5 Likes
I honestly don’t know what drives the internet fascination with them. Yes, they are neat and can give cool variations on the main scales, but the attention paid to them is far out of proportion to the actual usage in songs in most genres.
I blame Jazz 
6 Likes
It’s guitarists in general and also jazz 
Before I started playing guitar again and went on YT and music forums, I’d never even heard of modes… I miss those carefree times 
The internet obsession with modes is pretty weird lol I think it’s the typical behaviour of adults learning things; that if they learn all the rules, it’s a shortcut to learning things and it’ll let them hack the system. Also, it lets the theory/jazz nerds feel super smart. There’s nothing people love to argue about more on the theory subreddit than modes! Every once in a while im silly enough to wade into the debate about what key modes should be in… I stir the pot a bit and run off 
It’s like all the people who post some weird chord progression and want to know what it’s called and why it “works”.
6 Likes
I have a hidden suspicion they might be attractive to software engineers because octaves and intervals in music are an excellent illustration of modulus and binary math. Just think of the modes in relation to intervals as rotating a bit pattern in an integer and you’re golden
3 Likes
Until you venture outside of the 12 tone equal temperament system of western music 
I love tuning systems where sharps and flats are not enharmonic… I imagine that C# and Db not being the same note just blows some people’s minds
5 Likes
One thing that blew my mind was when I learned that while traditional music here does have common intervals, for some instruments they don’t have a fixed base tone/frequency like A=440. Everyone just shows up, they pick someone to tune to (probably the singer), and just roll with it.
3 Likes
Good one
1 Like
I’ve been to a lot of jam sessions where this is common practice 
4 Likes
Yeah it’s fine for messing around. It’s kind of mind blowing as a general system though
And yet when you think about it it is probably super common. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if concert pitch was a purely European/Western music invention.
4 Likes
Now there’s a thought to ponder.
2 Likes
Every once in a while I tune my guitar for the key I’m playing in because some of the chords sound out of tune just enough to annoy me
3 Likes
You’d love 5 string Banjo then as the standard tuning is a G chord ie. G D G B D
2 Likes
I’m pretty sure that most conventional theory is a european/western invention, much of it came from the Greeks. Middle Eastern music does share some concepts too. I think Adam Neely talks about it a bit in his video “mucic theory and white supremacy” which I think is a bad name for a good video. Western theory is just mostly stuck in 400 year old classical music…at most schools if you want to learn theory, it’s classical ; if you want to learn bass, you have to take upright.
2 Likes
I have one sitting on my couch I haven’t played it in a while though because I usually play late and it’s too loud. Slide guitar is similar with open tunings too.
3 Likes
Mode is something that you’d discuss with strangers who probably have no idea what you are talking about. Discuss this with your band mates you’d just get your ass kicked. Plain and simple, lol.
8 Likes
You can also discuss how you need $1000+ headphones to listen to music and about $3000 of espresso machine and grinder to properly enjoy coffee… and I thought wine people were bad.
4 Likes
Coffee winesnobbing is a huge pet peeve of mine that I could rant about for a long long time. STFU hipsters, blends are better than single origin.
8 Likes
Ah the greeks ! I was once told that it was the Greeks that invented sex but the Italians who first involved women! It just may have been an Italian that told me this
7 Likes
Ah man. Those are the 2 things I really love to geeked out.
2 Likes
I love to geek out about it! It’s the winesnobbing that irritates me
2 Likes