Therory question:: Metal harmonies. How do?

[Manc Chris]

In a commendable attempt to drag me off the soul train for a while, a mate gave me a CD of 'driving music', containing a load of stompin metal tracks.

Loved it.

Got me thinking about the rousing harmonies used in these songs. Occurs to me that there is definitely some kind of formula for vocal harmonies applicable to pop metal tunes??

Taking a snip of a track, can anyone ID exactly what harmonies the vocalists are hitting? I've tried thirds fifths and sevenths, but have never managed to get anything so bloody uplifting sounding.

Whats the secret? (yeah yeah, 'good vocalist for a start' etc)

Right click the clip - 'save as'. (its a very small dl)

http://members.lycos.co.uk/neonmusik/InMyDreams.mp3

[jeffn1]

In a commendable attempt to drag me off the soul train for a while, a mate gave me a CD of 'driving music', containing a load of stompin metal tracks.

Loved it.

Got me thinking about the rousing harmonies used in these songs. Occurs to me that there is definitely some kind of formula for vocal harmonies applicable to pop metal tunes??

Taking a snip of a track, can anyone ID exactly what harmonies the vocalists are hitting? I've tried thirds fifths and sevenths, but have never managed to get anything so bloody uplifting sounding.

Whats the secret? (yeah yeah, 'good vocalist for a start' etc)

Right click the clip - 'save as'. (its a very small dl)

http://members.lycos.co.uk/neonmusik/InMyDreams.mp3

Someone will know the real answer, but it sounds like lots of layers with slight delay and panning might be one factor.

jeffn1

[Sepheritoh]

OK I know nothing about singing and theory, but I can offer some poor attempt.

First, that clip might rather fall in the genre of classic rock pop than metal. The only reason why that is relevant is that metel tends to stick to 5ths in harmony. With classic rock it really gets more tricky.

I'm not sure who sings there, but it reminds me a bit of the van halen style where everything was mainly done in octaves or 6ths for harmonies.

[Manc Chris]

OK I know nothing about singing and theory, but I can offer some poor attempt.

First, that clip might rather fall in the genre of classic rock pop than metal. The only reason why that is relevant is that metel tends to stick to 5ths in harmony. With classic rock it really gets more tricky.

I'm not sure who sings there, but it reminds me a bit of the van halen style where everything was mainly done in octaves or 6ths for harmonies.

Ok, forgetting the exact genre, (Its pop metal, whatever), the point I'm making is that it's a harmonic trick used by many such bands - Bon Jovi, Poison, Cinderella, Saxon, Heart, even Alice Cooper used those harmonies on 'Poison'.

Octave's and 6ths eh? Hmmm. Any other elaborations?

[Sepheritoh]

I agree that the genre is not relevant other than what "normally goes" for metel. I am a fairly dat with the theory anyway. I used to play in a band many many moons back where we did some harmonies ala metelica / BLS style and that was easy because the backing vocals were not very challenging. Bon Jovi stuff was just too difficult for us. Even GnR harmonies - which is not that complicated - was too difficult for us. Alice cooper tends to get 3 to 4 pretty ladies doing backing vocals which makes it sound even more complicated.

[VicDiesel]

Taking a snip of a track, can anyone ID exactly what harmonies the vocalists are hitting? I've tried thirds fifths and sevenths, but have never managed to get anything so bloody uplifting sounding.

Just by ear, and playing it softly (office), the main hook is either Am-Dm or C-F, with the top voice singing e-e-f, and the lower c-b-a. This is nice classical voice leading, and not simply thirds. although at the crucial moments it does hit thirds or sixths.

Also, this alternates with unison passages, and lines where someone sings vocals, and another just does "ahhhh.......".

Someone clearly knew what he was doing.

(Check out Todd Rundgren for the best harmonies in all of pop music.)

[kimik]

(Check out Todd Rundgren for the best harmonies in all of pop music.)

or Seal.

[Peel]

I heard that on the Def Leppard albums, the producer would layer multiple takes of every band member (maybe some session musicians too) singing every part. The layering of several different singers' voices seems like an important part of the sound here.

(also, the guitar parts (notes & tone) seem to be carfully matched with the vocals in this style)

[Manc Chris]

I heard that on the Def Leppard albums, the producer would layer multiple takes of every band member (maybe some session musicians too) singing every part. The layering of several different singers' voices seems like an important part of the sound here.

(also, the guitar parts (notes & tone) seem to be carfully matched with the vocals in this style)

Ah yes. Def Leppard. Mutt Lange must know the secret!

[Sascha Franck]

Seems to be harmonized in diatonic thirds down, at least mostly.