rock – Page 4

Steely Dan | Any World (That I’m Welcome To)

“(Katie Lied) captures Steely Dan in the thick of it all, still hungry and energized by their early burst of creativity but not taking anything for granted,” (Pitchfork). “Before Katy Lied, Steely Dan were a rock band, but this is the record where they became something else … Katy Lied lives at the midpoint of Steely Dan’s first act. Behind them were three records that were incrementally more sophisticated and less rock-centered. After this one were three increasingly finicky and obsessive albums that would find them reaching for a kind of perfection, albums that found them chronicling the decadence around them from the inside. Where they once wrote about the delightfully sleazy underbelly of life in America from a remove, they started to write more about what they saw around them. Katy Lied is the fulcrum in this progression—it’s messier, less sure of itself, besotted neither with youthful confidence nor veteran polish.

… The characters flailing clumsily throughout Katy Lied (1975) are paralyzed by desires they aren’t introspective enough to understand, so all they can do is keep stumbling forward. ‘I got this thing inside me,’ Fagen sings in a bridge on the late album highlight ‘Any World (That I’m Welcome To)’, ‘I only know I must obey/This feeling I can’t explain away.’ … This band was always about asking questions instead of giving answers … They wanted desperately to render their tragically amusing scenes just so, and the sonic purity they’d been chasing would soon be theirs. But here they give failure a kind of twisted majesty.”

The track alternates between Bb mixolydian on the verses and C mixolydian on the choruses (first heard from 0:39 – 0:54). The tune takes us through a short bridge (1:52 – 2:10), but holds off on modulating until an additional verse and chorus are added in. At 3:07, a chorus/tag jumps up to D mixolydian, with the utterly distinctive focus of frequent collaborating vocalist Michael McDonald (pre-Doobie Brothers and his own solo career) ringing out alongside of Donald Fagen’s lead vocal.

Joan Jett + the Blackhearts | Little Liar

“Joan Jett calls out a duplicitous lover in ‘Little Liar,’ the follow-up to her hit ‘I Hate Myself For Loving You,” (Songfacts). “She wrote both songs with Desmond Child, who was also working with Aerosmith (‘Dude (Looks Like A Lady)’) and Bon Jovi (‘Born to Be My Baby’) around this time.

… ‘Little Liar’ (1988) was a modest hit for Jett, reaching #19 in the US. Her biggest hits came early in the ’80s and were mostly covers, including ‘I Love Rock and Roll,’ originally by The Arrows. Jett had the chops to write her own songs, but there was such a big well of songs by male artists that she could transform, and those went over very well – ‘Crimson And Clover’ (Tommy James and the Shondells) and ‘Do You Wanna Touch Me (Oh Yeah)’ (Gary Glitter) are examples. “Little Liar” is one of the biggest hits she had a hand in writing; others include ‘Bad Reputation’ and ‘Fake Friends.'”

After a start in D minor, the second half of verse 1 shifts up to F minor at 0:34. At 0:44, verse 2 reverts to D minor and then features another jump into F minor at 0:54. The chorus (1:03 – 1:28) remains in F minor. Verse 3 (1:28) and chorus 2 (1:49) follow the same pattern. From 2:09 – 2:28, an instrumental chorus shifts to Ab minor. At 2:28, there’s another verse in D minor, but the last choruses of this raw power ballad jump all the way up to Ab minor again at 2:51 — this time with no intermediate step — to end the track.

Pretenders | Message of Love

“Over their 44-year career, the Pretenders have never chased trends or followed fashions to stay relevant,” (The Guardian). “But they didn’t need to. Their influential jangling sound – helpfully described on their T-shirts as ‘two guitar, bass and drums’ – has become timeless. It’s also still the perfect vehicle for (Chrissie) Hynde’s voice, an instantly recognisable mix of sand and honey, attitude and yearning … “

Seeing this singular band in its prime reveals what a huge blast they were having. Little wonder that Pretenders benefited — more than most bands — from a nascent MTV, accelerating their career via video.

“Message of Love,” from Pretenders’ sophomore release Pretenders II (1981), is built in an up-tuned A major overall, its gears rotating around clanging syncopated guitar chords. A profoundly different extended bridge starts at 1:22; the bassline has shifted to a smooth walking line and the key shifts to C mixolydian and then D mixolydian at 1:55. At 2:09, we’ve fallen back into line for the next verse in the original key. 2:45 brings a mostly instrumental outro in F major.

Counting Crows | Bulldog (demo)

“Counting Crows have enchanted listeners worldwide for more than two decades with their intensely soulful and intricate take on timeless rock and roll,” (BendConcerts.com). Exploding onto the music scene in 1993 with their multi-platinum breakout album, August and Everything After, the band has gone on to release seven studio albums, selling more than 20 million records worldwide, and is revered as one of the world’s most pre-eminent live touring rock bands.

