Breaking Down The Strangest Phil Collins Hit Song

started what's up everyone we're gonna talk some Phil Collins today I was uh talking with Aaron earlier and I said man have I done Phil Collins video really I thought well I did in the air tonight as my number one in my top 20 drum fills of all time I had that in there and I was thinking like I'm not sure that I've done any Phil Collins songs so the first song that came to mind is this song we're going to talk about today and I was singing about it's just an odd song but it sounds so normal that you think it's uh that you think you don't think it's strange but it just has some really weird moves that Phil who was at the time kind of incapable of not writing a hit song everything that he wrote became massive hits in the 80s right so uh this one starts out and you think okay yeah this is kind of normal but then it's like wait what okay so let's check it out oh by the way before I start since this is Labor day here in the U.S I have a Labor Day sale going on 99 bucks for all my educational products if you want to get better at music improve your ear because this is going to be an ear training thing right here improve your theory knowledge because we're going to be talking a little bit about theory about why this is um about why this is a uh what about this like how do you do the analysis of this how do you understand kind of what the chord progressions are with this and how the melody works with it my biato ear Training Method is uh is part of the sale 99 bucks for that and this things there's 80 videos hundreds of interactive training modules and a 27-page PDF might be out of book interactive which is my theory course that has um uh video lessons video lectures audio examples of everything in it it's been completely revamped and my quick lessons Pro guitar course which has five hours of video content music notation and tabs and uh PDFs for every lesson along with Guitar Pro files okay so now that that's out of the way let's check this out so it starts you know this song this again Against All Odds okay let's just get a reference point from where we are in the beginning so it starts out when you hear it you're like um um so it's really like a 2-5 in the key of D flat so it's an E flat minor kind of a weird chord weird key to start in but for the voice you know [Music] man E flat minor LED you all just let you leave okay so right there it's it's weird you hear it and you're like okay all right yeah it's cool when it goes to the B flat minor chord you're expecting to go two five one but it goes two five six that's called the deceptic Cadence totally normal but when you hear this C minor chord that's way out in left field that C minor seven chord and it's really unusual to start a song with a verse Melody with these two minor seventh chords a step apart just we I always thought it was strange but it sounds totally normal right listen again [Music] with you you're the only one really knew me at all okay so that Dennis starts to get back in the key of D flat so it's like um um let me play along with the track actually [Music] this is a very filled love that you okay let me just talk about that this is a type chord change here that it it just you never find this anymore but it was very much of the 70s and 80s so this is the four chord in the key of D flat right you hear that in Earth Wind and Fire and any David Foster any Jay Grayden production any you hear in all the a it was in the 80s pop music all over the place and it was in Genesis Genesis used this all the time a lot of 70s um progressive rock use this chord change a lot of yes songs frankly Pat Metheny songs used it it was used in jazz but you just don't hear it anymore so it's so it'd be uh the four chord to a first uh a second inversion a third inversion dominant chord that's really A7 over g flat so a it's an A or a flat seven with a flat seven in the bass [Music] or to resolve back E flat minor seven you're the other one then it goes two to five that's kind of normal okay listen [Music] repeats [Music] another name and share the tears you're the only one then we're gonna sauce [Music] okay I love this so he goes to he goes to a straight sus4 now that's another thing that you just was very common in that time period but doing a straight sus4 like that is really great but then he goes he doesn't change the bass note on the downbeat when it instead of going to the one chord he staves with the fifth and the bass this is weird Okay but and what it does is it makes the beginning of the chorus sound deceptive you don't realize that you're hitting the chords right so so a flat sauce then the bass stays on a flat right here here's a weird verse [Music] Okay so what is going on there so he's going from two five sauce to the one chord with the fifth and bass and then this is E flat seven over a flat so instead of that's really a secondary dominant chord except he's doing a secondary dominant chord almost like Bach would do where you've got a five over one but it's really five over uh it's five over the five right it's it's a five seven a five so you got the one chord it's similar to this other progression where you're going