Understanding Dream On
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- Опубликовано: 8 апр 2021
- Dream On is a startlingly mature piece of music in both theme and composition. It was one of the earliest power ballads, and to my mind, it remains one of the best. It avoids a lot of the cornier elements that plagued many of its successors and shows just how effective the power ballad can be if it's done right. It's a masterclass in crafting a musical journey, a fact that's made all the more impressive by the fact that Steven Tyler wrote it when he was 14. Let's talk about what makes it so great.
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Script: tinyurl.com/e5zf5hc9
Huge thanks to our Elephant of the Month Club members:
Susan Jones
Duck
Jill Jones
Howard Levine
Ron Jones
Brian Etheredge
Khristofor Saraga
Len Lanphar
Ken Arnold
Elaine Pratt
William (Bill) Boston
Chris Prentice
Jack Carlson
Christopher Lucas
Dov Zazkis
Hendrik Payer
Thomas Morley
Jacob Helwig
Andrew Beals
Davis Sprague
Alex Knauth
Braum Meakes
Hendrik Stüwe
Dan Bonelli
Kevin Boyce
Allyson
Scott Howarth
Luke
Kevin Wilamowski
Symmetry
Nicholas Lennox
Dhruv Monga
Jake Fisher
Ken Jones
Kelly Christoffersen
Carlos Kobalent
Obadiah Wright
And thanks as well to Henry Reich, Gabi Ghita, Owen Campbell-Moore, Gene Lushtak, Eugene Bulkin, Logan Jones, Oliver, Anna Work, Adam Neely, nico, Rick Lees, Dave Mayer, Paul Quine, CodenaCrow, Nikolay Semyonov, Arnas, Caroline Simpson, Michael Alan Dorman, Blake Boyd, Luke Rihn, Ian Seymour, Trevor Sullivan, Favrion The Man, Tom Evans, Elliot Jay O'Neill, Dmitry Jemerov, Michael McCormick, Charles Gaskell, Chris Borland, Justin Donnell, JH, David Conrad, Alex Atanasyan, Elliot Burke, Tim S., Chris Chapin, Elias Simon, Jerry D. Brown, Lamadesbois, Jake Lizzio, Ohad Lutzky, James A. Thornton, Todd Davidson, Brian Dinger, Stefan Strohmaier, Shadow Kat, Adam Wurstmann, Kelsey Freese, Peter Leventis, Angela Flierman, Richard T. Anderson, Kevin Johnson, Blake White, Chris Connett, Ryan, Matthew Kallend, Rodrigo "rrc2soft" Roman, Patrick Callier, Danny, Francois LaPlante, Volker Wegert, Joshua Gleitze, Britt Ratliff, Darzzr, Charles Hill, Alexey Fedotov, Joshua La Macchia, Alex Keeny, Jeremy Zolner, Valentin Lupachev, ml cohen, John Bejarano, Kenneth Kousen, James, h2g2guy, W. Dennis Sorrell, Aaron Epstein, Melvin Martis, Professor Elliot, Jozef Paffen, Niko Albertus, Steve Brand, Rene Miklas, Connor Shannon, Gary Butterfield, max thomas, Roming 22, Red Uncle, Doug Nottingham, Andrew Engel, Nicholas Wolf, Peter Brinkmann, Robert Beach, ZagOnEm, Tuna, Mathew Wolak, Naomi Ostriker, Alex Mole, T, Lincoln Mendell, Vincent Engler, Hexa Midine, Kaisai Morihito, Matt McKegg, Beth Martyn, Lucas Augusto, Caitlin Olsen, NoticeMK, Anna, Evan Satinsky, James Little, RaptorCat, Sam Rezek, Betsy, Tonya Custis, Dave Shapiro, Jigglypuffer, leftaroundabout ., Jens Schäfer, Mikely Whiplash, room34, Austin Amberg, Francisco Rodrigues, Elizabeth, CoryC, Rafael Martinez Salas, Walther, Jacopo Cascioli, Doug Lantz, Michael Tsuk, Graeme Lewis, Jake Sand, Max Glass, Robert McIntosh, Brandon Legawiec, Brx, Jim Hayes, Evgeni Kunev, ThoraSTooth, Aditya Baradwaj, Matt Ivaliotes, Yuval Filmus, Kayla Sparks, Alon Kellner, Özgür Kesim, Rob Hardy, Richard Goldberg, Jasmine Fellows, Patrick Chieppe, Eric Stark, David Haughn, Gordon Dell, Juan Madrigal, Byron DeLaBarre, Matty Crocker, anemamata, Brian Miller, Lee-orr Orbach, Eric Plume, Kevin Pierce, Jon Hancock, Mark Henning, Caleb Meyer, Jason Peterson, Peggy Youell, EJ Hambleton, רועי סיני, John Carter, Jos Mulder, Daryl Banttari, J.T. Vandenbree, David Taylor, Dragix PL, Conor Stuart Roe, Marcus Radloff, Cereus, Gary Evesson, Kottolett, Brian Stephens, Dylan Vidas, Wayne Robinson, Gabriel Totusek, John Castle, Nicolas Gort Freitas, SecretKittehs, Mnemosyne Music, AkselA, Carlos Silva, Sean Thompson, David MacDonald, Jeremiah Coleman, Matty Tamer, Nellie Speirs Baron, Charles R., Philip Miller, The Gig Farmer, Sam, Hunter Embry, DialMForManning, Wayne Weil, Michael Wehling, darkmage, Sam Plotkin, Josh, and Jeff Bair! Your support helps make 12tone even better!