… Over the last 30 years, the masterful songwriting from frontman Adam Duritz put the band at #8 on Billboard‘s 2021 “Greatest Of All Time: Adult Alternative 25th Anniversary Chart.” After nearly seven years, the award-winning rockers announce their highly anticipated new project, Butter Miracle, Suite One. Produced by Brian Deck, the four-track, 19-minute suite is set for worldwide release this spring.”

Starting in E minor, the unreleased demo track “Bulldog,” featuring an insistent energy throughout, shifts at 0:55 to a chorus that shifts to an alternating B major and B minor. At 1:23, verse 2 returns to E minor. The pattern continues from there until the tune’s end, which features an unresolved F major chord at the end of a chorus — an unsettling tri-tone away from the tonic of the key.

for Kelli

Mountain | Nantucket Sleighride

“A lot was expected of Mountain’s second album when it arrived in January 1971,” (Ultimate Classic Rock). “Nantucket Sleighride appeared 10 months after their debut, Climbing!, and 10 months before third LP, Flowers of Evil.” The New York-based band’s release “was another strong offering, highlighted by the nearly six-minute title track.

Referencing the true story of a young man whose whaling vessel became the victim of its prey (which inspired Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick), it also drew on a 400-year-old Scottish folk tune … Despite being regarded as one of the world’s first heavy metal bands, there was plenty of prog-rock and psychedelic pop to be found here. And it all felt seamless.”

After beginning in E minor, the tune features a contrasting section in A major, running between 1:07 – 1:42. E minor returns in an instrumental interlude at 1:42. Quite a few more shifts in tonality follow.

Midnight Oil | Power and the Passion

“Midnight Oil is, in Monty Python’s phrase, ‘more of an autonomous collective,'” (The Guardian). “For that reason, dealing with Midnight Oil can be infuriating. But their staunch solidarity has kept them together in the face of enormous pressure and their crusade has woven them into Australian history unlike any other artist … When the Oils started in the late 1970s, there was no shortage of disaffected, pimply young men with a Fender and a chip on their shoulder. There was also no shortage of songs bewailing the state of the world. But Midnight Oil did it bigger and better. As (frontman) Peter Garrett wrote in his memoir Big Blue Sky: ‘Midnight Oil’s message wasn’t in the songs themselves, which varied … The message was in joining the music with actions that matched what was being sung. Were we earnest and self righteous? Yes, we were.’

It was there in the songs too – lyrics about apathy in the suburbs, the entropy of dead-end jobs and the hollow Australian torpidity. ‘The Power and the Passion,’ a signature song, is about exactly that. Midnight Oil itself, at that point in 1982, was the opposite of apathy.” Perhaps not surprisingly to anyone who’s listened closely to the band’s signature song, “Beds Are Burning,” Garrett went on to champion indigenous peoples’ rights and work for the Australian Conservation Foundation as well as serving as a government representative. He put a stop to whaling in Australia’s Southern Ocean, among other initiatives, while also still fronting the band … “You couldn’t help but reflect how this band … changed the culture in this country. In 1973, Australian artists were rarely played on the radio or signed to a record deal … very few young Australians were concerned about land rights or environmental destruction, but Midnight Oil put all of those issues front and centre.”

Frontman Garrett, 6.5 feet tall and “big in every way,” is made even moreso by his rangy, frenetic stage presence. Other than the lyrics of “Power and the Passion,” which are always at the center of attention, the clash between drum machine and analog percussion might be the track’s most compelling factor. After a start in B minor, there’s a shift to E minor for the pre-chorus (0:32), followed by a chorus in a very improbable Eb minor (0:49). 1:12 returns us to B minor for the next verse; the pattern continues from there.

The Beatles | While My Guitar Gently Weeps

“In spring 1968, George Harrison found himself eager to play the guitar,” (Financial Times). “This may not sound like a particularly illuminating observation about the lead guitarist of the world’s biggest rock group, but the recording sessions for what became known as The Beatles’ White Album marked the first time in a while that he had approached his instrument with anything more than grudging professional obligation. For the past three years he had been fixated on mastering the sitar, but now he was finding joy in his six-string again … (it) was one of The Beatles’ best compositions — a perfectly balanced mixture of elegiac vocals and electrified solos; of West Coast dream-rock and eastern philosophy.

Prior to writing the track, Harrison had immersed himself in the teachings of the I-Ching, which posits that there is meaning inherent in ostensibly random events. Putting this idea into practice, he contrived to write a song based around two words plucked arbitrarily from a nearby book: ‘gently weeps.’ But perhaps there was nothing incidental about the choice of this emotive phrase; Harrison was, after all, in a fragile state, alienated from his own band … Things had become so fraught that Harrison asked his close friend Eric Clapton to help out. Not only would his presence cajole the other three into pulling their weight, but he was, handily, one of the best guitarists in the business; his uncredited playing on ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ became one of the greatest moments of individual virtuosity on any Beatles track.”

