Minor Plagal
I was jogging the other day, listening to Japanese Breakfast’s (excellent) recent album Jubilee, when a song came on that instantly perked my ears. Its clever songwriting moves almost drew too much attention to themselves, the way early Beatles album tracks often would. After I got back home, I tried to work out what it was about that piqued my interest.
The song was Kokomo, IN. It’s a mid-tempo ballad with touches of melancholy, played on typical indie guitar/bass/drums instrumentation, plus some strings. After listening a few times, I think I worked out the exact element that drew me in—the chord choices in the verse. And one choice in particular—the consistent use of the minor 4 chord.
It’s one of the most effective moves in a songwriter’s toolkit and once you start searching for it, you’ll start hearing everywhere. And you’ll be gobsmacked by its effectiveness.
The Minimum Amount of Music Theory I Have To Include While Hoping You Won’t Leave The Page
In Western tonal music—i.e. the basis for 95% of rock/pop/indie—there are 7 chords (one for each letter of the alphabet from A to G) inherent in every key. Most of these chords are either major or minor, and they always follow the same pattern, regardless of what key they’re in. The I (“one chord”) is major, the ii (“two chord”) is minor, the iii (“three chord”) is minor, and so on.
In the key of C major, that pattern will produce a set of “home chords”, called the diatonic (fancy Greek word that’s accurate but not particularly important) chords. In C major, the diatonic chords are:
C major (I) - D minor (ii) - E minor (iii) - F major (IV) - G major (V) - A minor (vi) - B diminished (vii)
Forget about the weird seven (vii) chord for now, and just focus on the four (IV) chord: it is major. If you follow the major key, the IV chord is a major chord. It is always a major chord.
Except when it isn’t.
Every so often (or, if you’re a Jacob Collier-type, every 2.5 seconds), a good songwriter will use a different chord, one that doesn’t follow that familiar pattern. Why do they do that? In order to surprise us. Because that’s what creates interesting songwriting—the deliberate but surprising circumvention of an expectation in the listener. In other words: breaking the “rules” once in a while.
And one of the most effective ways of “breaking the rules” is to change that major 4 chord (IV) into its minor version, the minor 4. So instead of the chord F major (Fmaj) in the key of C major, we substitute it with F minor (Fmin).
This is what that substitution would sound like:
The first time around (0:00 to 0:06), we’re changing from Cmaj to Fmaj and back to Cmaj. Your regular, vanilla, I-IV-I progression.
The second time around, we’re changing from Cmaj to Fmin to Cmaj. Can you hear the sweet, sweet sorrow of the minor 4 chord?
Done! I swear that’s the last bit of music theory
The thing about this minor 4th chord, this little bit of rule-breaking, is that it’s actually quite common. And it is ridiculously effective. You may not know—or understand—anything about the theory of it, but you’ve definitely heard it. Thousands and thousands of times. And it has worked on you. It has tugged at your heartstrings and made you connect with a certain line in a song. It’s almost ludicrous how effective it can be.
Don’t believe me? Here are just a few in a long list of examples (the minor 4 chord strikes on the highlighted word/syllable):
Green Day - When September Ends
“… wake me up up WHEN September ends…”
Death Cab for Cutie — I Will Follow You Into The Dark
“… I’ll follow YOU into the dark…”
Radiohead — Creep
“… I want a perfect SOUL…”
The Decemberists — On The Bus Mall
“ ….we’re kings among runaways (HERE)…”
And what would a list of songwriting trickery be without some Beatles examples?
The Beatles — In My Life
“… there is no-oh ONE who compares with you…”
The Beatles — Across The Universe
“… possessing and caREssing me…”
As is clear from the examples, generally artists will use the minor 4 chord very strategically, often near the end of a verse or chorus.
Japanese Breakfast, on the other hand, goes all out with the chord. Here’s Michelle tossing out four of them in the first 30 seconds of the song! Is the technique still effective? Is it overkill? I’ll let you be the judge.