Also, thanks to Jareth Arnold for proofreading the script to make sure this all makes sense hopefully!
Some additional thoughts/corrections:
1) So, full disclosure: I'm not actually 100% sure all the guitar parts I described were Joe Perry. Aerosmith has two guitarists, so some of them could've been Brad Whitford too. I couldn't find any definitive documentation on who played what, but Perry's generally the lead guitarist and most of the parts I was referencing were lead guitar parts so I think it was him. Apologies to Whitford if I was wrong, though.
2) Ok technically that run at the end of the intro includes both E and Eb so it's not quite F harmonic minor but the Eb is really fast and I decided it didn't matter enough to be worth explaining.
3) To be clear I don't think Tyler was _actually_ confused in the prechorus. It's just a good way of framing the changes, but if I don't say this here I'm gonna get a bunch of comments accusing me of underestimating Steven Tyler or whatever.
4) Another detail on that anecdote: When I sang this back in college, the arrangement we used was for an all-girl group and was pitched up a half-step, so when I did did the high part I was hitting A5, not Ab5 like Tyler does. That was pretty much the literal top of my range: On a good day I could warm up to around the Bb, and with coaching I could make it a little higher than that, but A5 was basically the top. (And I definitely can't hit it anymore, in case you were wondering.)
I have been watching your channel for years. I love the light hearted ways teach music theory, and I follow your little doodles with glee. But I give up - that one drawing you use repeatedly is an ant? Is that right? What does that mean? I've been trying to decipher for years but I can't figure it out. Please help me out of my misery?
@@spiderine1prime He does regularly draw an ant, so I'm assuming you're right in that's what you're referring to. Usually he uses it to talk about something small, or something that follows a group.
Could you please make a video understanding "Every breath you Take"? It is one of my favorite songs and I'd like to know how, despite the creepy lyrics, they were able to create a romance vibe with the melody
(Sorry for my english. It is not my native language)
It's okay, Corey (Cory? I don't think I've ever seen your name written), I couldn't hit that A5 today either, and I can't claim to have ever been able to in the past. Anything above middle C is tiring for my voice. My soprano wife might be able to though :P
I'm glad both that you had a life before and that I get to watch elephants and gummy bears now. :) You got me onto nebula just so I can keep up with ghost notes.
Its missing the bass sounds or is my yt weird
"Before the Elephants took over."
It's not possible for me to express how much I love that sentence. I am stealing it to use out of context as much as I can.
I lol'd at that as well. And want it in my vocal arsenal
It truly had me in stitches
It's right besides Dominique Noble's "one by one, the penguins stole my sanity" shirt.
@@1972LittleC That used to be all over Linux in the late 90s with "Tux" (the penguin mascot of Linux). The origin is allegedly a lot darker, though.