instead of it going but it's more of a creative way to do that it's just it's it's very interesting right but you don't even notice it because the melody is so strong on it let's go back listen I love this here it is [Music] [Music] way Aloha gives an extra bar [Music] for the huge bill [Music] y thanks so much sauce so only one verse for us [Music] [Music] the other thing that makes it where it's not mundane to me is the weird drum party well I don't know why he plays those upbeat kicks there but it's so weird you don't notice it just because you're kind of just going along with it he does these two weird upbeat kicks in his field [Music] [Applause] [Music] that whole thing there the Dr all the drum fills are are with all those upbeat kicks it's just not what you would call um it's not what you would normally play in a pop ballad like that it's so smart and the arrangement is so good it's a reef Martin did the uh did the arrangement or did the production on it it's it's what Phil being such a great drummer he knew to to put these things in there that that take anything that that people would take um it cuts down on the sweetness of It kind of the saccharine where it could almost get like that and it has this intensity I think that these weird upbeat kicks and the the fills here act to uh to throw the listener off a little bit make it a little more mysterious listen again he's just jamming here and you coming back the other thing is his vocal performance is unbelievable here somebody rhymes with carbon just wrote nobody nobody does pain like Phil that is so right on I love that nobody does pain like Phil [Music] I think that that because he's such a great drummer that he knows how to just put that emotion into that and and he's played The Fill I mean he's doing the vocal part later but he knows how to place the vocal rhythmically in the right spot that's the other somebody the master of melancholy that has I love that the master of melancholy and what was the other one again um uh I just think that these are just perfect Perfect pop songs um this is uh and when he hits his high note here the distortion on his voice face wow and then grateful [Music] [Music] then [Music] Jacob I love this [Music] so he goes to the end um right two to five then the third time I love that d flat sus two just the MU chord Steely Dan then four five beautiful right but one of the things that Phil being being from playing in Genesis and and having such a sophisticated knowledge of Rhythm and of Harmony is uh uh makes his songs not just be predictable songs I think I think that that the um there's so much more interesting because just there's where he places the vocal rhythmically his melody lines um how he um uh where he decides to jump up and use Distortion in his voice it doesn't matter how if the chord progression goes in some weird place he just uh has such a natural sense of Melody he could not it's really he was at a time uh time period where he just couldn't write a bad song I remember talking to my my really good friend Lee scalar who played with Phil back in the 80s I remember asking Lee I said Lee when Phil would come in with a new song that you're gonna do was it what was it like was he what do you say would you just listen to the songs and go oh my God here's another hit and then then he does another thing oh my there's another hit it's like he was just you know it's like Aces every time right it was it was amazing he he owned kissed the skies that he owned 80s radio which he really did and if you go back and listen to The First Genesis record that he was the lead singer on which is trigger the tail how sophisticated some of those songs were I'm just incredibly sophisticated entangled um squonk dance dance on a volcano um uh um what are some of the other ones absolutely one of my all-time favorite records and then he does the uh and then he does the um and then it gets in the 80s and he does the solo records right and then he starts having all these massive pop hits that he I mean he did start having pop hits with Genesis around the Duke era right uh with uh uh abacab with with um um what's the song I'm thinking of that's in 70 um did it turn it on again so he started having those hit songs but it wasn't until he he did a ripple somebody said that was on on uh on that that's one of my favorite songs of all time Robert you saw in battery all those songs off off trick of the Tail amazing songs if you don't know trick of the tail by Genesis came out in 1976 not only is it some of the finest one of the finest rock records of the 70s but it's also one of the best produced uh uh David henschel I think was the producer on it and it sounds as good as anything today I mean it's absolutely phenomenally good sounding um but when he hit the 80s doing all these solo songs he just could not do he couldn't write a bad pop song it was just hit after hit after hit after hit and I just think this is brilliant just the weird kind of things he does and these the chord changes though these are really held over from Genesis the two uh uh or I'm sorry the do you look at me now that's something Tony Banks would do right that's that's a uh that's really like