Understanding Carry On Wayward Son

Carry On Wayward Son is one of those songs that's both totally unique and perfectly emblematic of a larger musical movement. There's nothing quite like it, but it still captures the sound of rock music in the mid '70s, and that blend of the unconventional and the iconic singlehandedly changed the fortunes of a struggling rock band. Kansas had built a following, but Carry On put them on the map, and almost 50 years later, it still stands as one of the greatest classic rock anthems ever recorded.

Huge thanks to our Elephant of the Month Club members:

Susan Jones
Jill Jones
Duck
Howard Levine
Brian Etheredge
Khristofor Saraga
Len Lanphar
Ken Arnold
Elaine Pratt
William (Bill) Boston
Chris Prentice
Jack Carlson
Christopher Lucas
Andrew Beals
Dov Zazkis
Hendrik Payer
Thomas Morley
Jacob Helwig
Davis Sprague
Alex Knauth
Braum Meakes
Hendrik Stüwe
Dan Bonelli
Kevin Boyce
Kelly Christoffersen
Scott Howarth
Luke
Warren Huart
Donal Botkin
Kevin Wilamowski
Symmetry
Grant Aldonas
Stephen Cook
Dhruv Monga
Ken Jones
Obadiah Wright
Kobalent
David Bartz
Jason Nebergall
Carlos Rendon
Aleksandar Milojković
Kylie McInnes
Daniel Reaman
Tom

And thanks as well to Henry Reich, Gabi Ghita, Gene Lushtak, Owen Campbell-Moore, Eugene Bulkin, Logan Jones, Oliver, Anna Work, Adam Neely, Rick Lees, Dave Mayer, CodenaCrow, Nikolay Semyonov, Arnas, Caroline Simpson, Michael Alan Dorman, Michael McCormick, Blake Boyd, Luke Rihn, Charles Gaskell, Ian Seymour, Trevor Sullivan, Tom Evans, Elliot Jay O'Neill, Lamadesbois, JH, David Conrad, Chris Borland, Chris Chapin, Alex Atanasyan, Elliot Burke, Tim S., Elias Simon, Todd Davidson, Jake Lizzio, Jerry D. Brown, Ohad Lutzky, Peter Leventis, James A. Thornton, Brian Dinger, Aaron Epstein, Blake White, Chris Connett, Stefan Strohmaier, Shadow Kat, Adam Wurstmann, Kelsey Freese, Kenneth Kousen, James, h2g2guy, W. Dennis Sorrell, Angela Flierman, Richard T. Anderson, Professor Elliot, Kevin Johnson, Ryan, Rodrigo "rrc2soft" Roman, Jeremy Zolner, Patrick Callier, Danny, Francois LaPlante, Volker Wegert, Joshua Gleitze, Britt Ratliff, Darzzr, Joshua La Macchia, Roming 22, Charles Hill, Alexey Fedotov, Alex Keeny, Valentin Lupachev, John Bejarano, Andrew Engel, Gary Butterfield, Peter Brinkmann, Steve Brand, Rene Miklas, Red Uncle, Doug Nottingham, Nicholas Wolf, naomio, Alex Mole, Kaisai Morihito, Robert Beach, ZagOnEm, Betsy, Tonya Custis, Dave Shapiro, Jacopo Cascioli, Mathew Wolak, S, Lincoln Mendell, CoryC, Rafael Martinez Salas, Walther, Doug Lantz, Sam Rezek, Destros, Beth Martyn, Lucas Augusto, Graeme Lewis, Jake Sand, Evan Satinsky, James Little, RaptorCat, Jigglypuffer, leftaroundabout ., Jens Schäfer, Mikely Whiplash, Austin Amberg, Aditya Baradwaj, Yuval Filmus, Francisco Rodrigues, Elizabeth, Michael Tsuk, Juan Madrigal, Jim Hayes, ThoraSTooth, Brandon Legawiec, Scott Albertine, Evgeni Kunev, Hikaru Katayamma, Alon Kellner, Rob Hardy, רועי סיני, Conor Stuart Roe, Patrick Chieppe, Eric Stark, David Haughn, Gordon Dell, Byron DeLaBarre, Matty Crocker, anemamata, Brian Miller, Lee-orr Orbach, Eric Plume, Kevin Pierce, Jon Hancock, Dragix PL, Gary Evesson, Kottolett, Dylan Vidas, Jason Peterson, Peggy Youell, EJ Hambleton, Jos Mulder, Daryl Banttari, J.T. Vandenbree, Carlos Silva, David Taylor, John Castle, Lyan Porto, Wayne Robinson, Gabriel Totusek, Brian Davis, Eric Daugherty, SecretKittehs, Mnemosyne Music, AkselA, Pamela O'Neill, Philip Miller, Sam Plotkin, David MacDonald, Nellie Speirs Baron, Charles R., Josh, Thomas Morgan, Ludwick Kennedy, The Gig Farmer, Sam, DialMForManning, Wayne Weil, Michael Wehling, darkmage, Brandon Peckham, Ridley Kemp, Mark James, James, David Peterson, Bryan C. Mills, Adam Ziegenhals, Mark Meckes, Amelia Lewis, sonicolasj, PatSandmann, Bean, A Devoted Servant of the Holy Water Bottle, Milan Brezovsky, Edmund Horner, Daria Gibbons, TJ FUNCTION, NinoDoko, XCompWiz, Michael Blaby, Kristofer Hill, William Merryman, Ryan Mayle, J Denton, M. Bock, Daniel Joseph Moynihan, William Robert Tabb, Niles Loughlin, Josh Witkowski, Clever Patreon names are a waste of perfectly good cleverness, Graham Orndorff, Michael Sacksteder, Mark Lacey, Justin St John-Brooks, Jaren Tilford, Catherine Berry, Watch Harder, Will Derr, Jason McPherson, Chris Robson, A.J. Yates, Mitch McConeghey, and Matt Moulder! Your support helps make 12tone even better!