The tune was later covered by a broad array of artists: Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne, and Prince (at Harrison’s posthumous 1988 induction into the Rock + Roll Hall of Fame); Peter Frampton; Jeff Healey; Carlos Santana, India Arie, and Yo-Yo Ma; and Regina Spektor. “For most, the song is unmistakably Harrison’s personal triumph; ‘Only a guitar player could write that,’ Mick Jagger noted.” There is probably not much need to time slate this tune; the verses (in A minor) and choruses (in A major) are about as clearly delineated as any tune we’ve featured!

George Baker Selection | Little Green Bag

“Peaking at No. 21 on the national charts in the spring of 1970, ‘Little Green Bag’ scores a bounty of brownie points for being one of the most enigmatic songs ever placed on plastic,” (Something Else Reviews). “Driven by cheesy surf guitars, the zippy little tune sounds a bit like ‘She’s A Woman’ by the Beatles, accompanied by a sprinkling of bossa nova styled rhythms. The vocals are rather theatric, and the hooks are jarring and jaunty. The lyrics of ‘Little Green Bag,’ which are somewhat muddled, are just as quirky as the tone and structure of the song itself. Subtle references to pot are easy to imagine, but the truth is the theme is money.

A Dutch band, George Baker Selection went several years before courting the airwaves in a serious way. Early in 1976, the catchy and danceable ‘Paloma Blanca’ seized the Top 30. But that was that, making George Baker Selection a two-hit wonder. Released in an era when pop music was all for taking chances and nothing seemed too odd or alien for public consumption, ‘Little Green Bag’ still proved to be quite daring, different and downright curious at the time.”

The tune starts in G minor, but a shift to G major for the chorus is hinted at during a short pre-chorus instrumental section (0:46; the first several repeating choruses run from 0:55 – 2:00). At 2:01, another verse returns us to G minor; at 2:29, we revert back to the major chorus. 3:08 brings a wholesale shift up a half step to Ab major for another chorus, but 3:30 brings us back down to the original key.

Genesis | You Might Recall

“On the one side stood their proggy past; on the other, pop stardom. Even the album itself – released in tandem with a film of the same name on June 1, 1982, it chronicles the tours in support of 1980’s Duke and 1981’s Abacab – seems to be peeking ahead,” (Ultimate Classic Rock). “The fourth side features a handful of sleek tracks left over from the Duke sessions and 1982’s 3×3 EP.

‘The direction we took is very obvious, having started off in a very complex and technical background,’ (guitarist) Mike Rutherford told the Oklahoman in 1982. ‘If you want to progress and change, where do you go? You don’t want to get more technical and complex. You have to go simpler in the sense you get more into feeling … you’ve got to do what you enjoy doing. It’s as simple as that. There’s no other way to do it and be honest with yourself.’ Three Sides Live (is) a recommended entry point for anyone who came to Genesis via the MTV-era hits, and is now curious about what came before. It’s a perfect bridge to the past.”

The “single side of studio tracks from the double album” conceit only worked during the vinyl era, which in 1982 was within five years of its end. “You Might Recall,” one of the tracks from the studio side, starts in C minor with an energetic, arpeggiated keyboard hook, prominently out front in the mix. As the verse begins at 0:19, keyboardist Tony Banks’ marshy comping texture lets the lavish chord progressions and Phil Collins’ rangy vocal melody shine. At 1:01, the three-section chorus arrives with a shift to C major, rich in compound chords, supported by a pedal-point G in the bass throughout. After eight measures (1:21), part two arrives with a shift to Bb major and a pedal-point F. Finally, part three features eight measures of F major with C in the bass (1:43). At 2:04, a C minor interlude mirroring the hook-centric intro returns, and we cycle through the pattern again. As a parting gift, the second interlude (following verse 2 and chorus 2) shifts up to to new territory — G major with D in the bass (3:47 – 4:08) — before the 3-segment chorus returns and fades.

Cheap Trick | Tonight It’s You

“Combining a love for British guitar pop songcraft with crunching power chords and a flair for the absurd, Cheap Trick provided the necessary links between ’60s pop, heavy metal, and punk,” (Qobuz). “Their sound provided a blueprint for both power pop and arena rock; it also had a long-lived effect on both alternative and heavy metal bands of the ’80s and ’90s (and beyond), who often relied on the same combination of loud riffs and catchy melodies.

The band’s early albums were filled with highly melodic, well-written songs that drew equally from the crafted pop of the Beatles, the sonic assault of the Who, and the tongue-in-cheek musical eclecticism and humor of the Move.” From most accounts, the mid-80s was a bit of a lull for the band creatively, but one strong single resulted from its 1985 album Standing on the Edge: “the silvery-sounding ‘Tonight It’s You,’ which peaked just outside the Top 40 at number 44 in the fall of 1985.”

Starting in F# major, the tune’s long pre-chorus in B major appears at 0:59 leading us to a chorus in D major (1:19 -1:41). The pattern continues from there.