From that first bar of the verse, the listener is primed for the extensions those notes make with every chord: DM6, GM7, and Em9 (or alternatively, you can think of B, D, and F# as pedal tones that donвЂ™t affect the underlying harmony or name of each chord. The notes B, D, and F# are emphasized in every measure of the verse, and the major sixth between D and B is emphasized from the pickup measure of the tune. (YouвЂ™ll see that the score below goes straight from PostвЂ™s verse to SwaeвЂ™s verse, which isnвЂ™t how the song goes, but the chorus is already transcribed in the graphic.) LetвЂ™s look at how Post uses these two notes throughout his verse prior. IвЂ™d like to push their analysis a little bit farther using one word: contextualization. (Disappointing, because I warned them that I might trash this graphic). Despite my initial doubts, I came to the conclusion after some analysis that Top40Theory was indeed correct. So why does the chordal sixth need to resolve over G but not over D? And it seems rather old-fashioned to assume that the 9 has to resolve down, especially when itвЂ™s repeated over an entire progression. On top of that, when it goes to IV (G), E is the sixth of that chord. The B in measure 1 never resolves to a chord tone, and B and E are the two pentatonic extensions of D Major, which means, to me, that they create a similar level of dissonance over that chord. This resolution to I is teased at in measures four and seven (using Top40вЂ™s numbering) when the melody, but not the harmony, goes to the tonic. In the chorus to Post Malone and Swae LeeвЂ™s Sunflower, the scale degree 2 at the end of almost every measure suggests an eventual melodic resolution down to D, or 1, on the tonic. IвЂ™ve reposted it below with the permission of the page admin. A couple of weeks ago, a post came up on my Facebook feed from Top40Theory.

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