That line plus that doodle of the elephant holding a flag should be on a T-shirt.
If you want, you can put the 12tone logo on the flag.
"Before the elephants took over"
Very ominous
An elephant, never, forgets.
*Switchblade goes shink*
I think he's lying - there is no life before the elephants, for any of us!
I would love to hear your analysis of "Sultans of Swing" by Dire Straits. The rock song about a jazz band, where the instruments are often used as sound effects to reflect the lyrics.
The guitar fills alone could be a video on their own. Holy crap I love that song.
Sultans is a straight masterpiece
Hell yeah
A great song about a shitty little jazz band.
I really love that idea. Dire Straits is such a great band, and Sultans of Swing is one of their best songs.
That feeling when you voted for Welcome to the Black Parade for the millionth time in a row but you’re always basking in the glory of how well this song was explained.
Generic comment to increase engagement statistics.
This is the song I always point to if anyone asks "was Aerosmith even any good?"
Such an exceptionally well written song. The first few seconds DESERVED those 1,000 words!
I loved the Perry the Platypus 😂
Damn spoiler!
Joey Kramer and Tom Hamilton don't get NEARLY enough credit for all the work they do in Aerosmith. Those drums and that bass is what brings emotional weight!
Love in an Elevator is a great example of this, hearing it with little bass is basically musical murder.
Power ballad balances emotional sincerity and over the top drama. Wow
“before the elephants took over”
*the 12Tone cinematic universe now has lore*
"Before the elephants took over..." that delivery was just so perfect hahaha
"It’s not really a chord thing at all. It’s a voice-leading thing." - ONCE MORE FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK!
When you finally realise these comments mean the nail on his thumb
fr i thought they were talking about the thumbnail of the video
Ooooohh!! Thanks for clearing that up!
I thought they were talking about the video thumbnail myself, because that's proper grammar.
2:56 I had my left earphone off and I was so confused why there was an awkward silence.
Me too, I read your comment about a second after I realised 😂
Gonna take a hot second to brag. My sister and brother-in-law were both audio technicians, and my BIL worked with Aerosmith once upon a time. He was pretty friendly with Tom Hamilton, and ended up getting a bass from Hamilton as a gift. My BIL was grateful, but didn't really play bass, so guess who he gave it to when he found out she played bass (hint: not my sister)! The fact that I own one of Tom Hamilton's basses is literally the only cool thing about me, but goddamn is it cool
That's sick! My claim to anything similar is that my Gibson SG was signed by Marty Friedman, long time guitarist of Megadeth and Japanese game show host.
My favorite band getting an analysis by 12tone? Hell ya!! As a bass player, nobody gets why I love Tom Hamilton and consider him one of the bests! Other bassists like Geddy Lee, Flea, Victor Wooten and more legends just blow me away when I learn those ridiculously hard lines, but bassists like Justin Chancellor and Tom Hamilton just know how to make the most out of the least!!!
No mention of Steve Harris?
I thought the part of “Dream On” everyone remembers is when Tyler screamingly hits that high note, not the bridge. But I guess everyone experiences it differently.
Yeah same
For me it's the times he's singing "dream on" *not* up the octave. :-)
...That is part of the bridge...
@@GlaceonStudios Oh. Yeah, I’m not a music theorist or even musician, so that’s kind of an expected mistake on my part. I just assumed it was a different part because Cory talks about the scream minutes after “the bridge”, so I assumed it was a different part.
@@jessehammer123 all the "Dream On" bits are the bridges. Songs don't always only have one bridge, though they can. The bridge is just the intermediate bit between the verse and chorus. It's a repeated part, so it's not part of the verse, but it's not technically the chorus proper. The bits beginning with "sing with me" are the chorus. The high, screaming "dream on" is just an extended, more exciting bridge to lead into the final chorus.
To me, the back-and-forth bits always sound like alarms. It's most noticable at the end of the song as everything else fades away and you're just left with the sound of ambulance sirens fading into the distance...
This is a surprisingly dissonant song when you actually take it apart!
