Tag: pop

Thomas Dolby | Urban Tribal

“London-born Thomas Morgan Robertson had already made a bit of a name for himself as a synth wiz for hire – working with Bruce Woolley/The Camera Club, Joan Armatrading, Thompson Twins, Lene Lovich and Foreigner – before embarking on his debut solo album in late summer 1981,” (MovingTheRiver). “But, as he once said, he knew ‘too many chords’ to get any regular employment in the punk and new-wave bands of the era, so was pretty much forced to go it alone.

… Lyrically, The Golden Age Of Wireless (1982) … seemed to be a Janus-like vision of England – looking back to its WW2 past and forward to the kinds of urban dystopias explored by novelist JG Ballard.” Its international smash hit single, “She Blinded Me with Science,” became “a signature tune of the Second British Invasion” but was “somewhat of an anomaly. Much of Wireless is downbeat, enigmatic and haunting. Dolby proves himself a brilliant producer and arranger, a master of painting pictures with sound.” His retrofuturistic palette included passages of shortwave radio and marine shipping weather forecasts undergirding the music.

A bonus track from the album,”Urban Tribal,” is certainly a song in the haunting category. The modulations are solidly in the enigmatic mode, too: they don’t announce themselves clearly or proudly. Instead, they pivot smoothly and quietly underneath the gathering stormclouds of Dolby’s storytelling. The lead vocal is prominent enough that a synopsis of the song’s ultimately sad plot is likely unnecessary, but please take a moment to refer here if there’s any doubt. This live performance features a few sudden changes in volume, so please don’t adjust your set. The instrumental intro, featuring the chorus’ rangy melody, is in Eb minor. Just in advance of the verse (0:29), the tonality shifts to D minor. At 1:24, the chorus reverts to Eb minor; the pattern continues from there.

Thelma Houston | Don’t Leave Me This Way

“There is absolutely nothing in this world like what happens when disco music is operating at peak capacity,” (Stereogum). “Disco was a wave that swept all across pop music for years. It was tremendous, all-encompassing, and, when done wrong, flattening. The whole genre was more or less built around a drum pattern — a stead thump-thump-thump kick — that kept people in clubs moving and made it easy for DJs to blend one song into the next … There were people who became stars because of disco, and there were fading stars who used disco to extend or even elevate their fame. But disco, like early rock ‘n’ roll, was also a genre of fast, elusive, one-time success.

Every once in a while, when everything lined up just right, a long-toiling artist could hit just the right sound at just the right moment and make something immortal. That’s what happened when Thelma Houston made ‘Don’t Leave Me This Way’ … Most of Thelma Houston’s career works as a story of what happens when the starmaking machine fails. Houston — no relation to Whitney or her extended clan — was an absolute monster of a singer, one who was capable of taking her gospel training and using it to make earthly concerns sound urgent and wracked and overwhelmingly joyous. She spent years with Motown, a label that should’ve known exactly what to do with a singer of her surpassing power. But for Thelma Houston, everything clicked exactly once. Thankfully, that one time was something special.”

Starting in Bb mixolydian for the wordless (and initially grooveless) intro and verse, the tune shifts to C mixolydian for the chorus at 1:19. Billboard included the track on its list of 70 Best LGBTQ Anthems of All Time: “This Motown Hot 100 No. 1 hit in April 1977 was appropriated by the gay community as an anthem for friends lost to the AIDS epidemic. As part of a commissioned ‘public space statement,’ artist Nayland Blake juxtaposed the title of the song against an image of a bouquet of flowers with their tangled roots showing.”

One Direction | Night Changes

**We are re-posting this tune today to recognize Liam Payne, who died in a tragic accident earlier this week. Our thoughts are with his family and loved ones. **

English/Irish boy band One Direction makes its MotD debut with the 2014 single “Night Changes.” Included on Four, the group’s fourth studio album, the track is notable for being the last to feature Zayn Malik before he left the group to pursue a solo career the following year. The tune begins in Ab major and modulates to Bb and 2:29.

