Mod of the Day

David Bowie | Life on Mars

“In music, there are some songs that speak to some people, and some speak to every one of us,” (Anurag Arya). “This is a song that makes us think of escapism and disillusionment with the world: ‘Life on Mars’ by David Bowie. The song is a career-defining one for Bowie, and one of his most-covered songs. Originally appearing on his Hunky Dory album (1971), it isn’t your standard rock ballad by any means. Bowie could have easily made a four-chord hit out of this one, but instead, this song contains about twenty chords, with unusual scale and tempo changes.

… In a song with a duration of about four minutes, David Bowie made us think of life, a sense of purpose versus a tendency to escape the real world, and commercialism with vivid imagery and a beautiful melody. No wonder his genius lives on even after his death: Among the generic and commercial tropes within pop music, David Bowie managed to cut through the clutter and redefine songwriting musically and lyrically.”

After beginning in E major, 0:42 brings us to a transitional pre-chorus with plenty of pivots in tonality. But at 0:58, we land squarely in A major for the chorus. After another unsettled section — this time an instrumental interlude (1:38 – 1:53), another E major verse returns. The pattern continues from there, with the tune ending with a return to A major.

Many thanks to Mark B. for submitting this tune — his fifth contribution to MotD!

David Wilcox | Rusty Old American Dream

“Around the mid-to-late ’80s, major labels started to notice a new group of folk artists,” (Popdose). “They were more diverse than the Seegers and Guthries of decades past; the ‘new folk’ label could apply to traditionalists like Ellis Paul or Jonell Mosser just as easily as it could to the more overtly commercial Shawn Colvin. And the new folkies could be obvious direct descendants of living masters, like the Richie Havens-channeling Cliff Eberhardt, or they could head off in new directions entirely, like Patty Griffin. Though it’s doubtful anybody in a record label boardroom ever thought the “new folk” would be a huge commercial success, having an “Americana” imprint was sort of prestigious — it meant the suits hadn’t been entirely blinded to the meaning and appeal of music at the root level. A&M Records, recognizing this … signed David Wilcox.

Wilcox had been plying his trade in and around Asheville, North Carolina, for some years, and had become a favorite fixture at the legendary Bluebird Cafe. The Bluebird’s proprietor, Amy Kurland, was instrumental in the development of his career — even after the release of his second A&M album, the label was referring publicity calls to her — and it’s easy to see why she took such an interest. Other artists may have been more implicitly traditional, and thus more representative of ‘true’ folk, but Wilcox’s smooth vocals and emotional lyrics hinted at bigger things.

It’s no Born To Run, but for a folk musician in 1989, How Did You Find Me Here came fairly close — the album won him a modicum of critical attention on the national stage, nearly unanimous in its praise, and A&M realized it had a potential moneymaker on its hands.” One of the album’s standout tracks, “Rusty Old American Dream,” might be about an old car which has seen better days. But propelled by Wilcox’s intricate fingerstyle technique and impeccable time, an unprepared half-step key change (1:47) “gives that old starter a spin.”

Chase | Get it On

The early 1970s was the Era of the Horn Band — Chicago, Blood Sweat and Tears, Electric Flag, and Ten Wheel Drive among them (anyone remember Ambergris or Sweet Apple?). They played jazz-tinged rock, or rock-tinged jazz, depending on your POV. Then there was Chase, led by trumpeter Bill Chase, an alum of the Woody Herman and Stan Kenton groups, and also of Maynard Ferguson’s group. Like Ferguson, he was a master of the highest registers of his instrument, and not shy about flaunting it. Unusually, Chase had only trumpets — four of them! — as its brass section.

Chase released three albums on Epic, but only their first self-titled release met with real chart success (Billboard #22 in 1971). The single presented here from that album was a decent hit, reaching #24 on the Billboard 100 chart. A second album, Ennea, recorded after several personnel changes with additional changes during its recording, performed much less well. By the time of Chase’s last album in 1974, Pure Music, only founder Bill Chase remained. Sadly, Bill Chase and several band members were killed in August 1974 when the small plane carrying them to an engagement crashed.