4:25 in classical parlance, this is a bassline commonly called a “morte” and is often used to signify tragedy. it is related to a common opening gambit called a “lamento” (1 b7 b6 5).
Has your thumbnail always been a lethal weapon or am I just noticing this for the first time?
I was wondering that myself. It would explain why he's holding his pen so awkwardly...
That nail scares me
Haha I noticed this starting a few months back, it’s become a legit sword since. Impressive.
Wondering the same. That nail is somehow disturbing.
Probably for playing guitar or cocaine, either or
Speaking to the power of the song, I was in junior high and high school in rural Ohio between 1981-1987. We had multiple dances each year, and the last song at each alternated between "Stairway to Heaven" and "Dream On," neither of which is actually relevant to young infatuation in the ways we wanted them to be, but each of which allowed one last slow dance. I remember thinking they were old songs. "Stairway" was all of 10 years old and "Dream On" was 8...Anyway, "Dream On" felt the same way as "Stairway" - epic and timeless and profound and full of melancholy, and boy, my teen girl heart ate that up. My old lady heart still does.
"Before the elephants took over.." The delivery on that line was absolutely perfect and so surprising. Well done!
This song is such a work of genius that I can't explain the rest of their career.
holy shit, RIGHT?! one of my favorite songs from any group, yet i can mildly tolerate some other songs by them
I remember the first time I heard this; I thought to myself, what is this unbelievably beautiful dramabomb of a song? I even remember feeling some of the exact same reactions that 12tone points to in his analysis.
@Soy Orbison At one point in my early twenties I got tired of it, but I'm a musician/composer & have sometimes foolishly turned away from older music in an effort to chart new territory, but I've always come back to the good stuff. Writing that song at their age, was a really spectacular achievement, that still gives me a cinematic experience
Damn that did not feel like 18 mins, that felt like 5. Great work my dude
Master of the Power Ballad from 70s through the 90s. Meatloaf.
Dream On was one of my signature songs when I used to go to karaoke a lot before the pandemic
I love how you bring a broken down music theory analysis into songs that were written and played out of pure natural chemistry.
"...before the elephants took over" **thousand-yard stare**
I bet you are one of those rare people whose left and right brains are equally dominant. Your deep visual creativity, verbal wit, humor, and eloquence, musical wisdom, and video production flair come together in your sparkling RUclips channel. (This channel probably only represents a small percentage of your creative/analytical skills.) Superb work all around. Call me a new subscriber.
I appreciate the coke nail in honor of Aerosmith
Lmao. Usually it's the pinky finger though 🤔
@@adriatic.vineyards hey man who are we to tell a man what nail to do his coke from?
C'mon now. Everyone knows it's your pinky, not your thumb
I may have missed it somewhere, but if you made a sold a shirt that used one (or all) of your drawings of the elephants with the phrase "...Before the Elephants Took Over!" I would buy the crap out of it, maybe a poster & stickers too. Just saying. Love watching & can't wait to see what you do next!
I've always loved this song, and I'm not an Aerosmith fan. But I never really thought of it as a power ballad, because it's doing all this unusual movement, which doesn't seem typical of power ballads.
Also, I see the elephants closing in on me, ever so slowly...
This is my favorite song of all time.
One thing I also love is the song ending on a really muted cymbal crash and that guitar trill droning onward after the last chorus. There's no big climax it just kinda of goes until the song arbitrarily ends. There's something very haunting about the song and I think the majority of that comes from there being no resolution at the end.
Wow thanks for the analysis
Hahah I do overnight tech support and listen to things like this to keep me awake in the background between calls when processing emails that came in over the day. Right around when you talked about Power Chords I got an email from soneone asking for 3 Power cords for some laptops. I laughed.
aerosmith has a giant collection of underrated bangers imo
Seriously. I keep my radio tuned to classic rock, and whenever an Aerosmith song comes on, it's a guaranteed good time.
The fact that Steven Tyler wrote this when he was 14 makes absolute sense.
Who else believes beyond a shadow of a doubt that they've lived many lives and learned so much about the world in their time on earth more than teenagers?
Chill
@@MadassAlex no
I've been waiting for this one for a while.
Great analysis, as always!
This is the song of my life, thanks for analyzing it with such detail! Amazing video, keep it up!!
