Rod Argent

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Rod Argent around 1980, found on page 59 of Rock Hardware on Google Books.

Counterpoints / Moving Home

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For Christmas, I got vinyl records of Argent's Counterpoints and Rod Argent's Moving Home, so now I'm pretty sure I have the complete catalogue of both (although Rod Argent has done guest appearances on a lot of tracks and albums by other artists).  I've listened to both only once so far, but here are my initial thoughts and comments:

• John Verity sings more leads parts on Counterpoints than he did on Circus (actually, I'm not sure if he sings any leads on Circus), and he sounds a lot like Russ Ballard, which is interesting because Verity (and John Grimaldi) joined Argent around 1974 since Ballard left.
• One of the songs on Counterpoints (I'm pretty sure it was "Rock and Roll Show") references Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode."
• It seemed that a lot of the songs on both albums mention memories, dreams, and home, which wasn't very surprising since a lot of the earlier Rod Argent-related songs have those same themes.
• There's a greater degree of synth parts on both too.  On Moving Home, there's a picture of Rod Argent with a Minimoog (which is probably the only synth I'd recognize by sight), and the credits also list the Yahama CS80 (which I've heard of because it's also listed in the credits of some Electric Light Orchestra albums).
• I'd seen a picture of the record sleeve for Moving Home, which has all of the lyrics, so I knew that "Home" is the same song that's on Colin Blunstone & Rod Argent's Out of the Shadows, but I was surprised to find that "No. 1" on Moving Home was later re-recorded (solely on piano) and re-titled "Sea Picture No. 1" for Rod Argent's Classically Speaking album.

At some point, I'm going to make vinyl rips of the albums, so that listening to them is more convenient.  But I'm probably going to do the same thing I did with Still Got That Hunger and just take a year to familiarize myself with them.

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I also got a sustain pedal for my keyboard, which means I can start going through my piano books again.  I started going through them over the summer, but I ran into difficulties when both of them wanted to teach me how to use the pedal.  I didn't have one to learn how to use.

I also got a few other related albums:  a vinyl-reissue of Bill Evans' Portrait in Jazz, which I wanted because Rod Argent's mentioned him in some interviews; Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, which I plan on listening to a lot next year; and a set of John Lee Hooker, although it doesn't include "No One Told Me," the song that Rod Argent took the first line of "She's Not There" from.

"Just a Little Bit"

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I've been looking into bass parts recently, so I wrote out the notation for "Just a Little Bit."  In doing so, I discovered that I was wrong about the bass part during the organ solo.  I'd thought the notes get progressively shorter, but it's actually just that they become more frequent.  What I thought were whole notes and half notes are actually just quarter notes.

I should also mention that I'm not quite sure about the time signature change at the end.  But I knew that if I didn't write down something, the notation I'd already done would just languish unfinished.

For much of this, the guitar just doubles the bass, just an octave higher.

"If It Don't Work Out"

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Last week, I was thinking about the rhythms in the bass parts of some Zombies' songs (ones written by Rod Argent, specifically).  I plan to write a lengthy post about them, but for now, here's the notation for the bass part in "If It Don't Work Out," which is one of the songs I was looking into:

"Without Her"

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Yester-day I listened to a Harry Nilsson compilation album.  The bass part for "Without Her" (which Colin Blunstone covered under his Neil MacArthur pseudonym) sounded easy, so I just figured that out (while simultaneously notating it [it's still incomplete, but I have at least one instance of each section written down]).  I just referenced the Neil MacArthur version and discovered that while that bass part is more complex, at least it's in the same key.  Honestly, I'm not exactly sure what key it is, but I would guess A minor because there aren't any accidentals.

"Never My Love"

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Verulam Cover Project:

I happened to hear the Association's "Along Comes Mary" on the radio this evening, and it reminded me that - hey! - the Association is a band I like (although I have only one album and it's the compilation The Association's Greatest Hits!).  Later I tried figuring out some parts to "Everything That Touches You," which is one of my favorites by them, but I didn't have any luck on it.  But then I tried "Never My Love," and I ended up getting all of the chords (although I'm sure not all of them are actually played in the song; some are implied or something like that).

And that's relevant for this project because Colin Blunstone recorded a cover of "Never My Love" under his Neil MacArthur pseudonym (although - honestly - I prefer the Association's original; the opening string part in the Neil MacArthur version strikes me as over-dramatic).  As far as I can tell, he uses the same chords as the Association, but his version is a half-step higher, which I'm grateful for.  The Association's version is in Db major, which is one of the most difficult keys (because it has five flats); a half-step higher is D major, which is much simpler (because it has only two sharps).

