# best use of silence in music **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 9, 2003, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014 "2003-03-09T02:12:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![TJdude825](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dec6dc/32.png) [@TJdude825](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TJdude825)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/1 "2003-03-09T02:12:05Z")
What is the best (or even worst) use of silence that you’ve ever heard in music? Here’s a couple: From “The Blizzard” from the musical _Honk!_ > [@](#): > > The biting cold. > The swirling snow. > It’s hard to catch a breath. > And though we hate to say the word, > They’re facing certain… > (Facing certain…) > Facing certain… > [silence] And from “All I Really Want” by Alanis Morissette > [@](#): > > Why are you so petrified of silence? > Here can you handle this: [silence] ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/2 "2003-03-09T03:14:11Z")
From Sinead O’Connor’s “Just Like U Said It Would B”: When everything’s quiet {silence} Will you {beat} stay? Cliched to pause after the word “quiet” but still effective IMHO. ---
**Author:** ![Ferrous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Ferrous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferrous)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/3 "2003-03-09T03:18:50Z")
I was going to mention the Alanis Morrissette one. I was rather annoyed when I heard a newer radio edit of that song, and they’d covered that second and a half of silence with a drum track, completely ruining it. ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/4 "2003-03-09T03:25:56Z")
I’ll go with Pink Floyd, the transition from “On the Run” to “Time” is a great suspense builder, I still hit the ceiling when the alarms start to go off. ---
**Author:** ![FranticMad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c68b51/32.png) [@FranticMad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FranticMad)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/5 "2003-03-09T03:31:24Z")
Worst: John Cage ---
**Author:** ![Anonymous\_Coward](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/94ad74/32.png) [@Anonymous\_Coward](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anonymous_Coward)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/6 "2003-03-09T03:31:32Z")
I see you shiver with [antici…pation](http://www.inlyrics.com/display/The_Rocky_Horror_Picture_Show_Lyrics/Other_Songs_Album/Sweet_Transvestite_Lyrics/Sweet_Transvestite_Lyrics.html) ---
**Author:** ![FranticMad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c68b51/32.png) [@FranticMad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FranticMad)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/7 "2003-03-09T04:34:34Z")
Beethoven’s 5th. You know how it goes. Holst’s The Planets, Mars. Palestrina – several examples The Beatle’s Abbey Road, at the end of the album When Pat Buchanan shuts up, I think that’s music. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/8 "2003-03-09T04:43:12Z")
Beethoven’s 3rd, the fourth movement, after that wonderfully chaotic and energetic opening few bars, then there’s a silence … a long silence … followed by a one-note-at-a-time theme. ---
**Author:** ![DreadCthulhu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/db5fbb/32.png) [@DreadCthulhu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DreadCthulhu)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/9 "2003-03-09T04:44:42Z")
4:33, by John Cage the shear chutzpa to not only create that as a song, and then enforce the copyright against someone who did a minute of silence, just astounds me. ---
**Author:** ![Berkut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a88e57/32.png) [@Berkut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Berkut)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/10 "2003-03-09T05:49:31Z")
_Supervixen_, by Garbage. I have friends who still think that the CD is skipping when that song comes around. ---
**Author:** ![Moe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moe/32/2972_2.png) [@Moe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moe)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/11 "2003-03-09T06:44:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by DreadCthulhu \* > \*\*4:33, by John Cage the shear chutzpa to not only create that as a song, and then enforce the copyright against someone who did a minute of silence, just astounds me. \*\* Well, Cage was my first thought when opening this thread, though I’ve obviously been beaten to it twice already, but I didn’t realize there were actually copyright issues involved. Do tell! ---
**Author:** ![darksight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3da27b/32.png) [@darksight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/darksight)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/12 "2003-03-09T06:47:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by FranticMad \* > \*\*Worst: John Cage \*\* You got that right this exactly what I was going to post I knew someone beat me to it. John Cage = No Talent ---
**Author:** ![3trew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/13edae/32.png) [@3trew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/3trew)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/13 "2003-03-09T07:14:35Z")
My post above (which did not appear because I didn’t make it, which is why it’s art) was inspired by John Cage. Lawsuits are in the works. ---
