Discussions including terms like "diatonic" and "theory" are not limited to "traditional" or "classical theory"(whatever those are... is it like saying "let's discuss chemistry, but only using terms known by alchemists 300 years ago"?).
We commonly use the term "theory" but what we're really talking about is the study and vocabulary of music. Any music. Whether it follows some very basic rules or must be described in a more complex way. Maybe we should call it the musical science? Because the really interesting this about it is that we can gain new knowledge from the process of investigating, observing, sharing and, not least, testing. You can study a random noise generator in this way. It may not be classical music, but that doesn't make it unstudyable.
So... responses like "You cannot use theory to analyze it" says one of two things about you and nothing about the music. Those are:
1) You do not wish to analyse it at all. That's fine. But I have no interest in golf. Should I go post on golf boards about how much interest I lack in golf?
or
2) You have some separate way of analyzing it. If this is the case, please share. It is still music theory. We can learn something together. But I have a feeling that to have an effective conversation, we'll have to first learn the common language.
I recognize that you don't have to formally study music to write or appreciate music, You don't have to have the vocabulary. However, if you've heard music, and -- n turn -- created music, you are -- relatively primitively but not necessarily less effectively -- practicing the musical science I described above. Despite your best anti-intellectual efforts, you have musical theory.
/rant
The theory was already explained to you in terms of borrowed or accidental notes. Why it works was also described, but, I'll take another stab at it:
What happens in Tainted Love is Ed Cobb threw in an accidental to shift the melody away from sounding melancholy and toward a more hopeful / powerful resolution. Without that shift, the melody would remain sounding a bit on the morose / "woe is me" side for the whole tune. Listeners naturally want weakness and uncertainty to be followed (resolved) by strength and conviction. That is the "resolution" that has been described to you throughout this thread. Without that type of resolution, we listeners may lose interest and the song would most likely flop. That is true throughout all of music history.
I agree that perhaps the lack of a common language is leading to unnecessary friction here. And it is not the case that I lack a traditional theory vocabulary.
Pop songwriters use a different language when discussing what you are trying to force into a theory discussion. So, just for a moment, open your mind to another language that may help explain your query. What Cobb was developing there is called
the hook. If you are unfamiliar, the hook is meant to grab and hold the listener's interest. The hook is probably the most important feature of pop songwriting formula. It is responsible for selling literally billions and billions of records, but I doubt you will find the word "hook" in a conversation about theory. It would, however, be heard dozens of times a day at the Brill Building. One of the most common hooks in popular music is the minor to major shift, which happens only briefly in Tainted Love, but serves to snap us out of feeling sorry for the singer. As a result, when the melody returns to minor, it sounds more confident than before. A bit sassy. That is the hook. Without that shift, the tune would fizzle out.
Other terms associated with pop songwriting that will also not likely be found in a theory discussion: turn around, back beat, middle eight, hit, stab, climb, release, breakdown, vamp, etc... All of which can be explained in terms of theory, I suppose, but they are just little bits of songwriting formula meant to sell records. And a term like "hook" is no more or less intellectually valid than a term like "picardy third".
So, in my best of best anti-intellectual efforts, it works because it is part of the hook.
Also, music theory is not a science. Parts of it are based on science, but fails in too many aspects to be regarded as one. Same goes with linguistics.