I noticed that going into the bridge ("How can you think love will end…"), there's a modulation from I to III, which is unusual (there's a accidental in that second chord that makes it major instead of minor).  However, that same change is also in "Friends of Mine."  ("Butcher's Tale" has a III to V modulation, and because "Butcher's Tale" is in a minor key, I think that's comparable, although I'm out of my depth here.)

Anyway, now that I know the chords, it should be easier to figure out some other parts.

I spent some more time verifying these as I wrote them down, and I discovered that I was missing two chords, one of which is sort of significant with regard to the I to III modulation I made so much about above.  I'd thought it was just Db major to F major (or D major to F# major in the Neil MacArthur version), but there's actually an Fsus4 (or F#sus4) in between there.  In the Neil MacArthur version, those middle notes (B to A#) are actually sung in the backing vocals as "ah"s.

So, it's still something like I to III, but there's that interstitial chord there (that I don't know how to simplify into the Roman numeral convention).

"Never My Love"

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I happened to hear the Association's "Along Comes Mary" on the radio this evening, and it reminded me that - hey! - the Association is a band I like (although I have only one album and it's the compilation The Association's Greatest Hits!).  Later I tried figuring out some parts to "Everything That Touches You," which is one of my favorites by them, but I didn't have any luck on it.  But then I tried "Never My Love," and I ended up getting all of the chords (although I'm sure not all of them are actually played in the song; some are implied or something like that).

And that's relevant for this project because Colin Blunstone recorded a cover of "Never My Love" under his Neil MacArthur pseudonym (although - honestly - I prefer the Association's original; the opening string part in the Neil MacArthur version strikes me as over-dramatic).  As far as I can tell, he uses the same chords as the Association, but his version is a half-step higher, which I'm grateful for.  The Association's version is in Db major, which is one of the most difficult keys (because it has five flats); a half-step higher is D major, which is much simpler (because it has only two sharps).

I noticed that going into the bridge ("How can you think love will end..."), there's a modulation from I to III, which is unusual (there's a accidental in that second chord that makes it major instead of minor).  However, that same change is also in "Friends of Mine."  ("Butcher's Tale" has a III to V modulation, and because "Butcher's Tale" is in a minor key, I think that's comparable, although I'm out of my depth here.)

Anyway, now that I know the chords, it should be easier to figure out some other parts.

"I Know She Will"

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This is just an incidental thing, but I realized recently that the opening guitar notes in "I Know She Will" are the same intervals as the NBC chime (I also realized that the song begins on an upbeat).

"I Know She Will" starts with the phrase E C# A.  The intervals are a sixth followed by a third.  It arpeggiates an inverted A major chord (and the song is in A major).

I found a section on NBC's array of websites that says their chime has the notes G E C, so while the intervals are the same, the pitches are different.  There's a video here (if you scroll down to 1929), but - inexplicably - those tones are C A F.

"The Best Is Yet to Come"

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Last night, I happened to think of Colin Blunstone's "The Best Is Yet to Come" (from On the Air Tonight), and I realized that the line "Whatever doesn't break you makes you stronger" is basically the same sentiment as "What doesn't kill me will fill me with life" in "Moving On" from Still Got That Hunger.

I recently read this Rod Argent interview where he mentions the internal rhyme there (kill, will, and fill), which I'll admit I hadn't noticed before.

R.I.P.

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About two weeks ago, I happened to look at the track-listing for the Zombies' R.I.P. album (which - as I understand - was supposed to be released after "Time of the Season" became a hit, but wasn't [the Zombie Heaven liner notes claim that "the advent of Argent probably stopped its release"]).  Apparently, it actually was released a few years ago, and it follows the original slated track listing, which is:

1. "She Loves the Way They Love Her"
2. "Imagine the Swan"
3. "Smokey Day"
4. "Girl Help Me"
5. "I Could Spend the Day"
6. "Conversation off Floral Street"
7. "If It Don't Work Out"
8. "I'll Call You Mine"
9. "I'll Keep Trying"
10. "I Know She Will"
11. "Don't Cry for Me"
12. "Walking in the Sun"

When I lookt at this, I realized that the two songs included here that Colin Blunstone recorded for One Year have the same track numbers in that sequencing.  That is: on One Year, "She Loves the Way They Love Her" is track #1, and "Smokey Day" is track #3.  I'm suspicious that this indicates that the sequencing of both albums was done by the same person or people.

Starbucks Commercial

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Verulam Cover Project:

I heard "This Will Be Our Year" in a commercial for Starbucks this evening, and I have mixed feelings about it.

A small part of me is excited that the Zombies are in an-other commercial because there's a chance that more people will learn about them through it.  (Which seems like a good segue to remind you to vote for their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction.)

