"Smoke on the water" - G dorian!?

How about the note Db and chord Db5 ? It´s a b5 (diminished fifth).


G dorian:

G - A - Bb - C - D - E - F - G

Riff:

G5 - Bb5 - C5

then

G5 - Bb5 - Db5 - C5


Verse

G5 - F5

Chorus:

C5 - Ab5
G5 - Bb5 - G5 -Ab5 - G5 - F5 - G5
G5- Bb5 - G5 - Ab5 - G5 - F5

Smoke On The Water is in the key of G minor (relative major is B-flat major). The 2nd mode of B-flat is C dorian. So, all those notes are part of the same home key.

B-flat major (ionian)
Bb-C-D-Eb-F-G-A

C dorian
C-D-Eb-F-G-A-Bb

D phrygian
D-Eb-F-G-A-Bb-C

E-flat lydian
Eb-F-G-A-Bb-C-D

F mixolydian
F-G-A-Bb-C-D-Eb

G aeolian (relative minor scale)
G-A-Bb-C-D-Eb-F

A locrian
A-Bb-C-D-Eb-F-G

So, G minor (Aeolian) & C dorian are just different fretboard patterns of B-flat major. Make sense?

It's also important to remember that modes have two different purposes:

1. Sometimes they are only the same notes in a different fretboard position or pattern.
2. Other times, they create different sounds. But this depends upon the music you play them over & usually changing the key.

Originally Posted by: brenoazziHow about the note Db and chord Db5 ? It´s a b5 (diminished fifth).

The flat 5th or "blue note" is an ornamental note that you can use anytime you desire the sound of it. The idea here is that you can play any chromatic passing tone note (a note "between" the normal scale notes) to add drama to a melody or lick.

It adds drama or flair because you are temporarily delaying the arrival of the target note, the note after the flat 5th. In the case of the main riff, the Db5 is a flat 5th that delays the arrival of the C5, the 4th.

There is a brief moment of G dorian in the song, however! It's in the vocal harmony that Gillian sings when he does the chorus & sings, "Smoke!" he sings an E natural to make the chord a C major. Then, he immediately changes it to an E-flat & C to harmonize with the A-flat chord, "Wa-ter!".

This is a neat moment also because the A-flat is functioning as a tritone substitution of the dominant chord D (V) returning to the tonic chord G (i).

This tutorial covers his style:

http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=1473

These lessons mention tritone substitutions.

http://www.guitartricks.com/lesson.php?input=13881
http://www.guitartricks.com/lesson.php?input=13882

Hope this helps!

Thanks a lot, Chris.

Thanks for the links too.

As a complement..

Best known for the gargantuan riff at the heart of Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water," Ritchie Blackmore helped define heavy-metal guitar by mixing intricate classical composition with raw-knuckled blues rock. "I found the blues too limiting, and classical was too disciplined," he said. "I was always stuck in a musical no man's land." Blackmore made waves on 1972's Machine Head; his solos on the boogie rocker "Highway Star" and "Lazy" remain models of metal pyrotechnics. He looked back toward early European music with his next band, Rainbow – even learning cello to write 1976's stomping "Stargazer" – and now explores Renaissance-style fingerpicking with Blackmore's Night. But it's his Deep Purple work that influenced a generation of handbangers. "Blackmore epitomized this fascination I had with the bare essence of rock & roll, this element of danger," says Metallica's Lars Ulrich. "Deep Purple, in their finest moments, were more unpredictable than Black Sabbath or Led Zeppelin."

Key Tracks: "Smoke on the Water," "Highway Star," "Speed King"