[link to original on tumblr]
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But I learned some really interesting things. Fascinating, even.
At the beginning of the "She told me to be careful if I loved her" part, the chords go from G to G7, which is the same transition at the end of "Care of Cell 44." Normally, I wouldn't place such importance on this because it's just a transition from one chord to an-other. However, that bridge part also contains a transition from Cm to G, which is also a change in "Care of Cell 44" (and which also appears in the bridge). Not surprisingly, both songs are (mostly) in the same key - G major. For a while I've been wondering whether part of the cohesion of Odessey and Oracle might be just from the keys that the songs are in. Most of the first side is in G major.
The bridge also contains a chord change from Eb to Gm. The Gm is the second inversion (or at least I play it that way), so the transition is basically lowering the tonic in Eb by a half-step (Eb G Bb > D G Bb). That same change is in "She's Coming Home" (although a half-step higher - from E to G#m). In the liner notes to Zombie Heaven, Rod Argent explains that he took part of the chord progression for "She's Coming Home" from Howells' "Nunc Dimittis." I'm not sure, but I think the chord progression in question is E G#m C#m B, which includes the chord change also present in "I Want Her She Wants Me." Most of "She's Coming Home" is just an alternation between E and A (throwing a C in between them during the chorus), so unless it's the very end of the chorus (B, Bb, A, which is characteristic of Argent's writing in that it includes two sequential half-steps) or the bridge (C#m F# A B), the E G#m C#m B progression is what Argent took from Howells. If I'm right in that, it's interesting that that particular progression (or at least part of it) makes its appearance in two of Argent's songs. If I'm wrong, it's still interesting that he uses the same transition in two different songs.