Most of me is disappointed because of how the song's presented in the commercial.  It's the stereo mix rather than the mono mix (which I know only because it's missing the horn overdubs, which are present only in the mono mix).  In my opinion, the mono mix is superior.  Not only are the horn overdubs there, but the piano seems stronger in a way.  It might not be the right word, but it seems more focused in the mono mix.

Mostly though, I just think it's kind of ridiculous that there are three sections of the song edited together for a thirty-second commercial (or however short it is).  Chopping it up doesn't really give a true sense of what the song is.

It's always weird when songs I love are in commercials because - more often than not - I'm more interested in the song and in supporting the band than I am in whatever product the company is trying to sell by exploiting my emotional investment in the song.  I mean, I wasn't even looking at the television until I heard the opening chords (which I recognized immediately), and I was much more interesting in the Zombies' being on television than in Starbucks.  (I'm apparently an outlier among erstwhile English majors in that I don't drink coffee.  I had it once; I dislike it.)

 I saw the same ad on Twitter this morning, and I searched for (and found it) on YouTube:

Now that I can go back and really listen to it and analyze their edits (rather than catch a fleeting television commercial), I'm pretty annoyed at it.

One of the best (musical) features of the song - in my opinion, anyway - is the chromatic bass part and how even the chords by themselves contain that descent.  They edited the introductory piano part so that chromaticism is completely destroyed.  Instead of the chromatic phrase from A to E and then the diatonically descending phrase with the triplet (D, D, C#, B, A), it goes from G# to D.

The "And I won't forget the way you held me up when I was down" section following the first verse is excised, so the wonderful modulation from D minor to D major that's coincident with "'Darling, I love you'" is also absent.

I'd thought they'd edited the piano break from the middle so that it transitions into the piano part at the very end (which wouldn't work because there's a key change from A major to Bb major), but they just end it right before that key change.  While that key change might be troublesome for me to play sometimes (it's easier to play the chord progression in A major than Bb major), I still think it's an integral part of the song.  To some degree, it represents the temporal progression to what is now "our year."

While I'm hesitant to concede it, I realized that they have to edit the song in some way in order to make it fit a thirty-second commercial, but these edits are terrible.

Starbucks Commercial

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I heard "This Will Be Our Year" in a commercial for Starbucks this evening, and I have mixed feelings about it.

A small part of me is excited that the Zombies are in an-other commercial because there's a chance that more people will learn about them through it.  (Which seems like a good segue to remind you to vote for their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction.)

Most of me is disappointed because of how the song's presented in the commercial.  It's the stereo mix rather than the mono mix (which I know only because it's missing the horn overdubs, which are present only in the mono mix).  In my opinion, the mono mix is superior.  Not only are the horn overdubs there, but the piano seems stronger in a way.  It might not be the right word, but it seems more focused in the mono mix.

Mostly though, I just think it's kind of ridiculous that there are three sections of the song edited together for a thirty-second commercial (or however short it is).  Chopping it up doesn't really give a true sense of what the song is.

It's always weird when songs I love are in commercials because - more often than not - I'm more interested in the song and in supporting the band than I am in whatever product the company is trying to sell by exploiting my emotional investment in the song.  I mean, I wasn't even looking at the television until I heard the opening chords (which I recognized immediately), and I was much more interesting in the Zombies' being on television than in Starbucks.  (I'm apparently an outlier among erstwhile English majors in that I don't drink coffee.  I had it once; I dislike it.)

"Gotta Get a Hold of Myself"

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I have notation this week too!

Over the last couple days, I notated the bass part for "Gotta Get a Hold of Myself."  In the process, I discovered that I'd been missing some notes (which seems to be a regular thing; notation forces me to scrutinize what I'm playing).

The whole rests at the beginning and the first pair of tied whole notes at the end are where the organ plays the main motif, but the tempo there isn't consistent.  The musical term is rubato.

Because the 50th anniversary of the recording (1 November 1966) and broadcast (5 November 1966) of the radio version of "Gotta Get a Hold of Myself" was last week, I also lookt into that and notated it.  A long time ago, I mentioned something about comparing the studio versions with the live versions, and this was the first time I did that in a structured way.  I… uh, took note (I can't think of a less musical way to say that) of the notes that differed from the studio version, and when I wrote out the notation, I put those notes in red.  There are only four different notes, so starting a studio version/live version comparison with this song was sort of underwhelming, but there you go:

"Smokey Day"

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It's been almost a month since I recorded anything for this project; it's been too long.

After I wrote about "Smokey Day" recently, I figured out some more of it.  At first, it was just the introductory flute phrase, but then I got the rest of the guitar part (it turns out I already had the difficult part with the 6th chord and the weird E7; the part I was missing was much easier).  Like last time, I got a blister from playing this, but it took only two takes this time, rather than seventeen (it's not perfect though).

