Microtiming in Metallica's “Master of Puppets”

Re:Microtiming in Metallica's “Master of Puppets” by chubot on Tuesday May 23, 2023 @02:26PM (#36048673)

Yeah I hear that, if you focus on the kick. There's certainly a 4, 4, 4, 2, 4, 4 pattern.

But when I hear the whole song together, taking all instruments into account, I hear a cycle of 22. There's a polyrhythm of 3 different tempos:

- snare is a double-time tempo -- 11 repetitions, everything is accented equally, it's driving the whole song

- main vocal riff, bass drum, and synthy bass guitar are "regular time"

(I'm a drummer and I often hear the bass and snare at different "tempos", in many types of music, i.e. one is half or double the other, or 3:1 or 3:2 -- those ratios feel the most relevant )

- Hey Ya, Hey Ha is half time -- 12 + 10

So yeah I can certainly see why if you're a drummer (and I am) you would count it one way.

But I'd say the whole song is playing with tempos -- listen to all his vocal ad libs

"and what makes, and what makes, and what makes, and what makes" -- this is double time, following the snare

"love the exception" -- regular time

"why oh why oh" -- doubling the double time

So basically I hear it as a cycle of 22, and there are various tempos and rhythms laid around it. It's a gorgeous texture, and what an achievement to make it flow naturally in a pop song

Another nice thing is that while the vocals do have the 4, 4, 4, ... structure, most of the accents are on the upbeat, following the snare more than the bass drum

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Re:Microtiming in Metallica's “Master of Puppets” by gmueckl on Tuesday May 23, 2023 @05:41PM (#36051201)

First up, I'm more used to classical music (piano, recently more synths).

I don't think that applying half-time/double-time to melodies is a good approach. Rhythm and tempo (note lengths, really) in melodies are more fluid to get more variation and effect. When I listen to the song, most of the passages that you quoted as changing up the rhythm (except "Hey ya! Hey ya!") sound to me as if they are actually consistently starting on a 1 beat if you count 4/4 and 2/4, but not in 22/4. So you'd tear apart the structure that you claim is there. That feels like a contradiction to me.

Also, why am I discussing music on Hacker News...? I'll happily agree to respectfully disagree at this point. I respect your view.

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