Subliminal influence shining trough in your music?

[Bowromir]

I don't know if the topic subject is clear, because I'm not sure if I used the right words (I'm dutch, don't shoot me..).. But have you ever create a peace of music, which you thought was entirely your own, until you realised that somehow you almost managed to recreate a track which already existed!

 

A recent example.. I was playing around on the piano, and came up with a simple basic chord scheme. C Em/b C Em F Em F G. Since I am really new to music, I haven't developed a musical hearing yet, so everything I have heard before I started making music (which is about a year now) was simply music, no theory knowledge whatsoever.. So after a while I have a pretty cool song, kinda folkish and movie like.. So I add a violin, and a electric piano.. some additional strings and a bebop like drum.. I'm really suprised by the sudden boost of inspiration of adding instruments which fit the song so good! It all sound so logical!

 

About a week later I was watching Little Miss Sunshine for the 2nd time, and I absolutelty love the music in the film and listened to the soundtrack quite a few times about a year ago, but never "musically"..and the theme song starts playing.. And I am like; hey this sound kinda like my song.. cool! And then I start to listen better, and realize it also starts with C and Em.. and later uses almost the same progessions.. heck it even uses the same intruments and a familiar drum rhytm! And my violins sound the same aswell! I almost recreated the whole song, without even knowing it! Offcourse mine is not as good(duh) and they are different, but I was really suprised.

 

I'll post my song soon, just haven't got time to finish it, but then you can take a listen.. Have you ever created a song that sounded just like another song, without you realising it? If yes, let us hear!

 

Greatings,

Bowromir

[DocBop]

Not me, but theKB in a band. He contributed to songs, but never really wrote tunes on his own. Then one practice he is all excited he had written a song and couldn't wait to play it for us. He starts to play the song and about the end of the first verse we all join in and start singing the song with him. We even go into the chorus.

 

The KB has this weird look on his face, how did we know the song he just wrote??? Ends up his "original" was a Pop hit about a year before, and he just couldn't believe it. It was almost note for note. If we didn't know this guy better we think he was joking, but he didn't even remember the original till we got a copy and played it for him.

 

I've seen players swear they never transcribed some player, but their playing is full of that person motifs. Our subconscious picks up on a lot of stuff even just a brief listening on the radio. If the music made an impression it is stored somewhere in our brain.

[Denny S]

Hello, I have been working on a melody that I thought was original, and maybe it is, but with a slight twist of beat or reversal of two notes it becomes (we gota get out of this place). With another slight change it become a Tom Petty tune. Learning is much fun, the possibilitys are endless. After so many years of hearing and feeling it seems unlikly that I would come up with an original, but i also know that it will be original if i be myself.

peace, love and light baby

d.

[Subtonic]

I think one's musical output is going to largely encompass the influence of the music that one enjoys.

 

If you think about it, all the music today builds on the music of yesterday, which was built on the music before it, and so on. Like a giant musical snowball.

 

And then of course there's musicians who intentionally write music to sound like something else, either because that's the style they're going for (for a commercial or score or something), or because they're trying to sound like something popular to make a quick buck.

[leahbasskitten]

i accidently recycled material from the band i was in. i played bass, so it wasn't obvious i was stealing the chord progression and riffs till i laid the track down, and put the bass line down after.... for some reason the bass line from song A works wth this... wait a minute... *throws song away*

[Subtonic]

Are you trying to tell us that you were in Nickelback?

[leahbasskitten]

no, because i was smart enough to know i was stealing my own stuff.

[brentmagstadt]

And I don't think you can copyright a chord progression - only a melody. Or lyrics, or the arrangement of a cover, etc...

 

Can't speak to the accuracy or integrity of this educator's site, but here's a blurb anyhooz...

 

http://www.outsideshore.com/rmmj/faq/#b2

[XIONG]

This educator's Web site, thank you. I think this is what I want

[biff_larken]

That 'Breathe Me' song by "Sia", I believe (could be wrong)... the song at the very end of Six Feet Under. Turns out a song I had written about a year before I heard it is disgustingly close. I found out by playing with synchopating my chords, and bam... I was playing "Breathe Me"

 

Blarg.

[Voodeedoo]

This happened to me a lot at one point. I have a lot of melodies I've sketched out that I'm scared of publicizing in fear the songs already exist XD

[ViolaGhost]

This happens to me all the time. I don't think it's a big deal, because of course your mind grabs onto stuff it's heard before, especially things you like. Of course you want to be careful and make sure what you're putting out is not copyrighted before selling it However, I don't think it's uncommon to work off of things you've heard before. If it frustrates you, make sure to alter your theme or take the music in a different direction.

