Fascinating, isn't it?

That's the first time I've ever heard anything good about Rock Band/Guitar Hero as far as being anywhere close to the actual instrument.

Still, the foot pedal kills me. Whenever I imitate a rhythm, I use a hand as the kick. Yeah, I know, lame.

Well. It's like a single-stringed guitar I guess. You learn how to play chords on one string.

…Which is useless on a real guitar.

Oh yeah, the foot pedal for rockband kind of sucks. I wanted to drop a hundred-or-so on the one people were making out of a real pedal, with proper springs and stuff. There's so many fun songs that I can do with my real pedal, but that I can't keep up with on the rockband pedal.

…Although now that I have a TD-9, I have seen people modding their controlers to play rockband with it…Hmm…

Anyway, I have a special hatred for those who think music theory can be thrown out the window…But that's just me, and my resentment for being forced through 8 years of music lessons. XD

I might be misunderstanding what music theory is, but if it's what I think it is, it's very difficult to play "pleasing" music and go outside the realm of music theory.

Most songs are played 4/4. Many songs (in classical music anyway) are played in a certain key. Any note that isn't hit within a range of a 32nd note is either a sloppy musician, or done on purpose - and usually it's the person who understands where a 32nd note lands within a whole note that is not playing sloppily.

Everyone who makes music follows, to varying extends, rules of music theory. Not everyone will know that writing a song in the key of D major will play an F and C sharp instead of an F every time (and it might not sound good if C is sharp, and F isn't)

However, if a person is playing in D major, it's much easier for a guitar player that understands the theory behind it, to listen to the song and know "okay, C sounds sharp, and so does F…I guess it's played in D major", and subsequently all C and Fs are played sharp. Rather than the player sitting there saying "aw, there's that weird F note again, another F sharp? Weird…"

It just speeds up learning.

And with drums it's pretty much all about keeping time. Understanding how to recognize a song is in 4/4 time, then helps recognize (and understand) when a drummer on a song is doing "off-beat sounding" 16th notes, or a triplet.

Understanding music theory does not stifle you, it helps open you up to a whole new world of understanding music. With that understanding, you can do so much more.

It's not like there's some secret society somewhere dictating how music should go - if playing 7/8 time on distorted guitars with no rhyme or reason to the notes they play, then, well, great. It's out there, and because you understand music theory, you'll be able to get it.

In the video you posted, the guy was doing a scale. You can play it at different octaves. You can do it in different keys. It sounds different, and yet it sounds the same. If you stray from the guidelines of music theory, then it doesn't sound like it flows as well.

Music theory is just theory on how music works. A bar can be likened to a sentance, and a note can be likened to a word. People don't usually develop weird cadences to the way they talk; they might talk slower or faster, but it's usually steady, and follow punctuation rules.

You don't HAVE to follow what music theory dictates (you can go off and have fun writing bar-less music, in random time signatures if you want, but have fun), but it helps.

To continue the "language" argument, you do "pick up" language at a certain part of brain development, but you never pick up reading and writing without trying. Sure, civilization existed without reading and writing, but it's a very important way to get ideas across - even for helping yourself remember things.

I would find it extremely frustrating to try and come up with a song, and not write any of it.

Sure, most people record it when they're jamming, and then play it back and pick up what they want, but I don't have the memory to do that. If I go and play stuff back, I would want it written down so I can remember it for the future.

(of course not all musicians do this, but my memory's kind fuzzed)

So I guess you can liken music theory to writing, rather than language? And just like writing/language, expressing the music vs reading/writing the music, follows very similar rules, and they evolve together.

A sentance usually ends with a period, exclamation mark, or question mark. A set of bar is usually written and played to a certain time signature.

A comma means pause for a short amount of time, and a rest in music theory means "stop playing" for a certain fraction of the bar.

So yes, you can play music without music theory, but why bother trying to learn the rules yourself (because you will inevitably start playing your instrument with theory rules - at the very least with a time signature) when someone can teach you them?

Lastly, banhammer to anyone who whines about how "Thome Yorke never learned how to read sheet music". I don't care; it's not like it would be a hinderance for him to know how to read sheet music. Dyslexic people have difficulty reading words, and they're capable of telling grand stories.

You're only scratching the surface. Music theory does cover rudimentary tones in a scale and simple (in the theoretical sense) time signatures but covers so much more: (7+9)/8 patterns, dropping a beat from a bar, using cadences and key changes. Anyone can play a i-VIIb-VIb-V progression but do you know why it works? You can get into the realm of different modes and different tonic scales which often completely break the ear of a Western listener. It covers how to arrange music effectively and how to structure a piece. There's homophony, heterophony and polyphony. There's how to write a harmony and how to write a bass counterpoint. There's even the maths of it in there as well. Music theory even covers completely going off the rails and writing bar-less, noisy drone music (contrary to popular belief) because it's still music and can be analysed.

I love Radiohead but fuck Thom Yorke. His excuse for not learning sheet music is that "it doesn't correctly express rhythm." No, you just haven't learnt it properly. Colin Greenwood writes most of the songs anyway. What an asshole (type 2).

I simply hate how the western world takes to naming and explaining everything in a particular way. It reminds of English Literature and how you'd be asked to discuss "What device the writer was using in this sentence" when in reality he isn't doing shit.

I wasn't saying that you should play without following any musical laws whatsoever, all I was saying is that there is more than one right way. I'd rather figure it out for myself and be rid of the predictability that stems from everyone learning the same thing in the same way.

If I needed to read and write music, say if I was playing jazz or in a big band, then I would, I'm not against it, but as it stands I'm doing fine learning music by listening to it and writing music in my head. I can play in every key and time signature I need to, because it's counting numbers, nothing more, and that doesn't require hundreds of dollars in tutoring.

Having an unambiguous nomenclature to describe things is horrendous. Communicating your ideas with other members of a musical group is overrated anyway.