I really have to thank you. I came back to this channel after a while and it really reignited my love for music. I feel like we rarely really listen to music while focusing on it, and it transforms into such an emotional experience for me. Thanks a lot for all the good work :)
I love this song and have been hoping you'd cover it
Love your stuff always but this was one of my favourite ones you've done yet
Wow. Crazy beautiful analysis
As always, great analysis. In particular I love that enough time is spent on the voice leading part because too often I watch analysis videos by other people who just label the chords when much more seems to be going on.
I loved this. Thank you.
such a respectfully reverent exploration of music and emotion - by the end i found i'd been moved... to tears. powerful stuff.
Great analysis indeed. Thank you.
When you played the isolated instruments I could really appreciate just how much of this song was sampled in the Eminem song Sing for the Moment
Homage? Tribute? He knew his emotions.
@@quietone610 sampled. It's sampled.:-3
My point was, he could have sampled anything in common time, and chose this.
@@quietone610 ??
@@adriatic.vineyards He chose this exact chorus and these exact vocals to reflect what he was feeling.
Some people just pick samples because they're feeling lazy, on the day it is to write their backing track.
You just got a new subscriber and oh man, you are amazing, I'll definately be watching all your videos, lots to learn here, thanks for the content man
Absolutely BRILLIANT! Dang. You are just so very good at this.
Great video man!
heard this on my way home today, perfect timing
Could you please make a video understanding "Every breath you Take"? It is one of my favorite songs and I'd like to know how, despite the creepy lyrics, they were able to create a romance vibe with the melody
(Sorry for my english. It is not my native language)
great request!
also don't apologize. I don't think you had grammar errors, but I am also not a native english speaker so what do I know🙃
a lot of us aren't native speakers and using a second language regularly in conversations on the internet is the best thing you can do to learn and get better
@@danielhayun304 well said 😃😃
song request are done through patreon, only patreon supporters can request and vote for songs to analyze
As an overly pedantic native speaker, your grammar is almost perfect (better than most native speakers I see on the internet) and the couple of errors you do have don’t make it difficult to understand what you’re saying. The only one that I find noteworthy is saying romance instead of romantic. You’re describing the vibe of the song, so you want to use the adjective (romantic) instead of the noun (romance). When in doubt, remember that -(t)ic and -al are used on the end of nouns to make them into adjectives.
@@p.g.v.3765 Oh.... I didn't know that.... Are you a patreon supporter? If yes, could you request him to analyze this song please?
Every video I watch of yours make me want to hear your singing! Especially since I’m trying to be a metal vocalist too lol
This song is one of my favourite all time songs. So many memories of my childhood, the nostalgia.... It's the last song I'll ever listen to
This was an enjoyable analysis. :)
Having a lifetime in audio engineering, I find you one of the few on RUclips that just keeps amazing me with your musical education and appreciation for what the artist is trying to and how they are achieving their goal in real time!!🤩
Great video, as always! On top of your expert analysis and lovely drawings, you're just witty as heck and a joy to listen to. Sorry, that's probably laying it on too thick, but I keep forgetting to comment about how much I appreciate what you do! Looking forward to the next video!
Another great one. I loved the anecdote!
Incidentally (and à propos of nothing), my cats really liked this one, and kept trying to get your hand
My god, what a wonderful musical lesson
Wow! This is the first video I watched from your channel. Subscribed instantly.
… but I have soo many questions 🥺
dream ooonnnn dream oooooonnnnnnnnnnn
I love this channel! And do Brothers in Arms, please!
This video style is adhd heaven
I just discovered your channel... and I have to say every one of your videos I have watched so far have made me appreciate the songs you analyze so much more. I loved most of them (the songs I have watched are pretty iconic) but I understand now WHY I loved them.
Excellent ty
great song
Let me just say the editing in time at 13:45 was amazing. How long did that take? It was perfect 🤘🤘🤘 This whole episode was a master class in musical decomposition. Incredible as always.
That's a powerful thumbnail you've got there on your thumb. Bet it picks really well hah
I appreciate music but know nothing about anything technical. It's nice to learn with modern songs and I love this format
Sing with me~ sing for the year~ sing for the laughter sing for the tears~
Rock is not dead, it's in my blood!
