Strictly Borrowed

[mattblack850]

Thats 4 takes now! This is a NICE one..! You see actually having to follow the progression a bit is actually fun after all

There was a hemiola pull off lick section there that had me thinking you were going to go into the Sultans of Swing solo.

I don't know why I'm enjoying this one so much.
If you're talking about that last section, it's based around the harmonised parts in the 'Borrowed from Country' take, so that's probably where the hint at 'The Knopf' comes in!!!

[jessmanca]

Aye this method of "borrowing" is probably the easiest way of creating chord progressions that are unique, yet still sound "right"

In Harmony II class in college it was called "Modal Mixture" and it was a subject that always fascinated me. A very commonly borrowed chord in rock is the bVII in major. You can think of it as borrowed from the parallel minor or perhaps the parallel Mixolydian (probably more accurate). Indeed you can borrow chords from any of the modes while in a Major key. Of course those modes closely related to major will likely sound the best (chords borrowed from Lydian and Mixolydian for example), but the "minor modes" can be used to good effect as well.

Lately I have been playing around with using the minor v chord (borrowed from natural minor), I love the sound.

D / / / Am / / / D / / / Am / / /

[EDIT] I suppose this can also be thought of as borrowed from the parallel Mixolydian. Seems to be a common mode in rock.

[EDIT2] Well we might as well complete our borrowed chords from Mixolydian. We have the minor v and the bVII. The final one is the iiio (3 diminished chord. In our key of D Mixo it would be F# A C). So now we can use Am, C and F#dim in the key of D. As rock songs typically avoid the dim chord, let's borrow F from the parallel minor instead. Here's a sample chord progression:

D / / / Am / / / D / / / Am / / /
F / / / C / / / A / / / / / / :|| (repeat)