Before I recorded this, I got thinking about the bass part and realized it sounded pretty easy.  As it turns out, it's only, like, five notes.  That should have been pretty obvious, because it was after listening to Colin Blunstone's version and noticing the simplicity of that bass part that I figured out the first section of the guitar part in the Zombies' version (although it was recorded with Argent personnel, plus Mike Vickers).

My recording ends just before the line "Hear the call of plaintive voices" because at that point, the rest of the instruments stop, and it's just harpsichord for eight measures.  And I still can't understand what the line after that is.  It picks up after that section with the same parts, but it resolves to Bb major, which is weird since the rest of the song is in either F major or A minor (I haven't figured out enough to be certain).

Since I figured out a flute part for this, it seems relevant to say that I'm about halfway to having enough money to buy one.  I could actually buy one now, but I'd like to have some money left in my bank account, so I'm doing the fiscally responsible thing and waiting until I have twice as much as it costs before buying it.  I'm hoping that the price will go down a bit after Christmas (when I'll probably reject responsibility and buy one anyway).  That's what happened with my twelve-string guitar.  On Christmas Day 2012, the price dropped something like 30%, and that's how I got my Burns Double-Six, which is the same guitar Paul Atkinson had.

"Soulville"

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Collection Audit:

This morning I listened to the last disc of the Zombies' Zombie Heaven, subtitled "Live on the BBC," and I noticed a small thing about their version of "Soulville."  During a section about halfway through the song, the backing vocals consist of the phrase "Come on down to Soulville."  The "down" there is sung with two syllables; it's a G down to an E.  That descent sort of represents the whole "Come on down to Soulville" phrase itself.

"Smokey Day"

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Collection Audit:

This morning I listened to the second disc of the Zombies' Zombie Heaven (which is the last album I have to listen to before completing Collection Audit this year).  I'm pretty sure I'd noticed before that the harpsichord in "Smokey Day" is panned through different channels about halfway through the song (starting at about 1:00), but this morning I realized that that effect is connected to the lyrics.  The harpsichord moves from the left channel to the right channel after the line "Soft, serene, she dances," and during the next line "Moving sweetly through my life," it moves back to the left channel.  Both of those lines deal with movement, and the harpsichord somewhat literally underscores that movement through that panning.

I've been going through Zombie Heaven again for my Collection Audit project, and I noticed something about "Smokey Day."

Saturday Club

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Verulam Cover Project:

According to the Zombie Heaven liner notes, fifty years ago to-day (1 November 1966), the Zombies recorded "Gotta Get a Hold of Myself," "Goin' out of My Head," and "This Old Heart of Mine" for "Saturday Club."  The show was broadcast on 5 November.

"You'll Go from Me"

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As part of my Collection Audit project, I'm listening to the Zombie Heaven discs again.  I just listened to the third disc, and I noticed the lines "I want to hold you tight / While the warmth of the night surrounds us" in "You'll Go from Me" (the demo of what became "Don't Go Away").  I'm not sure of those line breaks, though.

In any case, these lines are fairly similar to some in "Maybe after He’s Gone," which - like "You'll Go from Me" - was written by Chris White.  The last verse is:  "I feel so cold; I'm on my own / As the night folds in around me / Night surrounds me; I'm alone."

The situations are the same:  night is surrounding the speaker/singer, but there's a difference in temperature.  In "You'll Go from Me" and "Don't Go Away" (the lyrics are the same; I think it's only the structure that's different), it's "the warmth of the night" because the speaker/singer is with a girl who loves him, but the speaker/singer in "Maybe after He's Gone" is "so cold" because he's alone.

Rod Argent's Harmonica

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Because I mentioned Rod Argent's harmonica in this picture (I'd never noticed it before), I feel like I should also mention that it's visible in this footage from 1964:

It's on top of his organ at about 1:21 (inexplicably, he doesn't seem to have his Hohner Pianette):

You can just make out some of the holes in the side.  It also looks like there are some guitar picks near the corner of the organ.  Paul Atkinson is standing next to him, so that makes sense.

Anyway, this is just to mention that both of these pictures seem to evidence that Argent played harmonica more during shows than in the studio.  I think "I Got My Mojo Working" and "Work 'n' Play" are the only two Zombies songs that feature it.

This footage is labeled as "Halden 1964," and "NRK" stands for Norsk rikskringkasting (basically, the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation).  Jeg snakker norsk, men ikke godt; I did research.  I lookt up the list of gigs in the Zombie Heaven liner notes, and while I didn't find Halden, the Zombies did tour the Scandinavian countries from 28 November to 8 December 1964.  There's a quote from Colin, and he mentions that it was their first tour abroad, so it's quite remarkable that this - which is (apparently) the only extant footage of the 1960s Zombies performing an actual gig, and not on a television show of some kind - is from such an early period.

