Musical cliches

['59]

I was fiddling around today and noticed that the open A position is commonly used to hammer on from an A major triad to a D major triad (Lights by Journey, Lonely Is the Night, Rock and Roll All Night)

Or at a more base level, a ridiculous number of guitar solos start with sliding into the first note.

I figure it would help me out learning if any of you guys could tell me some of the other little tricks you see a lot across different songs?

 

[DankStar]

There’s an accent ( it sure of the proper term) where the drums accent the end of a 4/4 measure that’s in a ton of songs.

Let me find the example in Cinderella’s “shake me”

it’s the accent at 40 seconds in:
https://youtu.be/ptPekKOigkQ

one and-two and-three and-four and-five, six

——-
there’s another one that always seemed odd to me. Might take me a bit to find the example but it’s something that happens during a chorus where the last word is left off, and then maybe the last chorus in the song they finally say the ending word.

 

[BlackhawkRise]

Rappers did a thing a lot back in the day where they would skip the last word of the last line before the hook and then the hook would finish it.

 

[El Dunco]

Rappers did a thing a lot back in the day where they would skip the last word of the last line before the hook and then the hook would finish it.

A lot of them feel the need to say their name, their producer’s name, their live lighting guy’s name in the intro. It’s even better when they start with “you know who it is!” but remind us anyway.

There must be hundreds of songs where everyone stops for a count when “stop” occurs in the lyrics.

 

[GuitarStv]

There's a thing that I run across in R&B tunes, where you barre the top 4 or 5 strings, hit them and then hammer on one fret below on the B and two frets below on the D at the same time to make a minor 7 chord. It's a nice sound. Not just for R&B either, Weezer does it in Say it Ain't So and Hendrix does it in Wait Until Tomorrow.

 

[beaubrummels]

In the 1970's, there were tons of songs that all went Am - G - F (Stairway To Heaven, Crazy On You, Don't Fear The Reaper, Carry On My Wayward Son, etc.). Now, if you just play Am - G - F, you've got a cliche 70's song.