I wonder if there are any other music teachers here? Because the “can’t fail” progression of I-V-vi-IV progression is now often referred to as the “Don’t Stop Believin’” progression.
To those who hate it: yea…but…“streetlights…people…oh”?
No one explains how popular the chord progression is than the Axis of Awesome.
I’m not sure what taste in music has to do with the popularity of the progression, though. I guess that shows the influence of the band on some later bands (which I don’t think anyone would probably deny) but that doesn’t mean I should enjoy their music because of that. They’re just not my thing… 
Comment edited because I clearly failed to read the entirety of your comment properly.
Axis of Awesome is indeed… well, awesome.
That’s one heck of an image.
Mindy: I’m not trying to make any claim about “taste in music”; I’m saying this chord progression - which was popular in the Tim Pan Alley days - just appeals to a LOT of people, and they don’t know why.
I’ve been playing for 45 years and I still don’t really understand it. It’s just a fact. The Axis of Awesome bit should provide clarity.
I think it’s been surpassed, but in 2012 “Don’t Stop Believin’” was the most downloaded song, worldwide, to that date. All I can surmise is that humans desperately need something that sounds optimistic?
As far as the idea that anyone “should” like any music? It never made sense to me: to quote Robert Anton Wilson, “Like what you like, enjoy what you enjoy…and don’t take crap from anybody.”
blink Holy crap! I never would’a thunk it.
I counted about 8 songs I might feel the need to get up and dance to but seeing as I normally only dance at goth clubs or 80’s nights that focus on new wave/dark wave. I listen to the Gorillaz, the Killers, and The White Stripes actively and those are good singles of theirs, just overplayed. And Take On Me and Come on Eileen are fun.
I did not include Girls Just Wanna Have Fun in that, although it was my favorite song as a wee one. I will dance to that sometimes but I have to be having a good night and already be in a good mood. The better my mood the more 80’s pop I will dance to.
There are also a few other “used to like but now meh” songs.
This topic is temporarily closed for at least 4 hours due to a large number of community flags.
I’ve always hated that song. It became a kind of running joke with me and one of my best friends in college. When we lived together, she trolled the shit out of me with it.
3 years after graduation, she died. I was out at a bar when I got the phone call. I went back inside, and “Don’t Stop Believing” was playing. She fucking trolled me posthumously. Good on her. Except now, I hear the song, and it sucks, AND I cry. So fuck that song.
This topic was automatically opened after 4 hours.
Just gonna throw this out here.
no nay never, no nay never no mooooore… wil I play the wild rover. Never no more!
Thank you for finally showing why I hate all those songs. I never really noticed it’s the chord progression. Which is just offensively boring.
This Playlist brings back the sense of alienation and otherness I felt my first few months in college.
“What is this music? Is this music? Why is this exciting?”
Most American artists I had listened to up to that point in my hometown had more melanin and a musical sensibility that was easier for me to groove to.
It never occurred to me to call that jarring aural atmosphere at that time on campus “white music,” but I feel a strange sense of comfort knowing that this was exactly what is was.
Or “Jesse’s Girl”…
How about “Hotel California”…
Maybe those would be the “old white people list” though.
Now play it at insane volume over a sound system that has zero bass (because the woofers were blown out ages ago) and this takes me back to every high school dance.
Or how bout that song that make the Irish sit on the floor and row?
Why not both? Meadow wielding a tommy gun…