a Genesis kind of chord change right there that you would hear um there's there's a Bach uh cantata number 54 that I I did it I I used it in a video that I did what makes Bach great a few years ago when I went to Leipzig and this is one of my favorite Bach cantatas you should definitely check out cantata number 54. and the opening chord is an F7 sus4 over E flat which is nothing like anything in box it's a really cool suspension it's absolutely beautiful and um and it's basically this chord in a different key so um uh I I just absolutely love that now I want to say it again I've got my Labor Day sale going on right now you want to get your ear where you can figure out this stuff just right off the bat and hear what these chords are you can get my beat outer ear training program my quick lessons Pro guitar course and my biato book interactive okay so you get the piano books music theory it teaches you what the chords are at each key and it shows you when you're changing keys or you have secondary dominance like in this thing and when you have inversions my ear training course will teach you how to hear all these inversions and you'll be able to pick out these notes that are different you know where you've got the that E flat dominant seventh chord most people would just play you know they would just play that but that note that seventh is is definitely in that chord voicing too and it's really those that's where the the fine tuning of the ear is become so crucial that's what my ear training course will teach you it'll teach you how to pick these things out on one listening right where you can hear the chord changes and be like okay I know what this is I mean as soon as you hear when I hear that I'm like oh that's a 2-5 okay I I just automatically assume it's like two five well what does that even mean well in my Beatle book it I explain what the diatonic chords are the major key it's really in the first part it's like how do you build Triads and what are the chords in a major key and it starts out the one chord is Major two chords minor three chords minor four chords major five chords major six chords minor and the seventh chord is diminished okay so when I say a two five I mean the two minor chord to the five major chords so if I'm in the key of D flat you E flat minor or E flat minor seven is the two chord and a flat major is the five chord okay so then once I know that then I I can make predictions I say when this B flat minor seven chord comes in as the first chord in the song I'm like okay yeah that's uh the six chord in that key okay so we're cool and then oh C minor seven well that's totally out of key where is that coming from and this is uh this is where your ear development really shines and this is why you should do ear training and learn these things is to be able to pick out all the subtle differences like this this teaches you how to play chords correctly I'll just tell you a quick story here so anyways this is my Labor Day Sale 99 bucks for everything that I sell they're all educational products to give you make you a better musician if you were thinking about getting anything now is the time to get it uh goes through the weekend I I played it I used to play gigs with with a guy just just for a short period of time friend of mine and and he's we have another mutual friend who actually connected us to do this and I just did some cover gigs uh with years ago this is 25 years ago and I said to my one buddy I said why is it that so and so plays every song wrong right so I sat in on base and I'm doing these cover gigs I did about 10 gigs or so and and the the guy whose gig it was every single song that he played he played the wrong chord changes on and it used to drive me nuts because I'm playing bass and and he's playing it I'm like what do you what are you playing there that's not how it goes oh really and he's out there playing it but he plays it's like so confidently that it doesn't matter and he sings all the lyrics wrong so I said to my I said to my friend I don't wanna I don't want to say it because I'm gonna offend one of them um I said to my buddy that introduced me to him that got me hooked up I said why is it that so-and-so plays every chord wrong he's like he's like I don't know I had to stop playing gigs with him because of that he sings Every lyric wrong and he plays every chord progression wrong and and to me this was was uh these are our you know you should be able to tell when you're playing a song If you're playing this song here you should be able to to know wait a minute is that the right chord there now granted when you're going from this this is d flat over eight a flat in the bass so it's a d flat major chord with a fifth in the bass right and if you went to this chord if I was playing that on a gig behind you you wouldn't know that I'm not quite playing the right chord that that chord has the seventh now he's playing this on keyboard This is not that's not really the guitar of uh a guitar voicing but um this E flat seven over a flat but those subtleties if I if I heard somebody playing the correct chord behind me I would be like yeah wow I'm hiring this dude again on the next gig and