The song here contains the trademark Chase elements: virtuosic, outrageously pitched ensemble trumpet lines and a driving rhythm section, fronted by gritty blues-rock vocals. In case you thought the trumpets couldn’t play any higher, there’s an upward modulation at 2:34.

Lyle Mays | Alaskan Suite: Ascent

From All About Jazz, May 2001, via LyleMays.com

” … Extremely thoughtful, intelligent, articulate, insightful and thoughtful in nature, yet with energy, soul and a quirky sense of humor … In listening to Mays, you hear the strains and references to the contrapuntal music tradition of Europe but used in the unconventional context of high energy, real-time improvisation. All the traditional techniques far older than the jazz idiom, with which he is most closely associated, are continuously reworked, re-invented and used to great effect in the PMG (hey, long hair is still long hair).

The similarity in the reference both to the design and creation of structure and form in the abstract, from the ground up, is clear. And this is what Mays is all about… creation of structure: the new from the old and back again … Though an integral part of the Pat Metheny Group as a player for over a generation, Lyle Mays’ focus remains primarily on composition and arranging. Sifting for what’s new and unusual and presenting it in ever more creative ways … May’s first record (Lyle Mays, 1986) remains a testament to creativity and nuance in the pursuit of evocation of mood and imagery. The casting of impressionists Bill Frisell, Billy Drews, and others was almost as much a part of the compositional process for this music as the scores themselves.”

“Alaskan Suite: Ascent” from Mays’ debut album flies its colorful melodic banners over frequently shifting harmonic terrain. Beginning in G minor, the track shifts to D minor (0:27), A minor (0:55), and back to G minor (1:16). But the change to Db minor at 1:44 is more noticeable, followed by Bb minor (1:57). At 2:10, another step down to A minor feels like the gentlest of shifts after all the change we’ve already experienced. At 2:58, the storm has passed and piece finally settles into Eb (major, minor, other Eb scales too …), cycling again through the anthemic melody at 3:33 and repeating onward to the end; more voices join the texture with each repetition.

The Four Tops | Shake Me, Wake Me (When It’s Over)

“Motown was on a tear, no question, and for most fans 1966 marks the apogee of the label’s anything-but-mythical Golden Age, the time when everyone at Hitsville was at their very best,” (Motown Junkies). “Motown’s prodigious output would be one thing, but the quality of that output at the time is, by and large, the stuff the label’s legend is built upon. Just as the city’s motor industry was firing on all cylinders, Motown brought worldwide attention to Detroit in the mid-Sixties, as the most successful music industry talent-spotting and -gathering operation of all time came to fruition. Berry Gordy had gathered around him the absolute cream of the industry’s black American talent, whether that meant in songwriting, musicianship, production, singing, dancing, marketing … you name it, Motown probably had someone who was the best at it.

… The Four Tops had somehow lasted until 1964 as perennial and well-known ‘local talent’ before getting a single on Motown, ten hitless years of hard slog rewarded and paid in full. By teaming the Tops with the Andantes, the immortal Motown female backing singers, the Holland-Dozier-Holland team created something close to alchemy, a blend of beautiful voices and gritty soul sensibilities verging on the perfect (and sometimes, as in the case of their début Motown 45 ‘Baby I Need Your Loving,’ actually perfect) … The Sound of Young America, conquering the world.

The biggest trademark of the genius Holland-Dozier-Holland writing and production team … is fully present and correct here. Not the 4/4 floor-filling beat, or the crotchet pulses the Funk Brothers throw in on the beat to keep things driving along, or even the swooping, sweetening vocal harmonies that lift those heavenly band tracks to another yet-higher celestial plane. Those are all here, alright, but I’m talking about another signature HDH feature, namely their ability to take a driving, fully danceable upbeat tune, and promptly marry it to the most anguished and depressing lyrics you could come up with. This is a song about a guy who is losing his mind, paranoid and permanently on edge, plagued by fears his partner is about to walk out on him, stoked by (possibly imaginary) rumors, fueled by insomnia. And it sounds like a party, like the narrator’s pain would make a great ringtone. That, right there, is the magic of Holland-Dozier-Holland, and this is as good an example as you’ll ever find in their catalogue.”

