Why The Strokes' "Oblivius" Hits So Hard

Hinzugefügt: 2026-05-12

[00:00:09]What side are you standing on? In Oblivious, that question hits hard. And not just because of the lyrics, but because of how they are sung and the music underneath. In this video, I'll show you the simple but effective songwriting techniques that the strokes used to create a song that shows you two sides and urges you to pick one.

[00:00:33]>> If you are a songwriter who wants to learn more about the stroke songwriting techniques, you'll find this video very useful. And if you're a fan, this will help you hear the music differently and appreciate new sides of their writing skills. So, let's take a look.

[00:00:57]When Julian Kasablancas asks, "What side are you standing on?" There's something in the music that makes that question even more urgent and powerful, demanding that you take a side right now. How does the music do this? Let's take a look at the melody first.

[00:01:16]>> Stand alone.

[00:01:18]What side you standing on?

[00:01:23]What side are you standing on?

[00:01:27]What side you standing on?

[00:01:32]What side do you standing on?

[00:01:37]>> The melody urges you to take a side by emphasizing two words, side and on.

[00:01:43]Those two words side and on fall in the first beats of measures which is the most important beat and the strongest beat in a measure. Those notes side and on are also held longer than the other notes. They're held for about two beats rather than the other notes held for about one beat. Together this makes those two words side and on the strongest. So that the essential notes and the essential words are side and on asking you what side are you on? That's the emphasis.

[00:02:13]You can hear this if we take just the vocal line and the drums. You can hear how important and how locked in the melody is with the side and on falling on the one. I'll also count along for you.

[00:02:37]side.

[00:02:49]>> So because of the length of those notes and how they fall in the one, those two words side and on are emphasized.

[00:02:56]Pressing this question to you, what side are you on? Demanding that you take a side. You can see how important this is.

[00:03:03]if I move the words around and emphasize the different lengths of the words. So in this I'll show you lengthening what and standing and I'll also place those on the one so you can hear how important and how much that changes the question.

[00:03:17]Let's take a look.

[00:03:40]By emphasizing what in standing, the question is very different. What standing? What standing? It doesn't really hit the same or as urgently as side on. It's not as clear of a question of two words. What kind of standing do you have? I'm not sure, but it doesn't work as well. So you can see that side on is a better choice to make that land as a making a decision. The word side and on are also emphasized by the pitches of the notes themselves.

[00:04:07]Side lands on the root of the chord which is the most stable and foundational part of a chord giving it a very authoritative feeling. When he asks the question again side lands on the fifth of the next chord which is the second most stable and most powerful note in a chord. So it also sounds authoritative.

[00:04:26]So that shows you the choices that Julian Kazablancas and the Strokes made in writing the melody so that the words side and on were emphasized posing this question to you in an urgent way. But there's even more powerful songwriting techniques at use here. There's also the idea of word or tone painting. Word or tone painting is when music is composed to literally represent the ideas in the lyrics. And so what's going on here is there's a step down from one note to the next that has a movement feeling. It's a step away and it creates a feeling of movement which is a feeling of space.

[00:05:02]And in those two spaces, stepping between two spaces, two sides, two positions. So you can see that the use of that chord and that use of those notes stepping down one pitch is very careful and deliberate choice to create a feeling of movement in the melody and therefore creating a feeling of two different places. It's also worth noting that the note didn't have to change.

[00:05:28]It's also in that E flat chord. So it could have stayed there. It just doesn't create that feeling of motion. So this choice to move a step down seems to be very intentional or at least very effective in creating a feeling of two sides. There's two positions. The melody ends in two different places, two different paths, creating a feeling of two sides that you have to choose from.

[00:05:50]So this is pretty incredible and thoughtful word painting that the strokes used to affect this feeling in you, the listener. I can show you how it it doesn't really work as well if we don't go down to that G. I'll make it stay on that A flat. Let's take a look.

[00:06:18]side you standing on side.

[00:06:30]>> So you can hear how the melody doesn't have the same feeling when it doesn't step down that one step because it doesn't have that feeling of motion. It doesn't create that feeling of two different places that the melody or your choices could end up. The G is a very important way of creating this feeling of movement and having two sides to choose from. So this is pretty effective and powerful word or tone painting. So the vocal melody expertly shows that there are two sides and really poses a question to you to pick. But the chords underneath are also doing a very effective job of creating a feeling of two sides as well. There are three chords, but the middle chord is setting up the final chord in a way that makes it more independent. The final chord is a chord that really wants to resolve back to the first chord, which is very standard harmonics. But because of this unusual choice of this chord, the C minor, which is a minor 3 chord, it's a passing chord as it relates to the first chord. But it is also acting as a pivot chord that creates a new sort of sound for the final chord. Uh that really does establish the strength of that chord on its own. If we take out the C minor, which I'll show you now, you'll hear that it doesn't really have the same tension and release that makes that final chord sound like its own side and own position. So, even though there's three chords, that middle chord is actually doing a lot to create a feeling of two sides. So, let's take a look.

[00:08:14]So, what I've shown you is that there could have been variations to the Oblivious chorus and they wouldn't have been as good. The strokes used expert songwriting techniques to make the most powerful and effective dramatic song they could have written, making Oblivious the masterpiece and top five stroke song that it is. Now, one of the things is that I made changes to show you that those changes wouldn't have been as good. So, I made the song worse.

[00:08:38]And I hope you don't think I was trying to improve it because I did make it worse because the song is so good. But one of the things that came up to me was that there's another song that exemplifies the uh songwriting techniques that were partially used here as well. The folk labor song, What Side Are You On? by Florence Ree. Now, this is an old labor song that the Strokes and Julian Kasablancas have probably heard, and I'm sure they maybe were inspired by it at one point, but uh it's maybe too speculative to say whether or not it was factoring in their minds here, but the similarities are interesting. The melody for the chorus, what side are you on, is uh beginning on the one. So the what lands on the one beat which doesn't give it the same length and strength as the Casablancas and Strokes version in Oblivious. The final on is emphasized by being a longer note than the others. So it does have that going for it. It also has a similar harmonic function of two chords. So it doesn't have the uh tension chord that third chord to create tension between the two chords to establish the two sides. So you can see that there are some overlapping ideas about the effectiveness of using this line and uh in this certain way. What I wanted to show you with that is that the same lyrical content can have not as powerful feeling without the sort of techniques and methods that the strokes used in Oblivious. But one of the things that showed up is that when I mashed it up, it actually sounds really cool. It gives it a minor sound because of the different key that it is in. But this recording uh that I found works really well. So I hope you like are you on which side are you on? Which side are you on? Which side are you on?

[00:10:32]Which side are you on? Which side are you on? What side you say are you? What are you?

[00:10:55]>> So, what I've shown you today is the masterful techniques that the strokes use to create a masterpiece that is oblivious. We looked at the placement of the melody notes, the length of the melody notes, and the pitches of the melody notes to create a feeling of word painting and tone painting to create a feeling of two sides that you must choose between. We also took a look at the chords underneath and saw how they also established this feeling and this dramatization of two sides to choose between. If you like this video, be sure to like and subscribe because I'll be making more videos about The Strokes, The Voids, and Julian Kazablancas because I'm a big fan of Julian Kasablanca's work and I'm really excited for the new album.