Composition
"Knock You Down" is a R&B song with a length of five minutes and twenty six seconds. The song also includes electronic tones, and derives from pop and hip-hop genres. The song is set in common time, and composed in a "moderate R&B groove." It is written in the key of G minor, and vocals span from F3 to D5. It follows the chord progression E♭–F–B♭–E♭–F–Gm. The song begins with a rap intro by Kanye West, accompanied by a "stabbing synth riff." According to Chris Williams of Billboard, The verses contain a "thumping bass-beat" while the chorus is in a "frenetic midtempo groove." Dan Nishimoto of Prefix Magazine said the song had a "4/4 Motown feel on the verses and stuttering drums on the chorus." Hilson performs the first verse and chorus, while Ne-Yo sings the second verse. West then has a rap interlude before Hilson sings an additional part before the song ends with the chorus by Hilson, accompanied by Ne-Yo. In West's lines, he references Michael Jackson and his song "Bad" in the lines "This is bad, real bad, Michael Jackson." Coincidentally, the song was released in numerous territories around the death of the singer. West also refers to the domestic abuse accusations against his Jackson's father, Joe, in the following lyric "Now mad, real mad, Joe Jackson." Lyrically, the song is about how a great love goes wrong.
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Famous quotes containing the word composition:
“Vices enter into the composition of virtues as poisons into the composition of certain medicines. Prudence and common sense mix them together, and make excellent use of them against the misfortunes that attend human life.”
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“Boswell, when he speaks of his Life of Johnson, calls it my magnum opus, but it may more properly be called his opera, for it is truly a composition founded on a true story, in which there is a hero with a number of subordinate characters, and an alternate succession of recitative and airs of various tone and effect, all however in delightful animation.”
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“If I don’t write to empty my mind, I go mad. As to that regular, uninterrupted love of writing ... I do not understand it. I feel it as a torture, which I must get rid of, but never as a pleasure. On the contrary, I think composition a great pain.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)