History Main / SongStyleShift

* Music/TheRollingStones' "Can't You Hear Me Knocking" shifts from a hard rocking howler to a gentler but building sax solo piece that takes up more than the last half of the song

** Another Bach piece with a Song Style Shift is the cantata ''Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen'' (BWV 66), specifically the fourth movement. ''[[http://youtu.be/o73shN739YU?t=17m57s Bei Jesu Leben freudig sein]]''. This movement is technically a recitative, but it actually shifts styles two times. The movement starts out as a solo recitative. The first time it shifts, the movement turns into an interesting and unique duet (see the LetsDuet page for more details). The second time the movement shifts styles is directly after the duet; the movement shifts back to a recitative format, only now it is a dialogue between the two duetters.

* Music/MannheimSteamroller does several ChristmasSongs (like "Fum, Fum, Fum" and "Masters In This Hall") that start out sounding Medieval or early Renaissance before transitioning to New Age rock.

* Music/{{Queen}}'s "Bohemian Rhapsody" starts off as a mournful apology song, but after a long guitar solo turns into something faster-paced and more whimsical and finally ends back on the apology tone. The operatic part in the middle makes sense given the album it's in: ''A Night at the Opera''.

->''"You see, we never ever do nothing nice and easy. We always do it nice and rough. So we're gonna take the beginning of this song and do it easy. Then we're gonna do the finish rough."''

* Starting off a {{Disco}} song as a lush ballad, then ramping it up to the usual tempo after a verse or so, particularly if the song was sung by a female, became something of a cliche for the genre in its heyday. Thelma Houston's "Don't Leave Me This Way", Music/DonnaSummer's "Last Dance" and France Joli's "Come to Me" are probably the most iconic examples.

* Music/{{Eminem}}'s "So Far" veers hyperkinetically between reggae, 60s rock, a modern bubblegum-pop sound bordering on childen's music, and - amusingly - Y2K-era pop-rap as the beat morphs into that of Eminem's old songs "I'm Back" and "The Real Slim Shady" to reinforce a couple of jokes.

If done well, it can result in some Crowning Music Of Awesome. Bear in mind that this is ostensibly the same song, rather than a [[SiameseTwinSongs segue]] (one song, leading to another), a [[FadingIntoTheNextSong crossfade]] or a {{medley}} (parts of different songs put together).

* "A Bass Renaissance" by Josh Powell & David Hewson (the original composer of "A New Renaissance", also attributed as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DiKV744NWk "Polyhymnia" by Scout McMillan]]), it starts out as Orchestra, but in less than a minute, it drops the bass into Main/{{Dubstep}}

* "A Bass Renaissance" by Josh Powell & Marc Williams (also attributed as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DiKV744NWk "Polyhymnia" by Scout McMillan]]), it starts out as Orchestra, but in less than a minute, it drops the bass into Main/{{Dubstep}}

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DiKV744NWk Pohymnia by Scout McMillan]], it starts out as Orchestra, but in less than a minute, it drops the bass into Main/{{Dubstep}}

* "[[https://sunispoison.bandcamp.com/track/lamb lamb]]" is BlackMetal for the first 41 seconds of its runtime, at which point it switches to indie folk.

* Mr Bungle built their entire career around switching from metal to funk to jazz to swing to crooning and back again within the same song.

* Music/{{Weezer}}'s six minute "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)", which seems to be inspired by "Bohemian Rhapsody". It starts out with classical piano, suddenly shifts into RapRock, and there are about 10 other change-ups in style and tempo from there.

* Music/{{Coldplay}} - once in "42", twice in "Death And All His Friends".

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKjOJuPjiu4 Infinite's theme]][[note]]performed by ''Dangerkids''[[/note]] from ''Videogame/SonicForces'' starts as a generic [[{{Glitch}} glitch hop]] beat. Then it drops, and immediately shifts into some of the heaviest metal in the entire franchise, with the occasional dubstep/glitch hop shining through.

* ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog''

* Music/MiracleOfSound's ''VideoGame/BioShockInfinite''-inspired song "Dream of The Sky" goes from faux-Christian hymn about the game's city in the sky and WhiteMansBurden, to a soul music anthem of rebellion that sounds like it could be sung by a prison ChainGang, to an Irish folk song about the opression of that minority within the city, back to the hymn for the chorus, to an oddball section about quantum physics, and finally to a LonelyPianoPiece that serves as a CallBack to his song for the first ''VideoGame/BioShock1'' game. All of that in ''one'' song!

See also MoodWhiplash.

* ProgressiveRock is full of these, particularly acts with "chapter"-structured songs. Music/{{Rush}}'s ''2112'' is a prime example.

* "In The End" off of ''Fly By Night'' by {{Music/Rush}}. The first half takes things nice and slow, and then, BAM, Alex Lifeson out of nowhere.

** The first fifty seconds of "Galaxie" is ''technically'' a separate composition, an unlisted song officially titled "Hello". Since it's still indexed on the same track, it still comes off as this: a slow, jazzy, brass band piece unexpectedly segueing into faster guitar-based AlternativeRock.