finding all the inversions you can play (one per beat?) to keep it interesting 🙂

[Author]

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