**Author:** ![green\_dragon\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/13edae/32.png) [@green\_dragon\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/green_dragon_1)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 10:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/14 "2003-03-09T10:50:26Z")
Another one for ‘that Alanis Morissette one’ 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Tusculan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecd19e/32.png) [@Tusculan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tusculan)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/15 "2003-03-09T14:54:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Moe \* > \*\*Well, Cage was my first thought when opening this thread, though I’ve obviously been beaten to it twice already, but I didn’t realize there were actually copyright issues involved. Do tell! \*\* I take it you want some details on the lawsuit. You can find a nice summary [here](http://www.onepotmeal.com/blog/archives/000887.html), or Google for Mike Batt, Cage and silence. In short, Batt had a track on an album consisting entirely of silence. The piece sounded ‘uncannily’ like Cage’s 4’ 33’’. The managers of the estate sued, even going as far as staging a hearing in which Batt tried to show that his silence was clearly original silence and not derived from Cage’s at all. Finally the suit was settled out of court. Copyright is great. Who will be the first to copyright the space sign? I’llrefrainfromusingitjusttobesure. ---
**Author:** ![ECJones29](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c77e96/32.png) [@ECJones29](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ECJones29)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/16 "2003-03-09T15:43:28Z")
Gotta be Sheriff’s **When I’m With You** right before the… BAAAY BEH EEH YEHHH. I’m just kidding. ---
**Author:** ![ianzin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ed655f/32.png) [@ianzin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ianzin)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/17 "2003-03-09T20:01:39Z")
Steve Harley’s timeless, sublime slice of peerless pop music, ‘Come Up And See Me (Make Me Smile)’, features several very nice, well-judged bars of musical silence. Another good one occurs in The Ballad Of John And Yoko (and if I have to tell you who that’s by, you’re reading the wrong message board), after “You don’t take nothing with you but your soul, THINK!”. My own personal favourite is almost wilfully obscure, but it occurs on side 1 of Mike Oldfield’s greatest piece of work, ‘Ommadawn’. One particularly rousing section (a sort of super-energised folk dance) comes to a resounding coda with all instruments landing on one final, resounding chord, and then a little harp trill springs up out of nowhere, like water bubbling up out of the ground all of a sudden, to lead into the next section which has a completely different colour to it. In between, there’s a split second of silence which actually divides ‘Side 1’ almost exactly in half. And I happen to like it a lot! ---
**Author:** ![Dryga\_Yes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@Dryga\_Yes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dryga_Yes)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/18 "2003-03-09T20:27:33Z")
Einstürzende Neubauten’s _Silence Is Sexy_ has to win. It really does sound sexy. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/19 "2003-03-09T22:04:44Z")
Best: Ben Folds: “So you wanted to take a break slow it down some and have some space… [silence]” Worst: Dashboard Confessional: “I’m the only one locked in this cell…” [silence] the reason its the worst, is because the silence lasts for a seemingly random time. I cant go with the “rhythm” of the song to determine when the music is gonna come back, and thats extremely annoying. Contrast with “Leave the Biker” by Fountains of Wayne, in which there is almost the same amount of pause, but is utterly replicable by tapping along with the previous rhythm. ---
**Author:** ![Theom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a9a28c/32.png) [@Theom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Theom)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2003, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014/20 "2003-03-09T22:28:42Z")
D’oh D’oh and double D’oh. John Cage did not have a piece of work that consisted of 4 minutes and thirty three seconds of silence. What he had was 4 minute and thirty three seconds where he did not produce any music, the point was that the piece was created by the sounds of the people listening. The squeeking of chairs, the clearing of throats, he wanted for people to understand that background noise can be as essential to a piece of music as anything else. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-use-of-silence-in-music/160014.md?page=2)