Hooray For Earth · from True Loves, track #8 · 117 BPM · 4:27 · Krumhansl 0.805
A study in one vocal note that changes function four times. The singer holds G-sharp for 21.6% of the whole track, and that single pitch functions as third, fifth, thirteenth, and passing tone across the bass rotation of E, C-sharp minor, D, B.
The song is in the key of E major, which means the home note is E and the mood is bright.
The bass player keeps switching between four notes as the song goes, E, then C-sharp, then D, then B, and this loop repeats.
The singer picks one note, G-sharp, and holds on to it about a fifth of the whole song. That is a lot for one pitch.
The cool trick is that G-sharp means a different thing against each of the four bass notes. Sometimes it is the middle of the chord, sometimes the high edge, sometimes a note that rubs.
The bass note D is not from the E major family; it is borrowed from a sound called Mixolydian, and it makes the song feel a little older and rounder.
Most rock songs end by moving from the note B back to the note E. This song almost never does that. It skips the classic move on purpose.
The lesson: one held note plus a bass that keeps walking equals a whole song with no dead spots.
The whole-song chord-root count is E 41, B 20, D 14, C-sharp 14, F-sharp 13, D-sharp 12, which lines up to I, V, bVII, vi, ii, iii in E major.
The Krumhansl detector agrees at 0.805 confidence, well above the 0.6 floor.
The mode is decided from the top: the vocal holds G-sharp for 21.6% of the track, and G-sharp is the major third of E, so the singer supplies the note that distinguishes E major from E minor.
The bass rotates through four roots and the vocal G-sharp holds. Same pitch, four functions.
Under E (I) the G-sharp is the chord-internal major 3rd, the mode-naming note.
Under C-sharp minor (vi) the same G-sharp is the perfect 5th, so it becomes the top of the chord.
Under B (V) the G-sharp is the major 6th, a color tone a step above the fifth.
Under D (bVII) the G-sharp is a chromatic passing tone against a bVII root, a natural 4th against D, and the dissonance between vocal and bass is at its densest here. The phrase “closer together” arrives on that rub.
The bass histogram is E 31.7%, C-sharp 22.3%, D 15.0%, B 7.5%, F-sharp 7.0%, and the I and vi carry more than half the bass work together.
The rotation runs I to vi to bVII to V, an Aeolian-tinged pop-major loop that runs the whole track without a bridge modulation.
The D at 15% of bass time matches the D chord at 14 windows, so the bVII is a root-position chord, not just a passing voicing over an E pedal.
The V (B) accounts for only 7.5% of bass time, so the classical dominant-to-tonic resolution is absent, and the phrase returns to E by repetition of the four-chord loop.
This is the second Hooray For Earth song in the analysis set where V undercount is the whole cadential story, No Love being the first.
The bVII (D) supplies the plagal-adjacent softening on the return, so the E arrival is a loop restart, not a B-to-E dominant resolution.
Vocal histogram: G-sharp 21.6%, F-sharp 14.6%, A 12.4%, C-sharp 11.7%, B 11.4%. Five pitches carry 72% of the vocal.
G-sharp acts as a pedal note for the melody the same way E acts as a pedal for the bass, so the whole song is a study in two held anchors with a rotating middle.
At the loudest phrase, the vocal moves up to A and B and the bass moves to its D bVII, and this is the one moment the vertical G-sharp anchor is briefly released.
| Degree | Chord | Nashville | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | E | 1 | tonic, most-hit root, third supplied by vocal G-sharp |
| 6m | C-sharp m | 6m | relative minor, second in the rotation |
| ♭7 | D | ♭7 | Mixolydian borrow, the brightest lift |
| 5 | B | 5 | the V that never resolves to I |
| 2m | F-sharp m | 2m | supertonic, a color chord in passing |
The vocal G-sharp holds through all four chords. That single pitch is a 3rd over 1, a 5th over 6m, a chromatic passing tone against ♭7, and a 6th over 5. Four functions, one note.
This rotation is the whole song. The chord windows never step outside long enough to define a separate section-level progression. Confirm the exact bar placements in the Hooray For Earth chord and lyric charts.
The four chords that carry the whole song: 1 (E), 6m (C-sharp minor, A-shape barre at 4fr), ♭7 (D), and 5 (B, A-shape barre at 2fr).
Dots show where your fingers press; the small number is which finger. An x means skip that string and an o means play it open. Each grid is labeled with the chord and its Nashville number.
The audio-truth chord read for the full HFE catalog: use the Bringing Us Closer Together entry to confirm the exact bar placement of the E, C-sharp minor, D, B rotation.
Open the HFE charts →The analytical template this page follows: key, meter, form, then a section-by-section walk of melody and harmony.
Open Pollack mirror →The measured Krumhansl centers and per-song mode readings across the HFE catalog, including the E-major-with-Mixolydian-borrow reading for this track.
Open keys & modes →The analysis plan for the HFE ixi sheet series, with the shared method notes and the No Love comparison that this page cites on the V undercount.
Open the ixi plan →