I searched the NRK website, but I couldn't even find this footage, let alone at a better resolution or more of it.

Zombies Newsletter

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Here are a couple more things I wanted to note about the 1 November Zombies newsletter.

This picture from their recent photo shoot was included:

Chris White has a bass that says, "This is a piano" and "This way up," just like the one he used to record Odessey & Oracle (and - apparently - later gave to Jim Rodford):

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There's a bit of an interview with Terry Quirk too, and it's mentioned that the figure on the Still Got That Hunger album cover is indeed inspired by Michelangelo (which I discovered back in February):

Here's the album cover again:

Rod Argent's Harmonica

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[source]

I'd seen this picture before, but I didn't notice until now that Rod's holding his harmonica.

Saturday Club

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According to the Zombie Heaven liner notes, fifty years ago to-day (1 November 1966), the Zombies recorded "Gotta Get a Hold of Myself," "Goin' out of My Head," and "This Old Heart of Mine" for "Saturday Club."  The show was broadcast on 5 November.

"I Want Her She Wants Me"

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I have a bunch of things I need to get around to writing.  Here's something about "I Want Her She Wants Me" that I realized back in April:

The bass part at the end of the song just repeats the same figure (G D E G' E D G), and in some ways, this figure represents the mutual wanting in the title and lyrics.  There are two G notes in the figure, and they're an octave apart.  The phrase involves moving from one G up to the second and then back down to the first.  So the ascent represents "I want her," and the descent is the reciprocal "She wants me."

"Goin' out of My Head"

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According to the liner notes for both Zombie Heaven and The Decca Stereo Anthology, fifty years ago to-day (23 October 1966), the Zombies recorded "Goin' out of My Head" - the last song they recorded while at Decca.  (The Decca Stereo Anthology also notes that "orchestral overdubs on 'Goin' out of My Head' [were] probably recorded at a later date.")

Unlike most of the Zombies' Decca-era recordings, this wasn't at Studio No. 2 in Decca West Hampstead.  Zombie Heaven says just "Kingsway," but The Decca Stereo Anthology is more specific, citing "De Lane Lea, Portland Place."

"Rejoice"

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Rod Argent playing the organ tonight before our show at the @stalbanscathedral. What a very special and magical night it was, thank you to everyone who came out. . #Repost ・・・ The incredible #talent that is #RodArgent playing the pump organ at #StAlbansCathedral #Argent #TheZombies #rrhofnominees #ilovemywork #RockLegend

A post shared by The Zombies (@thezombiesofficial) on Oct 21, 2016 at 6:16pm PDT

 Rod Argent plays the opening phrase from Argent's "Rejoice" on the St Albans Cathedral organ!

Rod Argent

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Rod Argent at the organ at St Albans Cathedral (from this album)

"A Rose for Emily"

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I recently re-discovered Khan Academy, and I've been going through the Music Basics course.  This morning I watched this video, which says that flats and sharps cannot be mixed in a key signature.  I was wondering about that earlier this month when I posted my notation of the cello part in "A Rose for Emily."  So while my notation is wrong from what I guess I would call an academic point of view, it's right from a tonal point of view.  I wrote some notes in the wrong method, but they're still the right notes (I think).

"She's Not There"

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Yester-day I watched the Zombies' concert at The Water Rats (be aware that there are a lot of quickly flashing lights in the video).  It's a great performance.  Tom Toomey and Steve Rodford both have brief solos in "She's Not There," which is a new feature, and it was good to see Jim Rodford playing his Mustang bass.  The last time I saw it was during the Breathe Out, Breathe In sessions.  And Rod Argent includes a quotation of Bach's Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben, BWV 147 in the solo in "Hold Your Head Up."

Anyway, I was reminded of the guitar riff that's been included in live versions of "She's Not There" since at least 2011.  There were a couple times I'd thought it sounded pretty easy, and I finally figured it out last night.

In my recording, I have just the bass part that links the first chorus and the second verse and that guitar riff.

Here's the tab:

I referenced four different videos of live performances (on KEXP, SummerStage, the first Vintage TV appearance, and this second Vintage TV show at The Water Rats) to be as accurate as possible in that tab.  (There's also the DVD of Live at Metropolis Studios, which I think may be the first appearance of that riff, but I didn't feel like digging it out.)  I figured it out from audio recordings, and I was playing the last note in the third phrase (an A) as an open string, but in each of those videos, Tom Toomey plays it on the fifth fret of the E string.

I hadn't really considered the origin of this phrase before, but after figuring it out, I have a suspicion that Rod Argent's behind it.  He wrote the song, so it makes sense, but there's also one of his trademark three-note chromatic phrases at the end (G G# A).