Also, thanks to Jareth Arnold for proofreading the script to make sure this all makes sense hopefully!

[tone]

Some additional thoughts/corrections:

1) I hope I don't have to clarify this, but knowing the dad rock crowd, I probably do, so just to be clear, the "six guitar riffs in a trenchcoat" thing was a joke. Carry On Wayward Son is a real song. Please don't yell at me, I made a whole 20 minute video for you about a thing you like.

2) On the F# in the main riff, it's tempting to call the whole thing Dorian, and sure, I could see that, but the intro vocals feature a prominent F natural so I don't think the song as a whole feels Dorian. If you want to read the riff itself that way though, I won't stop you.

3) Similarly, you could read the Bb chord in the verse as indicating Phrygian, but considering all the B naturals we hear in both the harmony and melody that seems like a stretch.

4) In the chorus progression, they don't play the F chord the second time, instead hanging on G for a bar. I didn't have anything to say about that and the video was long enough already so I skipped it, but wanted to at least acknowledge in somewhere.

5) On the second bridge riff, there's this really interesting microrhythmic adjustment where Livgren rushes the last note before the 16th-note one pretty significantly, spreading out the anticipation effect across a couple notes. You can actually hear that in the quantized version I presented, 'cause I removed that as well.

6) On the C# thing, yes, you could just call it the major 3rd, which would make that riff in A major, although there's a G too so I guess it's A mixolydian, but that doesn't sound right to my ears. It's kinda like the Bb in the verse progression: It's just doing the same thing but adjusted by a perfect 4th. (In this case down, but same idea.)

6) Another thing I didn't really have room for but wanted to at least mention is that all the vocal melodies throughout the song start on beat 2. To my ears that makes everything feel more like a continuation than its own definitive statement but I didn't feel like that thought was developed enough to be worth putting in the video itself.

[bryede]

The coolest thing about this song is that it changes so abruptly that it almost feels like you're flipping through radio stations.

