Tigran Hamasyan - The Curse - Full transcription

[@whywhatfour]

i just heard of this song and was like "well dang i wonder how many months i gotta wait before i can learn it through sheet music" and here we are. this is FAST. awesome work!!!

[@ha1lm4ry]

Dude, this is awesome!. Absolutely not an easy task! I've been waiting for someone brave enough to take this one on. Amazing work.

[@Madinko12]

Wait, you transcribed this in "just" 42 hours? For us humans, a lifetime would not even be close to enough. Thank you so much for sharing! Absolute masterpiece, amazing transcription.

[@lyoug]

Haha, thank you. You can do it! Work hard at transcribing easier songs first, work your way up, maybe take a couple music theory / ear training courses to sort everything out, and at some point you’ll be able to tackle anything :)

[@UnexpectedAmy]

Wow, this is crazy! Every time I listen to this song I realise it's so much more complex than I give it credit for. Amazing job transcribing such a difficult song!

[@ani1kin]

Just...WOW! Amazing work!

[@itaimelamed]

Great transcription! This is awesome, good job!

[@maxomilian]

Awesome ! Keep up the good work , we appreciate the work put into this 👍

[@UkuleleAversion]

Nicely done. Love how easy you've made this to read through.

[@joedunkelberg5054]

Incredible transcription, my one nitpick (and it is a nitpick, you did great) is that it is more in line with the feel to call the meters in the metal section a la 1:56 4/4 + 4/4 + 4/4 + 6/8, as it is being divided into two groupings of 3 8th notes, which are then being tupleted into 4 or 5 against 3. I can understand wanting to keep it in the quarter note pulse, especially when trying to explain what the metric patterns are on the top left of the screen, but when 3/4 is divided evenly like this thats when 6/8 makes more sense, especially because its just for one bar and its not like we're going back and forth between 3/4 patterns and 6/8 patterns. Most musicians reading measure 38 would struggle a lot more trying to figure out where the tuplets are dividing there because 3/4 implies the grouping of 2+2+2 and the tuplets take up 3 eighth notes each, causing some confusion (of course a good one would just go listen to the song but if its something new that isnt an option as a composer sometimes). Wonderful work! I need to get back into doing transcriptions more often and Tigran's music is the perfect way to give myself a headache while transcribing.

[@lyoug]

Thank you for your comment! Definitely valid criticism. I only wrote these bars in 3/4 because that’s the way I felt while listening to the song: as you said I naturally kept the quarter note pulse. You could say my headbanging made the choice for me haha. But I didn’t think much further than that, and I agree that 6/8 could be a better choice. (The metric patterns at the top left can easily be adjusted.) Not only is it easier to read with the tuplets taking 3♪ each, it would also make the transitions at 4:42 and 6:32 easier to feel, because these sections get into a dotted quarter pulse which 6/8 prepares you for. The only drawback is that, well, you lose the quarter note pulse, but what can you do, it’s Tigran music, gotta be ready for some rhythmic shenanigans.

[@joedunkelberg5054]

@@lyoug Thats super fair! I usually feel stuff like this that goes between 4/4 + 6/8 (or other similar enough time signatures) as a lifted 3 beat and usually pause my headbanging to adjust. Probably comes from me having less of background in straight up headbanging rock and metal and more in prog/contemporary classical and rock. I agree theres always gonna be back and forths about stuff like this, especially once you get as complicated as Tigran does, and i really like the choice of notating the tuplets as 5:3 or 4:3 as opposed to just saying "hey this is a quintuplet, do the math" and putting only a 5 there like some people do. Good luck with future projects!

[@leowurgaftmusic8957]

This is so impressive

[@9ielts]

Dude, are ya kidding me, I found this and instantly my week is better! That "out of tune" section from 3:05 sounds so good.

[@tsufmosplaysm336]

legend thank you

[@vvviiimmm]

thanks for sharing

[@diegomancinimusico]

THANK YOU!

[@maksimminko]

Man you are a hero

[@oliverschmidt4831]

so good! thanks!