The thing that sticks out for me the most about this video is that I never realized the weird mashup of the lead singer and guitarist's last names being (as you put it around 5:50). "Tyler and Perry" xD
I remember when I was first learning this song and I had dad, who was my inspiration to learning guitar, also look at it. He mentioned that the verse arpeggio sounds almost like a lullaby. Given the songs name that has always stuck with me
I was learning this song a few days ago and I was trying to analyze the harmony and I just couldn't. It's not like any classical harmony that I faced in college.
Thank you for this content!
great stuff - music theory and reading is so important/ however i doubt Aerosmith sat down and discussed these ideas and wrote scores for main Rock instruments- not that you said they did! lol
it it’d important for me to remember several things when studying this:
It has this written score- and so did orchestration /. But song was actually written based on music intsinct, intuition/ and above all Talent- these guys didn’t know they were doing classic music forms- they just wrote a song, based on their influences
But they were influenced by songs that just naturally do what you explain so they soaked it up and can do it but not name it
You are a great music theory expert and musicologist/ hearing this explanation is fantastic- But i’m sure you would agree that most classic rock and modern rock even is just born of playing - not writing on music- but, as I said, the greats either instinctively knew this or absorbed it somewhere else without even knowing it / if they did they’d be stealing!!! lol LOVE UR channel/ fascinating 🤨
Here I sit, terrified, pondering his statement:
"I had a life before this, you know - before the elephants took over."
What if he is posessed by them? What if this is a cry for help?
Anyways...
Dream on.
Does anyone else enjoy watching/listening to this, while understanding nothing?
This was an awesome video. Request: Rush's "Tom Sawyer"… it's got it all: bonkers chords, improbable time signatures, screaming high melodies, ostinato, pedal tones… and totally unclear stanza function (i.e does it even have a chorus? or does it have three choruses? etc)
Nice one
One of the earliest riff i ever learned
Re: the verse melody: It's interesting to me how you mentioned that swapping the two phrases wouldn't really work. To me the swapped phrases sound a lot like just an antecedent/consequent setup...
Oooo this makes me want to hear an analysis of Damn Yankees’ High Enough
It would be amazing to see you approach Alter Bridge’s “Blackbird” in this way.
I'd love to see a breakdown of what PMJ did to this song. Obviously, theirs was accommodating insane vocals and translating it to a lounge feel, but they took it in a whole other direction, still powerful (though Morgan James' vocal performance may be the defining factor in that, but they definitely gave an environment for her voice to shine in), but with a completely different feel.
Steven Tyler watching this: *Interesting*
I'm going to start keeping gummy bears around so i can randomly toss some while saying to keep rocking...lol!
My favourite Aerosmith track. Thanks for the analysis.
The Ab5 of Dream On was basically my party trick for a while. Still kind of is, though I've thankfully found another couple of songs with Ab5 or A5s I like. I guess for most people seeing an overweight male baritone who can consistently hit and hold a note like that is something unusual.
Great video and a phenomenal song. Have you ever looked at Kashmir?
missed opportunity to end the video with "keep on dreamin" instead of "keep on rockin"
Omg please please do sultans of swing!
Actually tried singing this song at one of my school’s open mic. Forgot half the lyrics in the first half and probably did a C#5 in the high part, not G#5. Solve those problems and I was a great frontman with no backing members because it was karaoke
It's a shame that older Opeth songs are so long, because I think that a video covering some of the structural choices they made in Still Life & Blackwater Park were absolutely 💯. They tended to meander from riff to riff back then, but cycling back to a prior riff let you know the piece was nearing its end. For 7+ minute songs, the repetition is a pretty good choice.
So yeah, if you want to cover song structures more than chord choices... They could be a good reference to use?
I clicked expecting a video about the Nazareth song. Still enjoyd it.
Hey!
Would you consider doing something around Daft Punk?
Especially Crescendolls has alot of neat tricks that make it an amazing hook,
additionally, it presents an interesting opportunity to showcase the real fun and
transformative spirit of mixing and re-mixing music.