Elton John | Tower of Babel

“Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, released in 1975, was the culmination of six years’ feverish exertion (PopMatters) … (it) was the first album to ever premiere at number one on the Billboard album charts … (Elton’s) early ’70s run is almost unmatched in the history of pop music. In terms of quality and quantity, his only real peers are the likes of the Beatles, the Stones, and Bowie … The duo of John and (lyricist) Bernie Taupin produced some of the greatest songs and most memorable albums of the rock era, and yet today their prolific career is routinely dismissed, if not forgotten.

The duo’s creative marriage was defined by their marked dissimilarities. While both came from lower middle-class origins, John (born Reginald Dwight), was raised in urban London while Taupin hailed from the rural districts of Lincolnshire, in the far north of the country. Their musical interests were similarly contrasted: John had been raised on a catholic diet of mainstream pop and early rock ‘n’ roll, with a special affection for American soul music, while Taupin was a fan of American folk and country … one of the most influential synergies in the history of pop music … Elton John, the globetrotting Captain Fantastic, and Bernie Taupin, the down-home countrified Brown-Dirt Cowboy, rose out of absolute obscurity to become the most successful songwriting duo since Lennon and McCartney (if you young’uns don’t believe me, just take a gander at the historical record).”

The album is listed at #158 on Rolling Stone‘s “500 Greatest Albums of All Time.” John mentioned in an interview: “I’ve always thought (it) was probably my finest album because it wasn’t commercial in any way,” (EltonJohnItaly.com). “We did have songs such as ‘Someone Saved My Life Tonight,’ which is one of the best songs that Bernie and I have ever written together, but whether a song like that could be a single these days, since it’s [more than] six minutes long, is questionable. Captain Fantastic was written from start to finish in running order, as a kind of story about coming to terms with failure—or trying desperately not to be one. We lived that story.”

After starting in C major, “Tower of Babel” falls into a flight of Elton’s trademark inversion-driven fancy at 0:28 before landing once again on the terra firma of Eb major at 0:50. Don’t get too comfortable, though, because 1:40 brings a multi-key instrumental bridge; eventually we’re led back to C major. The shifting pattern continues from there.

Astral Drive | Dum Dum

“‘Astral Drive’ is the musical vehicle for producer, singer songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Phil Thornalley,” (GetReadyToRock). The “orange” album, Thornalley’s second under the name Astral Drive, “… explore(s) uplifting psychedelic tinged pop, soul, and rock with beguiling piano chord voicings, lilting melodies, subtle vocal harmonies, and songs that frequently evoke their title. It’s an album rooted in the 70’s – think Rundgren, Wings and 10cc –  while on the opening brace of tracks he leapfrogs into the late 90’s alt-pop rock world of Weezer and The New Radicals.

… For those familiar with Thornalley’s musical history (The Thompson Twins, Duran Duran, Prefab Sprout, The Psychedelic Furs, XTC, The Cure, Bryan Adams and even Natalie Imbruglia, etc.), this album makes perfect sense, as it pushes his creativity into new areas … He knows the value of a succinct pop song with a catchy hook. As a result, ‘Orange’ is a creative tour de force with enough originality and diversity not to be be locked into a particular time, place or genre. It’s an album that gives full rein to Thornalley’s pop sensibilities. There’s plenty of feel, lyrical substance, deft harmonies and vibrant hooks, all subtly honed by his own production skills which lead him to a layered, but organic sound.”

“Dum Dum,” a track from the 2021 album, starts with a verse in F major. The chorus flips its emphasis over to its relative Ab major (0:30 – 0:57) before returning to the initial key for the second verse. 1:42 brings a guitar-driven instrumental chorus, pushed upwards into A major. At 2:00, we return back to Ab major for another chorus. The tune’s final measures leave us in an unexpected place: moved via a leading tone into a colorless F# chord.

The Eagles | The Last Resort

“The Eagles achieved stratospheric success in the 1970s, effectively bridging the country rock and soft rock styles that were popular in the early 1970s,” (Aphoristic Album Reviews). “Songwriting team Don Henley and Glenn Frey pumped out a ton of popular singles, and their Their Greatest Hits (1971–1975) is one of the highest-selling albums of all time.”