[@ZackSussmanMusic]

INCREDIBLE work mate!! Underrated af video, I loveee how you depicted everything it’s so hard to make some of those choices and you did a wonderful job. Does the program you used to make this let you put all those colors in or did you do that in post?

[@lyoug]

Thank you very much! I added all the colors manually during the editing.

[@EcePaksüt-q4y]

Hey! I’m a total noob when it comes to counting and I’m struggling to find break the 15/8 measures into 5+5+5. To me it sounds like 3/4 and I can’t put my finger on how to count them as 5/8. Could you enlighten me please? This is awesome by the way, thanks!

[@mr.mrowmusic8255]

This is incredibly well done, good job dude can anyone explain to me the thought process behind writing the section at 3:06? I love how it sounds and have wanted to do that kind of stuff for a while but it's very confusing

[@lyoug]

Thanks a lot! Not sure about the thought process - I guess you’d have to ask Tigran. As a starting point, 02:25 to 03:32 is the same 4-bar theme being repeated and developped. Here are a few details: - 02:25 introduces the theme (what I called Theme B, light green), and an C pedal ostinato (cyan). - 02:39 adds a very chromatic middle voice (B A♭ B F..., not highlighted), plus the bass hits (blue) introduced at 01:39. The theme and the ostinato keep going. - 02:52 speeds up the bass hits (every 2 beats instead of every bar), + the bass notes change. Theme, ostinato and chromatic voice keep going (but down an octave). - 03:06 bumps the theme and chromatic voice up two octaves. The chromatic voice is shared between both hands, and the left hand adds some more notes. Bass is back to a C pedal, but every 2 beats. The synth adds a G ambient drone. - 03:19 is similar to 02:52 Hope this helps :)

[@radivojemijacic777]

Channel your inner Future breed Machine 🤟💌❣

[@lyoug]

Was wondering when someone would notice 🤘

[@met-shuggah3845]

Awesome! I’m torn about those 5:3s. To me it originally felt more like during the heavy 4+4+4+3 parts, those were actually just eighth note triplets+eighth note release 2 times instead of 5:3 eighth notes with the 5th one rested 2 times. For the other 5:3s, I again thought it was actually just assuming an eighth note triplet rate, making those measures in section R “irrational” (10/12). By extension, I thought that in section S, they modulated more simply to the eighth note triplet pulse speed, not 5:3. The distinction is very fine (eighth note triplets are 4.5:3 eighth notes, to put it into perspective), which is why I’m torn. Even now, listening and reading while focusing heavily on all slight rhythmic spaces, I cannot decide which one it is, but I continue to lean towards triplets, even though I genuinely want it to be 5:3 cause that’s badass and I love 5:3. What are your thoughts? Did you originally think this too, but then change your mind upon further scrutiny? Or did you hear it and immediately recognize it as 5:3? And in general, what do you make of sections of this nature, where the combination of the 2 possibilities being very mathematically close, and the musicians’ own infinitesimally slight imperfections, seem to muddy the waters beyond the perceptions of all but the shrewdest listeners? Thank you for your work.

[@met-shuggah3845]

Very soon after my original comment but I am definitely hearing 5:3 now during sections R and S (if I tap triplets during those parts it feels like the music is rushing, indicating the ratio I have chosen is slightly too slow). During the main heavy sections like E, I am still torn because they are not super precise by this “fine-tooth-comb” standard in just that one tuplet part.

[@lyoug]

@@met-shuggah3845 Very interesting questions! What happened for this song is, I added a custom click track early on to help me transcribe some sections, and the ♪=270 metronome matched the whole way through, from section B to the end. (Of course sometimes they’ll be a bit early or late for a couple bars, but they always gets back on track.) (The intro is a bit slower around ♪=260-266, probably not recorded to a click.) This click made me not even consider the triplet rate and the 10/12 irrational signature, because the 5:3 tuplets just fit perfectly into the ♪=270 framework. I did notice that 5:3 was close to 8th note triplets though: when trying to tap the rhythms along, I had a tendency to align to the easier to play triplets, and had to force myself to speed up a bit to match the 5:3, just as you experienced in your 2nd comment. Tigran & co. seem to have the same tendency: when looking closely at the waveform in section R, the first beat after a bar of 5:3 tuplets is often a bit late. But as I said they quickly get back on track to the ♪=270 metronome within a bar or two, so it rules out the possibility of a 10/12 bar which would delay the rest of the song each time. (Edit: I just looked again, and in the E and M heavy sections, they stay on the click almost perfectly.)

