The 'Djent' Chord!!! (Prog Metal Chord Lesson)

If you've listened to any modern Prog Metal or Djent you've probably heard this chord. In this lesson I'll break down the theory of the Djent chord and show how to use it in your own songs.

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00:00 - Introduction
00:42 - The 'Djent' Chord
02:22 - How to use it
11:36 - Simple Variations of the Chord

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[Kevin]

This guy talking about chords and I'm like "ah yes, I know some of these numbers and letters"

[potatotaxi]

I just call this the Mark Holcomb/Sentient Glow chord. The djent chord is a 4 note chug. Easily my favorite chord it's so nice

[turianmoose]

Djent is probably the best thing to ever happen to prog metal.

[Kharnimani]

Ah yes my favorite chord, I love moving it around and seeing where it takes me

[Scafidi]

Dude your content was on spot, I've been searching for stuff like this for months!
Thanks for this wonderful knowledge

[Fenrisulv-nlkh]

Dude, this was kick ass. Extremely instructive and unbelievably digestable, just after one listen. I've subbed to you, and that's a testament to how good this upload was! It's very rare I sub to a person after having herard one single, solitary video. Kudos, man!! Again, great advice!!

[bobbymccrary]

First theory vid in a long time where I learned something. Many thanks

[SoulSeekingSon]

Great video and great playing, brother! Its my favorite and I've been using this chord for over 30 years. It's a Dm7(b13)... As the lead player, try layering it over your rhythm brothers Bbsus2... It's the gateway to glory. Or if you're in the key of G, play an Em7(b13) over his Csus2. Instant classic...

[Caracikguitars]

Here in Brazil we call it "clube da esquina" chord. It was made famous 'cause it was used on the intro of the self titled song

[travislee]

Wow really glad this popped up in my feed, this video alone is a veritable masterclass…subscribed!

[nanthilrodriguez]

@2:40 Bro, I hear more major vibes in modern guitar than all previous guitar music.
Between Helix Nebula, Plini, Walking Accross Jupiter, Animals as leaders, there's a fair few amount of expressions of Major tonalities between them.

[SamBrockmann]

I really enjoyed you properly defining the modal context. So many people, when referring to modes, act like a mode is just another scale or another key. No, modes are modes. They're their own thing.

And you treated modes that way. :)

[modernmetal]

Thank you so much. I really wanted to know the music style I wanted, but thanks to the algorithm, I enjoyed it.

[josuastangl]

A classic, cool video!
Interesting that you took it as the inversion and not with the root note on the drop tuned low string.
Even in your references in the beginning, Joseph Anidjar is the only one playing the inversion.
Everyone else has the root below (except Aaron Marshall, who's playing something else entirely).

[Jimmy.Williams]

Nice job, very articulate with the explanations, but in a very digestible manner.

[jellytroid]

Great video! I always thought of this as a “pretend to be Allan holdsworth” chord.

[grahamlong]

Love your channel and learning new stuff. I'm looking forward to getting into more of your videos.

You were right about the way tabs were written, don't know what I was thinking in my precious comment. Sorry about that

[Zyborggian]

Wow would you look at that. The moment 1:04 hit and you showed the pitches and I played em on piano I was like "oh shit... woulda never realized on my own probably that djent uses the FUCK out of first inversion Maj9s." Probably because I tend to only do harmonic analysis when a super unique chord or spicy modulation hella hella piques my interest lol.
Also thank you for this video because I have been composing prog metal for years but never formally learned guitar and so I had no idea it was so ridiculously easy to grab a major 9 in standard or drop tuning LMFAO I will now use this shape for Maj9s on guitar (I shoulda looked it up sooner but Im
Seems like it would maybe work well as a sweep shape too :)
And hell yeah I definitely would use Lydian to come up with melodies over major based chords generally. Idk it sounds less dissonant and more heavenly and uplifting and less hokey than Ionian to me.

But no like... When I started the video I swear I thought it was going to be this SUPER similar MINOR 9 chord shape which is easy to grab (in drop)
E: 5
B:6
G:7
D:8
A:5
D: 5

Its used in that INSANE modulating section (sorta like you did when you started chromatic medianting at 9:59 ... not random at all seems like you definitely knew what you were doing there by moving in thirds and its fun to do that when composing for sure ;) ) but yeah the minor 9 shape is used right after the deviny pitch screams in Omega by Periph and I THINK but don't quote me its also in Planetary Duality title track moving in similar intervals. I have ripped those sections off with this chord when jamming around so many times lmao.

The shape is EXTREMELY similar to yours Im noticing because for example Im noticing the chord I just tabbed is the relative minor to the "djent chord" Maj9 which is barred on the same fret. Which I suppose makes sense. Idk I never learned the fretboard Im way better at keys :^) LMAO With keys the C has a certain shape and position and so does a Ab... Fretboard is all just rectangles and I am big dumbdumb (and lazy).

Also I feel like I should join your discord. I have semi advanced harmony concepts I want fellow metal nerd friends to geek out with about and very few people who speak the language and Ive felt lonely on this topic for years :(

Anyway long autistic ramble over now.

P.S. yes I used chromatic mediant as a verb earlier and you can't stop me :^)

[leigor]

1:45 I think I heard that chord from an Erra song

[deks]

Nice lesson!! what do you think of tesseract? and the one note picking (like the outro of nocturne)... that acle is well know for!!