In Rolling Stone, the group’s lead vocalist and drummer Don Henley reflects: “‘The Last Resort’, on Hotel California (1976), is still one of my favorite songs… That’s because I care more about the environment than about writing songs about drugs or love affairs or excesses of any kind. The gist of the song was that when we find something good, we destroy it by our presence — by the very fact that man is the only animal on earth that is capable of destroying his environment … ‘ The song begins in Providence, Rhode Island, and goes all the way across America, wrapping up in the Hawaiian town of Lahaina. Along the way, it chronicles how Americans have exploited and destroyed their own land. ‘We satisfy our endless needs and justify our bloody deeds,’ Henley sings. ‘In the name of destiny and the name of God.'”

After a gentle solo piano starts the tune in E major, the track gradually grows in intensity over time. At 3:24, an instrumental bridge starts with a shift upwards to G major before the the next verse begins.

Many thanks to our devoted reader Scott R. for this submission — his first!

Bobby Bare | Detroit City

“In his current book ‘The Philosophy of Modern Song,’ the revered musical artist Bob Dylan critiques 66 popular recordings to explain how music reveals the character of a culture,” (Detroit Free Press). “Wouldn’t you know it, Page 1 of Chapter 1 presents ‘Detroit City,’ Bobby Bare’s 1963 crossover country classic about a disillusioned Southern white man who comes north to the Motor City. Bare recorded and released the song (61 years ago). On the Billboard charts, it reached sixth on the country-western list, 16th on the pop list, and launched his successful career. ‘It wasn’t till Detroit City came along that I realized I was never going to have to get a real job, which was a big relief for a guitar picker,’ Bare told the website All Access Pass.

Bobby Sr.’s big hit came early in a musical decade best remembered in Detroit for Motown’s assembly-line brilliance; for the raucous rock-and-roll concerts at the Grande Ballroom; and for young Canadian artists like Joni Mitchell and Neil Young clubbing their way to fame around the Motor City. In addition, Dylan’s essay cites “Detroit, the home of Motown and Fortune Records, birthplace of Hank Ballard, Mitch Ryder, Jackie Wilson, Jack White, Iggy Pop, and the MC5.”

The song was originally titled ‘I Want to Go Home,’ a phrase that dominates the chorus. The record found little success when first recorded and released by Billy Grammer in 1962, but Bare loved it. ‘I heard Billy Grammer’s record of Detroit City while I was driving down the street one day and I damn near wrecked my car,” Bare said on his website bobbybare.com. ‘I thought it was the greatest song I ever heard in my life.’” The tune makes a distinctive shift from E major down to B major at 1:19. Many thanks to our regular contributoro Rob P. for this tune!

Dusty Springfield | Sweet Ride

“There’s something odd about Dusty Springfield’s (rightly earned) position in the pantheon of great female vocalists. She’s up there with Aretha Franklin and all the best soul singers, but she began her career as a pop folkie with her brothers in The Springfields,” (BBC). “She’s cited as an influence on the new generation of gutsy stars like Adele and the late Amy Winehouse, but she was a model of vocal restraint and subtlety. And, in a medium where honesty and passion are almost slightly overrated, Dusty was discreet about her feelings and her life to the point where her Pet Shop Boys-produced 1989 hit ‘In Private’ might have been about her entire life.

Despite, or because of or nothing to do with, these contradictions, the former Mary O’Brien was one of the best singers of her era – which was a decently long one, from her recordings with The Springfields to the great duet ‘What Have I Done to Deserve This’ … she was a singer very much rooted in a showbiz tradition that’s come round again to some extent.”

“Sweet Ride,” the theme to the 1968 movie of the same name, was written by Lee Hazlewood. Starting in C# major, the tune shifts up a half step to D major at 1:30. Many thanks to regular contributor Jamie A. for this submission!

Connie Francis | Who’s Sorry Now

Written in 1923 by Ted Snyder, Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby, “Who’s Sorry Now” later became the signature hit of American singer Connie Francis in 1958. The tune was initially published as a waltz, but subsequent covers were arranged as a foxtrot in cut time. Francis’s version, in 12/8 time, was the first of her eight singles to be certified gold in the US, and topped the UK charts for 6 weeks.

The tune begins in Eb and modulates up a half step to E at 1:29.