After the anguished storytelling of the song’s first half, followed by an instrumental verse, a half-step key change hits at 1:47.

The Police | Every Breath You Take

“’I woke up in the middle of the night with that line in my head,’ Sting told the Independent” about “Every Breath You Take” (1983), (Ultimate Classic Rock). “He ‘sat down at the piano and had written it in half an hour. The tune itself is generic, an aggregate of hundreds of others, but the words are interesting. It sounds like a comforting love song. I didn’t realize at the time how sinister it is.’ Sting brought a demo of the song to his bandmates. Tensions were at their height back then, and arguments were commonplace. In keeping, the Police squabbled over the best way to attack ‘Every Breath You Take,’ and reportedly spent six weeks disagreeing on how to move forward. Eventually, everyone added their unique influence. Stewart Copeland’s backbeat propelled things along, while Andy Summers made an infectious contribution.

‘Without that guitar part, there’s no song,’ Summers told Record Collector. ‘ … I actually came up with it in one take, but that’s because Sting’s demo left a lot of space for me to do what I did. There was no way I was just gonna strum barre chords through a song like that.’ … the lead single for Synchronicity, ‘Every Breath You Take’ became a massive hit. The song reached #1 in six different countries, including the U.S., U.K. and Canada. It was the best-selling single of 1983 and won two Grammy awards, including Song of the Year.”

Written in a slightly uptuned G# major overall, the track’s chorus (first heard from 1:22 -1:43) shifts to F# mixolydian before returning to the original key.

Peaches + Herb | Reunited

“Peaches & Herb weren’t really reunited. The duo had been a pretty successful soul act in the ’60s, and then they’d disappeared for years before returning with their two biggest hits ever,” (Stereogum). But the Peaches & Herb of the late ’70s weren’t the same as the Peaches & Herb of the late ’60s. Herb was the same. (Herb was Herbert Feemster, a Washington, DC native who wisely took the stage name Herb Fame when he got famous). Peaches was different. The Peaches on ‘Reunited’ was Linda Greene, the third in a long line of Peacheses. Maybe ‘Reconstituted’ just wasn’t as catchy a song title.

… Back in 1968, the first version of Peaches & Herb had scored a minor hit with a cover of ‘United,’ an early Philly soul song that Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff had written for the Intruders. So ‘Reunited’ (1979) was a kind of sequel … The lyrics hint at past mistakes: ‘I can’t go cheating/ Honey, I can’t play.’ But they mostly refer to relationship bliss in the most generic terms possible: ‘I was a fool to ever leave your side/ Me minus you is such a lonely ride/ The breakup we had has made me lonesome and sad.'”

The sleepy track did quite well for itself: it topped both the R&B singles chart and the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart for four weeks in 1979. Selling over two million copies, it was ranked as the No. 5 song for 1979 by Billboard. After a start in Db major, “Reunited” features an early half-step shift to D major at 1:42, then another to Eb major at 3:10. The verses are just about identical to the choruses in harmonic structure, so the extra bumps in energy brought by the harmonic step-ups is welcome indeed!

Once Before I Go (from “The Boy from Oz”)

“(Thirty) years after he last had his name up in lights on Broadway, and a little over (25 years) after his death, Peter Allen lives again on stage (Theater Mania) … Allen’s life and music are celebrated the musical The Boy From Oz … (For the 2003 production), Allen was portrayed by a fellow Australian, Hugh Jackman, who achieved box-office stardom in the X-Men movies … the show’s librettist, Martin Sherman: ‘Everybody who encountered him adored him. He didn’t have the greatest voice, but he had that dynamic quality, his secret weapon.’ Jackman, for his part, has remarked that ‘Peter’s whole essence was very joyous. He was fearless, outrageous, and childlike, and he definitely lived life to the full.’

