Several recent studies have adapted William Caplin’s initiating, medial, and cadential functions to the analysis of popular music with more idiomatic functional labels. Examples include Drew Nobile’s initiation, buildup, and arrival functions, Alyssa Barna’s verse, riser, drop functions, and many others, each with nominal differences. Framing functions, which are an important part of Caplin’s theory, have received little scholarly attention. This lack of focus on framing functions may result from the lower hierarchical status of their associated formal units: introductions, re-intros, and outros. This presentation builds upon current scholarship on formal functions in popular music by crafting a theory of framing functions for Japanese City-Pop music.

With its roots in 1980s Western pop music, Japanese City-Pop relies on many of the same formal conventions as its overseas siblings, with intricately crafted introductions, re-intros, and outros ripe for analysis. Framing functions are structurally significant; often the musical material from the intro is recapitulated two more times, as a re-intro that leads into the second verse-chorus rotation, and as an outro framing the entire song. The introductory framing function also serves as an auditory hook for the listener, introducing the tempo, groove, harmony, and instrumentation of a song. Additionally, the intro may contain significant motives that develop over the course of the song. I argue that framing functions are integral to the formal organization of Japanese City-Pop (and 1980s pop music in general) and should not be cast aside and relegated to a lower status. This presentation focuses on framing functions and brings their associated formal units, the intro, re-intro, and outro to the forefront, emphasizing how they contribute to the overall form and character of a song in many significant ways.

Joanna Newsom’s music poses a challenge to prevailing analytical models of popular form: lyrical repetition is rare, and her songs contain successions of sections that eschew traditional distinctions between verses and choruses. These songs contain a high degree of internal structure shaped by recurring melodic patterns, harmonic relationships, and textural shifts (Encarnacao 2013; Hegarty and Halliwell 2011). Despite its widespread critical acclaim, Newsom’s music has received little scholarly attention.

Studies of formal function in popular music often begin with the verse-chorus paradigm (Biamonte 2019, 2014; de Clercq 2012; Nobile 2022; Summach 2011; Temperley 2007), even when examining unconventional forms (Osborn 2013; Cobb 2025). Recent scholarship concerning formal ambiguity examines textural processes associated with EDM and hip hop, offering limited application to Newsom’s instrumental, narrative-driven style (Adams 2019; Cobb 2025; Osborn 2023). De Clercq (2017) suggests a promising alternative, arguing that pop/rock music often blends formal functions, such as verse and chorus, within sections. Newsom’s music offers a compelling case study in extending this insight beyond familiar repertoires and formal templates.

Building on de Clercq’s concept of blended formal functions, I argue that Newsom shifts musical and lyrical parameters to craft sections that exhibit varying degrees of memorability. I draw on criteria discussed in Biamonte (2019, 2014), de Clercq (2017, 2012), Osborn (2013), and Temperley (2007) to demonstrate how formal function emerges gradually in service of narrative trajectory in the absence of traditional formal templates containing clearly focal sections. In doing so, Newsom guides what listeners are invited to remember, anticipate, and reinterpret as her songs unfold. In “Emily,” an ode to Newsom’s sister, this continuum of memorability supports a gradually unfolding narrative occurring in the mythical land of childhood memories.

While verse–chorus form has remained the dominant structural model for more than a century, recent popular genres have introduced new formal units whose primary function is not auditory but kinesthetic. In electronic dance music, this role is filled by the drop or core (Butler 2006); in contemporary pop, by the dance-chorus (Barna 2020); and in twenty-first-century metal, by the breakdown. Originally serving as a contrasting bridge section, the breakdown has evolved into a significant unit reshaping song form (Gamble 2019; Smialek 2015). Following Gamble (2019), the breakdown is understood as a half-time backbeat and coordinated guitar–drum ostinato that highlights rhythmic impact. The breakdown challenges the hierarchical centrality of the verse–chorus cycle, competing with the chorus as the structural goal. This paper explores how modern metal bands employ the breakdown as a permanent addition to the verse–chorus paradigm (Nobile 2020), arguing that its movement-oriented function often replaces the traditional chorus.

Drawing on examples from bands such as August Burns Red, Wage War, A Day to Remember, and Bring Me the Horizon, the paper examines a corpus of 2000s–2010s popular metal. Nobile’s rock-song formal flowchart provides framework, and form is interpreted via kinesthetic engagement and mass entrainment. The analysis examines the breakdown’s sectional placement, repetition patterns, and pitch centers. I identify three formal capacities of the breakdown: its ability to replace traditional units, to flip their functions, and to create novel forms antithetical to the verse–chorus cycle. In the first two capacities, the breakdown replaces bridges, intros, and outros and often replaces the chorus, producing a riff–breakdown cycle instead of verse–chorus form. I term the latter capacity breakdown form, in which songs are organized around forward momentum toward the breakdown rather than chorus repetition.

Breakdown form shifts attention away from performers and toward dance participation through moshing and mass entrainment (Hudson 2021). By situating the breakdown alongside EDM and pop dance-oriented structures, this work highlights a shift toward movement-oriented song forms. These findings expand theories of popular-music form by positioning movement as a structural force and reframing formal analysis in light of listener participation.