this is how you get gigs is by playing the stuff right and those subtle things to people that are professionals if you're doing a cover gig and somebody knows those those little things that are different that's what that's the difference between the pro players and the amateur players really is having that that knowing those subtle changes it's just like when I was playing on a jazz Gig if somebody played oh let's play all the things you are and somebody goes you know if they played that intro I'd be like they know the Charlie Parker intro okay well that informs me something about them as a musician right or if I'm playing at the end of the song and they both [Music] just knowing it to do a turnaround like that [Music] um I would know uh from that turn around that that the person would play I would know what their level of sophistication was and that would inform me on the types of tunes I could call on the gig if that makes sense right that gives me the vocabulary these nuances like that gives makes me know that they have the vocabulary to play certain songs so I would adjust my set if I'm playing with somebody in a pickup gig I would adjust my set and say oh they'll know how to play this tune and I would completely play different tunes that I would play if somebody uh does a does a different turnaround or something that's not really as sophisticated as that so once again this is why it's so important to develop your ear and develop your knowledge of what what all these little specific things are which is why I have my ear training course my biato book music theory course my quick lessons guitar course you can get everything for 178 bucks off this Labor Day weekend 99 bucks most people sell one course for that much I'm selling my three courses for that much you want to support the channel and be a become a better musician I say it every week this is how you do it uh this is how I can pay for for doing these interviews I'm doing I got some big interviews coming up um this is a way to support yourself as a musician become a better better musician and it enables me to go out there and travel to places and interview people like I just did in Seattle with Chris novuselage and Kim thyle and and Matt Cameron and I did in uh in Arizona when I went and interviewed Maynard from Tool these are possible because because of people supporting the channel this way so that's just the where it's at and uh um uh this a lot of times these these chord charts here when I was growing up they were almost always wrong so I would I grew up at the time where no one ever trusted lead sheets like this you just didn't everybody figured out stuff by ear and your um uh your ability to figure out things informed musicians that you played with that how good of a musician you were right so I prided myself on having a great ear and being able to figure out anything that was kind of one of the things and that's why I was able to progress in music frankly is is having that and it's not just figuring it out it's remembering it um my first band practice that I did with uh I remember this my buddy Andy in high school gives me this tape in junior high and the songs on the tape were like um he had as uh what Zeppelin song was on it uh it was uh what is and what should never be then he had the Triumph song Bring It On home I don't know it was the weirdest group of songs long distance run around by yes uh uh Don't Take Me Alive Steely Dan it was the most off the wall uh thing for a first band practice for a you know 15 year old guitar player and I come in and his brother's like I'm playing the Larry Carlton solo on don't take me live was did you know 50 I'm interviewing Larry Carlton and we're talking about that opening chord there and and the guitar solo in that and uh it's it's really been amazing to uh to to be able to to do this but but all those songs you know Lauren as long as this is running around but this kid's brother was like how'd you learn all those things I said I just figured him out by ear and that's the thing is that you got to be able to do that so uh anyways Labor Day sale uh if you're here in the US it's Labor Day if you're not in the U.S there's a Labor Day Sale goes through the weekend 99 bucks for all three of my courses my ear training course my my uh Beatle book music theory interactive course and like I said if you bought an old version of it you haven't upgraded you can still upgrade um and then the uh my quick lessons Pro guitar course you guys are the best got a little Phil Collins for you I've been been a long time uh I'm glad I I uh I brought some Phil out here I Love Phil I'd love to interview Phil sometime hopefully that's gonna happen you guys are the best have a great weekend all right we'll see ya

Channel: Rick Beato

Views: 856,412

Keywords: Beato Ear Training, Beato Book, Rick Beato, music education, pop music, Music theory, how to write a song, rock music, nostalgia, Tool, Maynard James Keenan, A Perfect Circle, Puscifer, Krist Novoselic, Nirvana, Kim Thayil, Soundgarden, Jack Endino, Skin Yard, Mudhoney, Nirvana Bleach

Id: UnxcxEv-BuE

Length: 30min 34sec (1834 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 03 2022