Guitar Piece that I recorded sounds strangely similar to a song - Coincidence?

This is my first time ever "starting" a thread, so let's hope it's worth it :-) and is in the right forum.
I want to share a little incident that has baffled me for a while now, although I never quite gave it much attention, but still want to see what people think. I want to share a piece that I recorded in September 2006.

I had just started learning Guitar on my own and at that time I only knew how to play couple of chords and had merely been playing for 2-3 months. This was 2 Years before I even knew who Anna Singt was. For those who don't know - Anna Singt is an Acoustic German band started by Anna Ratsch-Heitmann.

I downloaded her song in May 2008 (originally released in 2002). Now what's interesting is that I did not even hear her song until 2008. AND THAT is what has baffled me for a long time and I have no answers for it.
Could it be a pure co-incidence..that I recorded a similar tune or at least the intro?

Since this site does not allow embedding, I've added the play links on my site.

gdhar.com...

Comments welcome. May be it's nothing, but still a cool thing that happened
P.S. There is not a 0.0001% chance that I heard this song ever before 2008, so that theory is ruled out :-)

reply to post by himalayanhermit


They are somewhat similar, in the sense that they are the same chord.
And the rhythm. I say coincidence.
It's hard to get anything original on the guitar, considering everything has been said and done.

Yea that's my thinking. It's the intro that raised my brow more than anything.
Cheers

Originally posted by GmoS719
reply to post by himalayanhermit

 

They are somewhat similar, in the sense that they are the same chord.
And the rhythm. I say coincidence.
It's hard to get anything original on the guitar, considering everything has been said and done.

I would've agreed a year ago, but now i'm bassist in a metal band and we're at the forefront of new music.
we've been writing an album for the past year and it's by far my favorite music.
The only thing that stays the same are the notes you start with, the combinations and phrases themselves start to gain complexity giving completely unheard guitar originalities.

I've been playing guitar and drums for several years, some writers are afraid that if they listen to other people's songs, their own songs will come out sounding too much like something that's already out there. I disagree. Any new song is made of bits and pieces of other songs.

Imagine you have a big box of Legos. Some of the pieces came from a Star Wars set, and some from a pirate ship set. But you take those sets apart, dump the pieces together and use them to build a dinosaur. The more different sets you dump into your box and mix around, the more interesting things you can build out of the various parts.

Well, the big box is your brain, and the different Lego sets are the songs you know! The more songs you hear and/or learn, the more great new melodies your brain will be able to create out of all the bits and pieces.

Originally posted by GmoS719
reply to post by himalayanhermit

 

They are somewhat similar, in the sense that they are the same chord.
And the rhythm. I say coincidence.
It's hard to get anything original on the guitar, considering everything has been said and done.

Ya I agree with you.

Guitar chords lend themselves to various pull offs and hammer ons.
In this case OP is pulling off the top voice, a minor 3 settling into
the ringing E, or the 9th. I think the rhythm is what created the similarity
found in the use of notes.

I like yours better.

Slower and softer.

Hi Hermit,

My take on this is that Dm is a very simple chord, which can be played with only 3 fingers.
It is also very "haunting" and moody, so it's a great place to explore when you're learning the guitar!

For that reason, thousands - many thousands of people have dabbled in variations of picky Dm intros.

Yours does sound remarkably similar to the other one, but I remember trying out almost exactly the same combination of notes myself ages ago, and I have never heard your song, or the other one before, so my best guess would be simple coincidence. Many thousands of people trying out variations on a very limited number of chords/notes.

I'm liking the sound of it too btw !

GTD

reply to post by himalayanhermit


Do you really think every riff is unique? The exact same chords and timings are used in loads of different songs. my music business teacher had a guy emailing him for legal advice saying his riffs were stolen. When in reality 4 random chords are used in loads of songs, its total coincidence and happens a lot.

reply to post by himalayanhermit


Sounds similar but I'd say a coincidence. Been a git/bass player for 30 years btw.

There really isn't much original in music anymore. The notes and riffs really don't change, just the way they're played, and the tones used.

Think yourself luck you didn't accidentally come up with this riff...

They are pretty startlingly similar at the start, but it's bound to happen now and again.

Heres another song with a similar chord progression, from one of my favourite ever musicians

As another example, listen closely to these two pieces:

Here Comes the Bride


Funeral March


Coincidence? You decide.

Ask other musicians, pretty common, happens often, the guitar neck is not an inexhaustible source of sound.

This is the most beautiful song in that vein I think



Makes me cry every time

What are you trying to say?
There are only a limited number of guitar chords, obviously you will have music that may sound like some others.

When I was in grade 1 me and my friend played bionicals in real life, and played a game where we had to get a golden mask. 1 year later, bionicals the golden mask movie came out. IT MUST BE THE GREATEST CONSPIRACY IN THE WORLD!!! OH NOEZ!!!!!!

/tinfoil hat

reply to post by knightsofcydonia


I aggree with you there.

|.SLO7H.|

Well, I'm far from being a pro musician but I guess I must have done what you guys did and hit the play button on both samples at the same time. They are remarkably similar and could easily pass as the same piece to my untrained ear.
Has to be coincidence though.

reply to post by himalayanhermit


I play guitar for some 35 years now and because I rarely cover songs I always play my own tunes. Because of that it happened to me a few times that my tune had many similarities with the ones composed by musicians heared on the radio.

The only thing I can make of it is that "it" is in the air and I, with some other person grabbed it out of the ether.......that is my explanation.

All good replies. Thanks for playing mates.
cheers