Tuesday, October 13, 2015

"Just out of Reach" and "I Love You"

Backdated, archival post


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A few days ago, I realized that the bass parts for the verses of "Just out of Reach" and "I Love You" are quite similar:


Standard disclaimer that the notation might be wrong since I did it myself.  I guessed at the keys, although I'm more confident that "Just out of Reach" is in A major (that's what it resolves to at the end) than I am that "I Love You" is in A minor.  I should also note that the phrases repeat*, but I've included only four bars of each.  The phrase for the verses in "Just out of Reach" is only two bars, so that one's there twice.

Both phrases are comprised of the same four notes in the same order (A C D E), save for a C at the end of the phrases in "Just out of Reach."  I didn't realize this until I notated them, but each measure starts with the same rhythm too - a dotted quarter note and then an eighth note.

I looked up the recording dates to get the chronology right:  "Just out of Reach" was recorded on 2 March 1965, and "I Love You" on 8 July 1965.  "Just out of Reach" is a Blunstone song, so I'm unsure how involved Chris White was in coming up with that bass part.  It seems that either that bass part may have provided some inspiration for him to write "I Love You" (since the bass part for the verses of "I Love You" is basically an expanded version of that in "Just out of Reach") or both bass parts just illustrate his style of bass playing really well.

*I'm a bit unsure whether the phrases in the verses of "I Love You" really repeat or not because I can't tell if there are two verses of eight lines or four verses (in pairs) of four lines each.