Depends on which chord you assume is that of the home key. Since E (the last chord) apparently shows up the most, I'd say it's strictly speaking in E Mixolydian, and thus F# minor, so the second makes more sense if you're reading it that way.
I'll hide your name inside a word and paint your eyes with false perception.E Mixolydian is the seventh mode of F# minor and the fifth of A major, unless you're using the original Greek modes (which are entirely different). Yes, the emphasis is different, but the way the question was phrased, I thought that was the best answer.
I'll hide your name inside a word and paint your eyes with false perception.Refusing to have a musical education, I never learned the "official" names for notes (the Roman numeral thing). So I react to notes and chords based on their relation to each other, by ear.
I personally am a sucker for the Two Chords, when they are used creatively (and when there is a good melody to them). Here's an example
(the song's verses).
That I think is called a Plagal Cadence, and it's my favorite chord progression ever.
Meanwhile, I'm sick of pop songs that keep thinking that it's a great idea for ii or IV to go to I and call it a day.
What happened to V-to-I motion?
IV-to-I and ii-to-I rarely inspire a sense of harmonic direction/momentum. It's like, here's the song and it's just kinda running in place.
edited 13th Jun '14 12:46:44 PM by GlennMagusHarvey
Disagree completely. I've heard way too
many great
songs that
just use
IV and
I.
edited 13th Jun '14 12:58:46 PM by PhysicalStamina
Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.I reply with a number
of more
interesting
songs
that feature
V chords
(or bVII in minor)
(or sometimes v in minor too)
(or all of the above)
.
To be honest, though, we're probably talking different styles, which themselves have emphases on different aspects of the music.
edited 13th Jun '14 1:26:39 PM by GlennMagusHarvey
Yeah, I'm speaking mainly in terms of Electronic Music. You seem to be thinking in the pop/rock area.
"Moonlight Shadow" reminded me, though: the "Humoresque" Progression; what determines whether it's the minor i-VI-VII-III or the major vi-IV-V-I?
Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.
Am I the only piano player in the world who never learned to play "Heart and Soul"? Or "Spinning Wheel"? Or "Für Elise"? Or freaking "Chopsticks"?!?
Seriously, chord progressions can be context. "Find Out Who Your Friends Are" by Tracy Lawrence uses five chords, but feels like the melody uses only four notes of the scale, so the song sounds rather monotonous. Many other Casey Beathard songs have the same problem — the melody is practically all D, E, F#, and A.
"Boys 'Round Here" by Blake Shelton is an endless I-IV chord progression, but a semi-interesting melody is built around it, as well as some unusual production for a country song.
"Lover, Lover" by Jerrod Niemann doesn't even use chords, just a two-measure guitar riff. The closest it gets to a chord is that some parts of the riff have an open fifth (C-G) in them. Similarly, the entire first verse of "Keep Me in Mind" by the Zac Brown Band is just an F# chord played twice, then a two-beat riff. But the rest of the song is made more interesting by varying the melody, chord progressions, tempo a few times.
Similarly, Swans' "The Sound"
goes on for thirteen minutes with only one real change in progression—the first progression is root-fourth-root-fourth in I think D minor; the second I still need to figure out—but the layering of different melodies, timbres and chord phrasings makes that single big change incredibly dramatic and emotionally intense.
P.S. That's the Swans Are Dead version, which is slightly shorter but honestly drives home the point better.
P.P.S. The fact that some of the melodies—the vocal, the uppermost guitar—wander into parallel but different keys from that implied by the very simple progression really adds to the effect.
edited 16th Jun '14 9:02:45 PM by JHM
I'll hide your name inside a word and paint your eyes with false perception.What are the (movable) first verse chords of Let it Go? I THINK they are the "Four Chords of Alternative" that I named in another thread
"i-III-VII-IV", but I'm not sure.
Oh, I think the confusion on my part is because the piano's bass note on the second chord is Ab, whose major chord is III relative to Fm.
Also, this mashup may have aided in the confusion.

A place to talk about chord progressions. Ones you thought of, ones you heard in songs, ones you aren't sure about, anything related to chord progressions.
So, I'll start: is Get Lucky's progression i-III-v-IV or iv-VI-i-VII?
Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.