ZZ Top · El loco

Heaven, Hell or Houston

Heaven, Hell or Houston is in A minor at 111.4 beats per minute.

Tempo

111 BPM · Moderatomedian of 137 analyses · 111.3–111.7 across the middle eight tenths

Key: A minorno sharps and no flats · the key most of the analyses agreed on
Agreement: 100%share of analyses that agreed
Analyses: 137people who ran the extractor
One beat: 538.6milliseconds, 60,000 ÷ BPM
Tuning: 441.3Hz · +5 cents from A 440
Dynamics: 4.27dB the level wanders from its average
Loudness: 0.905Essentia's 0–1 scale, not dB
Danceability: 1.202Essentia's danceability, 0–3

Source: AcousticBrainz, dump of 2022-06-23 (CC0) · MusicBrainz core data, 2026-09-17 (CC0) · how each number is measured. Measured up to 23.06.2022 — AcousticBrainz stopped collecting in 2022, so nothing released after that date is here.

What the numbers say

137 independent analyses of this recording were submitted to AcousticBrainz. All but a handful of them — 100% — put it in A minor, a key signature of no sharps and no flats. The tempo printed above is the median of the 137 readings; 100% of them land within 2% of it, and they barely differ at all.

At 111.4 BPM one beat lasts 538.6 milliseconds, so a sixteenth note is 134.6 ms and a dotted eighth 403.9 ms — the delay times for this recording. Counted half as fast it is 55.7 BPM, counted twice as fast 222.8. A score would mark that Moderato, by the ranges this site uses.

The analyses put the reference pitch of the recording at 441.3 Hz, which is 5 cents above concert A at 440 Hz — the sort of drift a tape machine or a slightly different mastering leaves behind. That is a fact about this transfer of the music, not about how it was played.

The dynamic complexity of the recording measures 4.27 dB: that is how far the level wanders from its own average, so a small number means a loud, flat master and a large one means a recording that still breathes. Its average loudness is 0.905 on Essentia's 0-to-1 scale, which is not decibels and is not comparable to a streaming service's number.

10 other recordings here are in A minor; the ones listed below are the closest in tempo.

Beats per bar are not in this dataset. AcousticBrainz's analysis reports a tempo, a key and a loudness, and no time signature at all, so this page does not print one — a 4/4 here would be a guess dressed as a measurement.

Keys that fit with A minor

Each of these differs from A minor by at most one accidental, or shares its tonic. That is the whole of what a mixing wheel encodes; here the relations are named instead of numbered.

Delay times at 111 BPM

Note value	Beats	Milliseconds	Hertz
Whole note	4	2154.4	0.46
Half note	2	1077.2	0.93
Dotted quarter	1.5	807.9	1.24
Quarter note (one beat)	1	538.6	1.86
Quarter triplet	0.667	359.1	2.79
Dotted eighth	0.75	403.9	2.48
Eighth note	0.5	269.3	3.71
Eighth triplet	0.333	179.5	5.57
Dotted sixteenth	0.375	202	4.95
Sixteenth note	0.25	134.6	7.43
Sixteenth triplet	0.167	89.8	11.14
Thirty-second note	0.125	67.3	14.85

Half time 55.7 BPM · double time 222.8 BPM. Every row is one beat (538.6 ms) times the fraction in the second column.

Closest in key and tempo

Recordings in A minor, ordered by how near their tempo is to 111 BPM. A calculation, not a recommendation.

All songs in A minor All songs at 111 BPM A minor at 110–119 BPM ZZ Top

MusicBrainz collapses 2 recording ids into this one. Recording id d715c0af-f663-4173-ac65-b544c66a2ac6.