[@met-shuggah3845]

That clears it up then! Definitely 5:3. That being the case makes the other songs on the album that share motifs with The Curse more numerically consistent, especially Betrayed By Brothers, where 5:3 is further confirmed when the heavy riff is placed in a triplet grid, because when the 5:3 part is played there, they’re normal quintuplets, since the 3 that the 5s are “against” are the 3 notes making up a quarter note (or dotted quarter, however you wanna notate). It also makes the fact that the whole Curse motif is centered around 15 more poetic, as 15 is divisible evenly by both 5 and 3. Tigran is not only using different phrasings and implied meters to reflect this, he even uses tuplets to “call-back” to the numbers that make up 15. Very cool.

[@lyoug]

@@met-shuggah3845 I haven’t taken the time to listen to the album yet, I’m curious! Your 2nd paragraph is very well put. This is the main reason why I added the "1 phrase = 30♪" up top; I wanted to show that the "15-ness" of the music stays constant throughout (well, except for the 2-bar Future Breed Machine transitions). Also, I just noticed your username! I’ve enjoyed your channel for a long while. I think more people should listen to Meshuggah with a metronome, it helps a lot with feeling the 4/4, especially in trickier songs. If you ever decide to make some more, I happen to have made a spreadsheet a few months ago with the full BPM data of all their songs: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1AVAJBlXPeJNDfR7WrAQvtPX9KsVYFccJnvOLO-RkCw4/ It’s sorted alphabetically by default but check out the filtered views for a couple other sorts.

[@met-shuggah3845]

@@lyoug I'm glad those videos have been enjoyable to some folks! And damn, that spreadsheet is badass! Thank you for sharing! Waking up one day and going "I'm gonna get all the Meshuggah BPMs onto a spreadsheet" is complete insanity and I'm all for it. I stopped those vids because I got too busy, and now I'm at the point where if I made Meshuggah-related videos again, they'd be full transcriptions, or videos in the vein of your Ivory Tower breakdown. But who knows? 🤘🤘🤘

[@MineCRAFTINGMENCZ]

Would you mind sharing the .gp file?

[@lyoug]

Just added it, link in the description :)

[@maximysforeve]

крутота

[@vvviiimmm]

3:32 just realized that the melody here has the same pattern as the heavy breakdown part

[@lyoug]

Yeah! It feels completely different because of how the pulse is felt, but the duration is the exact same. Groups of 5♪ at 3:32 (also at 1:38 for the first appearance), and groups of 4♪ in the breakdown; plus the little ending (in orange), 6♪. 5+5+5+5+4+6 = 30 4+4+4+4+4+4+6 = 30 So many ideas are reused (often with little variations) in lots of different places, this is why I highlighted them in the video - each idea gets its own color.

[@vvviiimmm]

@@lyoug its getting more interesting in "Betrayed By Brothers" and "The Demon Of Akn Anatak"

[@lyoug]

@@vvviiimmm Ooh, I haven’t taken the time to listen to the full album yet, I’m intrigued!

[@maksimminko]

Do you have a GP file available?

[@ludocoker]

I would love to have it too ! Please :)

[@lyoug]

Just added it, link in the description :) Sorry for the late reply, I wanted to make a few audio tweaks before sharing it.

[@maksimminko]

@@lyoug thank you, masterfully done! The part I liked turned out to be pretty simple on the piano. If you provide a way to donate, I'll send a few euros

[@lyoug]

@@maksimminko Thank you! What part were you interested in? I do have a full time job / salary. Most music related things I do, I do on my free time, so I’m happy to release this for free. I do appreciate the intent though! Thanks again.