[link to original on tumblr]
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I had already learned (what I thought was) the guitar riff and the bass part. The guitar riff I may have known since last year, but I think I learned the bass part sometime this spring.
I went back to listen to it a few days ago, and I realized that the guitar riff isn't what I thought it was. I thought it was just a continuous repetition, but there are two distinct phrases that are juggled. I started wondering what would happen if you played those two alternative riffs at the same time, so I tried doing it, but it didn't sound that interesting.
But then I listened to it again, and I realized that the electric piano plays the alternate riff. So you have the D D F# D G F D C riff and the D D A B C B A F# riff playing simultaneously, but every time, they alternate instruments. (I think it's the instrumentational alternating that makes it interesting.)
And after I recorded this, I panned the electric piano part a bit to the left and the guitar part a bit to the right. Doing that made me realize that Rod Argent employs this same technique at the very end of "Lothlorien" from the band Argent's Ring of Hands album (except that's with guitar and organ).
This hadn't been one of my favorite songs, but now that I see how he used those alternative riffs between two instruments, I like it a great deal more.
Also, I think I messed up in the bass part after the guitar solo. Well, the blank part where the guitar solo should be.