"A Rose for Emily"

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I have more notation this week (albeit late at night because my internet connection's been atrocious)!  For the last week or two, I've been working on the cello part in "A Rose for Emily" (I'm hoping that becoming familiar with the cello part will help in figuring out the mellotron part).  After spending some time trying to figure it out from the version on Zombie Heaven, I realized that by splitting the track, I could hear it better because it was a bit more isolated.  And then I split the track with cello and mellotron from the 30th anniversary edition of Odessey and Oracle, and I found that it's even easier to hear there.  So I think what I have is more accurate than if I'd just listened to the tracks as they are on the CDs.

I'm a bit unsure of the key, but I put it in A major because that's what the song resolves to.  I have a couple piano markings, but they apply only to the notes they're above (C#s).

It wasn't until going over this again before I scanned it that I discovered that there's an-other Argentian three-note chromatic phrase.  At the end of the fifth line into the sixth, there's G# A Bb.  (Although maybe I shouldn't be mixing sharps and flats like that.)

For some reason, as I was going over this, it kept reminding me of "Greensleeves," but - so far, at least - I can't really find any resemblance.

Anyway, notation:

"Gotta Get a Hold of Myself" b/w "The Way I Feel Inside"

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According to Russo's Collector's Guide and the Zombie Heaven liner notes, fifty years ago to-day (23 September 1966), the Zombies' "Gotta Get a Hold of Myself" b/w "The Way I Feel Inside" (Decca F. 12495) was released in the U.K.

Hugh Grundy's Drums

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Earlier this week, I was looking at the Rex photos again, and I noticed something.  I can't tell precisely what it is, but there's a coat or blanket or something inside Hugh Grundy's bass drum:

It's a bit more visible (but further in the background) in this one:

After I saw that, I remembered something that Geoff Emerick wrote in Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles:

I decided to do something to dampen the bass drum... As quickly as I could, I removed the bass drum's front skin - the one with the famous "dropped-T" Beatles logo on it - and stuffed the sweater inside so that it was flush against the rear beater skin.  Then I replaced the front skin and positioned the bass drum mic directly in front of it, angled down slightly but so close that it was almost touching (pp. 12-13).

In Revolver: How the Beatles Reimagined Rock 'n' Roll, Robert Rodriguez, who's somewhat critical of Emerick's foggy memories, also writes that

Emerick had noticed Ringo's habit of dampening his snare drum's head with a cigarette pack.  The engineer wondered if applying some sort of muffling to the kick would result in a more powerful sound on tape (p. 105).

And then he goes on to describe the same process that Emerick writes about.

It seems that either Emerick himself or Peter Vince (the other Abbey Road engineer who workt on Odessey and Oracle) did the same thing here.  I went looking through Claes Johansen's The Zombies: Hung up on a Dream, and I found something Chris White says about this: "When we went to Abbey Road people like Geoff Emerick and Peter Vince engineered us.  They had been doing all the Beatles stuff and we could get great drum sounds" (p. 166).

I think I'm most excited about having noticed out because it's a demonstrable example of something that the Abbey Road engineers did to improve the sound of Odessey and Oracle.  In interviews, Rod Argent always says that because they were walking into Abbey Road as the Beatles were walking out after Sgt. Pepper, they had the technical advantages that the engineers came up with for the Beatles.  In particular, he mentions that they had eight tracks on which to record, but that's actually not correct.  Johansen writes that "all the songs had been recorded on four-track equipment with just mono in mind" (p. 175).  As a bonus feature on the 40th anniversary concert DVD, there's an excerpt from a documentary (which I can't seem to find in its entirety), and right after Rod Argent says, "We were a bit like kids in the toy shop in the sense that suddenly there were eight tracks to play with," it cuts to Chris White, who says, "We knew we had the limitation of four tracks, and Rod's wrong; it was four.  I've got them."  Presumably, he's referring to the master tapes.

After writing all of that, the chronology piqued my interest, so I did some research on that too.  I skimmed the entries in Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions (which I haven't gotten around to reading yet), and the last date I can find with any Sgt. Pepper song is 20 April 1967 (mixing the stereo version of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)").  According to the Zombie Heaven liner notes, "Friends of Mine" and part of "A Rose for Emily" were recorded on 1 June, which Lewisohn lists as the U.K. release date for Sgt. Pepper.  At some point, I'd like to cross reference the Odessey and Oracle recording dates with the dates in Lewisohn's book, just to see if the Zombies were recording at the same time the Beatles were.

In any case, this was a lot longer than I'd planned.  Here's a more trivial thing I noticed while looking through the pictures again.  On the right in the picture below, you can see a plaid suit coat on the piano:

That's Hugh's; here he is wearing it outside:

"I Don't Want to Know"

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At the end of July, I said I had only one more notation post planned, but then I never got around to posting it.  Part of that was procrastination, and part of it was just my forgetting about it.  So I finally got around to finishing off a patchwork notation (actual notation, chords, and tabs) of the guitar part in "I Don't Want to Know."