… The conceit of Sherman’s libretto is that we’re at a Peter Allen concert during which the performer recounts the story of his life. ‘When I saw him in concert, I remember thinking, These songs sound like they belong in the theater,’ says Sherman. Spinning a musical out of an existing collection of songs is not at all unusual these days: Mamma Mia! took the approach of brazenly allowing the audience into the joke of how and where the songs were placed. The Boy From Oz goes in the opposite direction, creating the illusion that Allen wrote the songs to punctuate his life story. Popular hits recorded by the likes of Melissa Manchester (‘Don’t Cry Out Loud’), Olivia Newton John (‘I Honestly Love You’), Ann-Margret (‘Once Before I Go’), and Frank Sinatra (‘You and Me’) reveal unexpectedly deep emotional layers in this new context.”

Jackman’s version of “Once Before I Go” begins in A major. The tune is full of cliché melodic shapes and chord progressions, but particularly in light of Allen’s biography, the lyric is undeniably affecting. 2:44 brings a shift to Bb major.

Ben Folds | Learn to Live With What You Are

“If Elton John had retained his original sense of fun, he might now be doing something along the lines of Ben Folds’ celebrated live act,” (The Guardian). “Having long ago embraced his inner nerd, Folds employs spectacles, piano and wit as weapons against a world that is taller, cooler and sexier, and emerges victorious. Accordingly, there’s an audience who want nothing more than to show their love for the man who describes himself, much to their delight, as a ‘piano-playing asshole.’ They sing every lyric back to him, pretend to be trumpets when requested, and generally assure the pocket-sized North Carolinian that brains beat brawn.”

Before turning his focus fully to the piano, Folds’ longtime instrument of choice was the drums; he still gleefully trots out a small set at some of his live shows to accompany his guest/opening act musicians. “Folds’ very physical playing reminds us that the piano is a percussion instrument, and he bends it to his will – as delicate accompaniment during a solo interlude, and aggressive mainstay elsewhere … a big, clever noise.”

(The video has an actual plot of sorts, but if you prefer to skip to the music, it starts at 0:30). “Learn to Live With What You Are” (2003) begins in E major. After a brief bridge, 3:44 brings a shift up a whole step to F# major for a final chorus. However, the closing seconds of the tune appear to settle back down into E major. Many thanks to our reader/listener Mandy D. for this submission to MotD — her second!

Rick Astley | Take Me to Your Heart

“Best known for his global 1987 hit ‘Never Gonna Give You Up,’ Rick Astley is an icon of British pop, his style marked by a rich, deep voice and love of classic soul and R&B,” (Qobuz). “An overnight sensation, Astley topped the U.K. charts with 1987’s Whenever You Need Somebody and again hit the Top Ten with 1988’s, albums that also reached the Top 20 of the Billboard 200 and spawned more hits like ‘Together Forever’ and ‘Whenever You Need Somebody.’

However, looking for more creative autonomy, Astley broke with his production team for 1991’s Free before largely stepping away from the spotlight. He reemerged with 2005’s Portrait and gained widespread viral fame via the “rickrolling” meme, a phenomenon he purportedly found amusing, and which brought a wave of renewed interest in his work, leading to him winning Best Act Ever award at the 2008 MTV Europe Music Awards. In 2016, Astley released 50, an organic, soul-infused production returned to the top of the U.K. Albums Chart. He has continued to enjoy a career renaissance with releases like 2018’s Beautiful Life and 2023’s Are We There Yet?“

1988’s “Take Me to Your Heart” features an instrumental intro in D major, but at 0:17, verse 1 shifts down to C major. The chorus (first heard at 0:49 – 1:05) returns to D major. The keys continue to alternate from there.