 

Best of luck! Looking forward to hearing.

[David Nahmani]

I've told that story here before, but for those who haven't heard it yet:

 

One day I was asked to write a chord progression over a melody to turn it into a chorus. The melody was pretty simple and allowed for a lot of flexibility with the chords, so I thought I'd make it move a little and wrote something that followed: Im - III - VII - IV.

 

On the way to the studio where I was expected to play my arrangement to the band, I realized I'd been listening to "The Fragile", by NIN, quite a bit at that time, and that he was using that chord progression in "We're in this together now" (@ 1:59).

 

So before I played it, I told the band I'd play the song but we probably couldn't use it because it was already used in a pretty big song at the moment. I played it, and immediately the drummer smiled and looked at me. I stopped, and told him "So you recognized it, huh?" -him: "Yeah, it's I want to fly away by Lenny Kravitz!". We ended up using the chord progression, recorded the song and played it live a bunch of times, and nobody ever said anything.

[katejenkins]

As music makers, we start as music lovers, internalizing on some level every song we've ever heard. We each have a mental catalog of thousands of songs. When I'm composing a song I *think* is original, sometimes someone else's melody creeps in.

 

In other words, yes I do it all the time without realizing it.

 

I wrote an awesome chorus, that came effortlessly. A full year later, I realized it was Sunday Bloody Sunday by U2, note for note, just different words. I was so so disappointed.

 

Now I have to run any new song by all my musician friends to find out if I subconsciously stole something.

 

Sometimes these ripoffs make it to the charts without the artists even realizing it. I genuinely believe Avril Lavigne's producers didn't know they were ripping off the Rubinoos with that "I don't wanna be your girlfriend" song. Otherwise they never would've put themselves through the shame of getting caught.

 

And I'm positive Elastica had no clue they were biting Wire's Lowdown. They got sued by EMI, and I think they should've gotten a pass for that one. Because it was almost 20 years after the original song, and sounded sufficiently different in the melody dept.

[Rev. Juda Sleaze]

And I'm positive Elastica had no clue they were biting Wire's Lowdown. They got sued by EMI, and I think they should've gotten a pass for that one. Because it was almost 20 years after the original song, and sounded sufficiently different in the melody dept.

 

I'm not so sure...

 

"Elastica’s debut album can easily turn into a game of “Spot the Music Reference.” Actually, it’s more than just a “reference.” How about “Spot the Stolen Song?” Wire’s “I Am the Fly” is turned into “Line Up,” while their “Three Girl Rhumba” serves as the basis for “Connected.” The Stranglers also appear in the form of “Waking Up,” which employs “No More Heroes” as a melodic base."

 

From http://compactdiscpreservationsociety.blogspot.com/2006/02/elastica.html

[ginadeangelis]

Music is not something you DO, it is more something you feel. The keys should flow out of your mind and onto your finger tips. Musicians all share this type of existence and thought process so of course there will come a day when our music begins to have similarities. Being that we all ride on the same musical wave length, common tunes are bound to happen. I'm sure that even super stars come up with similar tunes. Unless you are trying to make money off your music, I don't think there's anything wrong with your music being similar to others. In the end, music is about expression and how you are feeling when you are producing this music so if someone else is feeling similar than they can have similar music as well. 8)

[geomancer]

Usually not all people listen to the same kind of music, but "one good thing about music when it hits you you feel alright" feed thy soul. I hope the music industry progresses even though there are lots of issues about piracy.

[petervh]

Hi guys

completely new here

I do a lot of work helping people with their belief systems. You may ask how does this fit in with the discussions so far. Part of what I do is to take the subconscious beliefs and move them around.

The subconscious mind is a very powerful tool and has taken on thousands of bits of information all the time, a lot of what the subconscious mind picks up on we have no idea that it actually has stored this information in the mind.

So for you guys when your subconscious mind has heard a song it is stored on the mind waiting for some sort of trigger to unlock it and access it again.

This could be something like being creative and starting to write a song, the subconscious mind looks for information, then feeds it to the conscious mind which in turn is your new song which in fact really was a song that was heard at some other time

hope this makes some sort of sense

[Beat Poet]

With the drums I always listen back to stuff I recorded in previous months and can pick out fills and rhythms I subconsciously "borrowed" from stuff I was listening to at the time.