How To Use The Locrian Mode

The 7th mode of any major scale will be very difficult to make a chord progression out of for a few good reasons. 

1) Any chord built off the 7th scale degree will be a m7b5 chord, and it doesn’t have the stability of a major or minor chord. 

2) This means our ears want to move away from this chord and onto another. 

3) It’s why some small sections of a song lasting 2-4 measures at most will go right back to a major or minor chord. 

So that’s why I reposted the reddit comment below: 

And this one too: 

The mention of using perfect 5ths on the tonic is also why there’s no strong example of the locrian mode being used. 

Here’s what I’m talking and let’s use B Locrian as an example: 

B Locrian scale = B – C – D – E – F – G – A 

B5 = B – F# (F# isn’t in Locrian) 

C5 (bII of B Locrian) = C – G 

F5 (bV of B Locrian) = F – C 

All of these chords use the perfect 5th interval, and this is the standard in many metal riffs and songs. By using the F# instead, for argument’s sake, you’re not truly using the Locrian mode. 

This is why we’ve broken down every scale and mode so far. By seeing the composition of the chords and the scales, you’ll better understand why a mode is or is not being used. 

So although metal songs love to build powerchords on the bV and the bII, it’s not truly Locrian unless you go back to a chord using the Bm7b5, which is not a very metal chord but it’s used often in Jazz. 

The reason a chord like a m7b5 wants to go to a major chord like C major, or a minor chord like Em, is because we want the B-F interval to resolve into one of the intervals in these two chords (the E-G interval in Em or the C-E interval in C).