[HopeRunsDeep]

Ill never forget the night I was singing this song while walking to the bathroom at one of my Highschool football games I was at, and as I walked through the doors I sang "Lay your weary head to rest
!" and the entire bathroom with like 20 dudes in it ages like 16-50, yelled "DONT YOU CRY NO MORE!" and we all busted out laughing. Legendary song.

[realShadowKat]

The best thing about acapella intros of songs from the 70s.... DJ's would ordinarily talk over the instrumental opens (I don't listen to much commercial music today, admittedly so I don't know if this practice is still done). They would know how long the instrumental was and blather on until the lyrical mark. Can't do that when the lyrics start at the zero.

[motomike]

"Kansas was in a rough state." SMH

[emmbeesea]

Ah, a cappella intros, you know how intrigue us. Another go-to example for me is "Renegade" - Styx.

Another fantastic analysis of a classic song!

[femthingevelyn]

I literally don't know anything about music other than "sometimes sounds are good when they go into my earholes", but by god this channel always makes me feel like a medieval peasant listening to someone who actually knows how to read explain to me a story I thought I knew. In some ways, when you're talking about the feel of a song and some of the way you talk about the purpose a section serves, I kinda understand it, but it's coated in a language I barely understand. You have this way of talking about music that actually kind of makes a kind of sense even though I don't understand the technicals of the subject at all.

[amandastevens]

Supernatural has conditioned me into having an emotional reaction the second I hear this song

[doctorsteveb]

Between you, Polyphonic and Rick Beato, I've never been so entertained, while being taught so much, maybe ever.
Please keep doing what you do. We REALLY appreciate it.

[sjdanthem]

Really, really good stuff. The "Icarus" reference is a good one. I'm a lifelong Kansas fan and I am embarrassed that I never really put that motif together with "...Borne On Wings of Steel."

[thegreatgambeeno]

The new girl at work just heard this on my speaker and says, "Oh, the Supernatural song" and started singing it, and now I'm in love with the new girl from work.

[happycamperds]

4:36 If I had a nickel for every hard rock song that that was about Icarus, I'd have 2 nickels. Which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice.

[joshuacervenkamusic]

I just want to say for guitar players out there, this is a great song to learn.

Its not too challenging but because of all the different sections it makes it a really fun tune to play.

Plus, it work on a bunch of different techniques. Highly recommend for intermediate players

[rruhland]

We went from making the emo kids cry to making the Supernatural fans cry. I wonder who’s next!

[heathurban]

This song is definitely stuck in my head again.

[bonecanoe]

When I was a kid in the 90s, the Classic Rock stations my dad listened to talked about this as the ultimate classic rock song. It was routinely at the head of the annual countdown they used to do on WMGK in Philly. It's still one of my favorite dad rock songs of all time, and Kansas in general is a great band that blends American heartland rock and prog rock in a fairly unique way. Also, it's worth checking out the GWAR cover of this song they did on ADVClub a few years ago, it's an interesting take on the song!

[jennylovesjoe]

*I studied Music Theory for 4 years and THIS video and your execution of literally every single moment of the song, was by far...better, more informative and riveting than anything I learned in those 4 years. The way you presented this was like a performance of a piece of music in itself! So freaking well done!!! (This was my first of your vids and I subbed about 45 seconds in!)* 🎶🎼🎵

[zacharyclemens]

Another harmonized Acapella intro is 7 bridges road by The Eagles, such a great song!

[Ignonym]

The transition of the instrumental into the first verse is one of my favorite parts of the song. The loud, dynamic, in-your-face guitar riffs that seem to be almost shouting over each other suddenly dropping away into the clean, steady piano really gives the impression of, as the lyrics put it, rising above the noise and confusion. It feels like flying above a thunderstorm and into a clear blue sky--where before you were surrounded by change and turbulence, suddenly all is still. Or at least, that's how my ear reads it.

[ospero]

5:39 "And that may seem counterintuitive"
*draws the Monty Hall problem*
I, indeed, see what you did there. Carry on, wayward son.