When I wrote out the riff in notation, I discovered that - while it's repeated so that it lasts a while - it's actually only two measures:

Here's the whole song written out:

|: Riff, played thrice
A major
C major / A major / B major :|

D major / A major
Solo*
A major
C major / A major / B major

Riff, played just once
A major
C major** / A major / B major

D major / F# minor / G major / A major
D major / F# minor / G major / A major
F# minor / G major / A major / D major

–
*This was the cause of most of my procrastination; I had to write out the tab for this, but I couldn't just write it out in this post because the formatting would be off, so here's a screen clipping of it written out in characters of equal width:

I used tildes (~) to indicate glissandi.  I should also note that I put a line break there, lest it get too long.

**In the transition from this C major to A major, there's an added figure:

The way I play it, all of the chords are barre chords, which makes it easier to play this figure.

"Rejoice"

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A couple days ago, I read this Rod Argent interview (which is pretty decent compared to most; part of it is Argent's standard answers to common questions, but it does branch out a bit).  He talks about a couple of the earlier Argent songs, including "Rejoice" from Ring of Hands.

This morning I was playing various Zombies things on piano, and just before I quit, I played the opening (which is also the closing) phrase from "Changes."  Because I recently read that interview (in which Argent briefly mentions the structure of "Rejoice"), I realized that both "Changes" and "Rejoice" have an introductory keyboard part that's repeated at the end as a conclusion.

"Care of Cell 44"

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I knew I'd been procrastinating on this, but I didn't know how long I've been procrastinating on this.  Back in June after I posted the chords to "Care of Cell 44" I learned the vocal melody.  There are a couple interesting things that I felt a recording illustrated better than just text, so I recorded an abbreviated piano version.  I think all I omitted was one of the initial two verses, but because I played this from memory and not along to the recording, it goes a lot faster (as is apparently my wont).

The "better, baby" in the first line ("Good morning to you, I hope you're feeling better, baby") has an ascending melody (G A B C), which reflects the meaning of that adverb.  There's an ascent to represent that optimism ("I hope") and improvement ("better").

I've written before about how - while the speaker/singer seems optimistic - there are some musical things that portend ill toward the relationship in the song (like the static bass part in the bridge [to which I can now also add the static vocal melody; it also gets stuck on a G note for a while] and the dissonant tritone [G and C#] in the a cappella sections, not to mention the lyric "Kiss and make up," which seems to indicate that the speaker/singer had some involvement in the girl's incarceration).  I found some more of those.

The "home" in the line "Feels so good you're coming home soon" is sung to an A note.  The song is (mostly) in G major though (where the musical "home" is a G note), so there's sort of a musical implication that the home to which the girl is going isn't the same one that the singer/speaker is talking (or singing) about.  It's as if she's going to A major instead.

During the bridge (particularly during the A7 chords, so roughly for the lyrics "we used to walk" and "we used to talk"), the melody is on the off-beats, which implies that the two people walked out-of-step and that there was some friction in their talking to each other.

The "and it could be so nice" is sung in either a different key or with a lot of accidentals (it's G G F Eb F D).  Because of that foreign tonality, there's a feeling of difference, which I suppose the conditional "could" also points to, but it remains that the different tonality there is because of either a different key or a lot of accidentals (implying that the girl would have to go somewhere else for it to "be so nice" or that - like the accidentals - the speaker/singer would have to change a lot).

"Lothlorien"

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Yester-day, the Zombies posted a link to this interview with Rod Argent, and he confirmed something I'd been suspicious of for years (and wrote about a couple months ago):

I did enjoy doing "Lothlorien". It obviously came from Lord of the Rings – I had just read Lord of the Rings.

Coincidentally, 43 years ago to-day (2 September 1973) J.R.R. Tolkien - the author of The Lord of the Rings - died.

The Bluetones

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Pictures of Jim Rodford in the Bluetones from this article that also reveals that he's writing a memoir!

"Pleasure"

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I recently listened to Argent's Ring of Hands for my Collection Audit project, and I noticed something interesting about "Pleasure."

After the first part of the solo (the part that's mostly arpeggios doubled on electric piano and organ), the guitar rhythm (starting at about 2:06) has exponentially diminishing note values, the same feature that's also in the bass part of the alternate version of the Zombies' "I Want You Back Again" and the version of "Just a Little Bit" that they performed on The Beat Show in November 1965.  (I wrote about this in two posts last year.)

Here's my hand-written notation for the bass part of the alternate version of "I Want You Back Again":

Here's the notation I made for the bass part in the live version of "Just a Little Bit":

And here's the rhythm of the guitar chords in the second half of the solo in "Pleasure."  They're E major chords, but I'm not sure of the exact phrasing (I think it's the standard E B E G# B E, but I don't think every note in that fingering is played), so I just notated E notes.

The note values are both larger and shorter here, starting with four measures of tied whole notes (sixteen beats) and ending with sixteenth notes, but it's the same feature.

Like I've mentioned before, Rod Argent and Chris White shared the writing credits during this period although they continued to write separately.  Because this feature is present in both "I Want You Back Again" and "Pleasure" and because "I Want You Back Again" was written by Argent, it seems to suggest that he wrote "Pleasure" too.

Back in January 2015, I discovered that a phrase in the bass register of the piano part at the beginning of "Pleasure" (B C# D# E F# G#) is also in the Argent-written "Hung up on a Dream," a similarity that also seems to suggest that he wrote "Pleasure."

"Celebration"

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Collection Audit:

This morning I listened to Argent's Ring of Hands, and I noticed something about "Celebration," the first track.  The first couple lines ("Celebration / An invitation") are sung by just one voice, but then more voices join in for the next lines ("To come and join in / The ring of hands together"), so there's a musical representation of that "join[ing] in."

Olympic Studios / "Road Runner"

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Two general sorts of things:

1.  I recently ran across a reference to Olympic Studios, and it made me realize how appropriate it is that some of the Odessey and Oracle songs ("Maybe after He's Gone," "Beechwood Park," and "I Want Her She Wants Me") were recorded there.  The title of the album conjures up Greek mythology (and The Odyssey, in particular), and Mount Olympus is where the Greek gods lived.

This sends me off on a tangent, though.  Previously, I've linked to this photo set of the Zombies recording at Abbey Road.  The caption for the set says, "Sixties band 'The Zombies' pictured during the recording of 'Time of the Season' at EMI's Abbey Road studios in September 1967."  I'd always been dubious of the claim that they were recording "Time of the Season."  I just thought, "Oh, well, they're probably just attaching their pictures to the Zombies' most famous song.  Who knows what they were actually recording."  But in referencing the Zombie Heaven liner notes to see which songs were recorded at Olympic Studios, I think I've inadvertently proven that those pictures are of the Zombies recording "Time of the Season."  Hammond organ is present on only two tracks on the album - "Beechwood Park" and "Time of the Season."  "Beechwood Park" was recorded at Olympic Studios, and Rod Argent's playing Hammond in some of these pictures, so it has to be for "Time of the Season."  (Unless he was just playing around with the Hammond in the studio, but considering the time and budget constraints they were under to record the album, I don't think that's likely.)

2. Two days ago, I re-organized some of the folders in which I keep my recordings for this project.  While putting the Begin Here songs in their proper track listing, I realized that since "Road Runner" starts a cappella and starts Begin Here, the album itself begins with an a cappella part.  Last night I was thinking about this again, and I remembered some other album does the same thing.  Eventually, I remembered specifically that it's the Beatles' Beatles for Sale.  "No Reply" starts with an a cappella "This happened once before."  Beatles for Sale is my favorite Beatles album, so I knew that offhand, but With the Beatles (and "It Won't Be Long") has a cappella start too.

The Zombie Heaven liner notes and Russo's Collector's Guide both list the release of Begin Here as April 1965; Russo says the 30th specifically where Zombie Heaven lists only the month.  Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions lists the release date of With the Beatles as 22 November 1963 and Beatles for Sale as 4 December 1964.  (The U.K. release dates are the only important ones here because none of these albums were released in the same form in the U.S.)  Chronologically, it's possible that Begin Here's starting with an a cappella part is a nod toward the Beatles, but since the Zombies didn't have any control in the studio at that point, I'm not sure if they would have had any control over the track sequencing.  Still, I think it's an interesting similarity.

"I Can't Be Wrong"

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I felt like figuring out a part last night, and since I'd listened to New World recently (well, sort of recently, two weeks ago), I thought I'd figure out a part from that album.  But because it had been a while since I'd listened to it, I couldn't remember which parts I'd thought sounded easy when I listened to it.  I did get this guitar phrase from "I Can't Be Wrong" though.  I think it's actually played on a (double-tracked) classical, nylon-strung guitar, but I don't have one of those.  I hadn't noticed until figuring it out that there's a keyboard part under this, so that'll probably be the next part of this song that I try to figure out.

The Zombies

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[source]

I was going through my Twitter favorites and found this again.

I love this picture.

Argent at the Palace Theatre

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About a week ago, The Zombies Fan Club Page posted a link to an Argent concert at the Palace Theatre on November 7, 1973.  I finally got around to listening to it this morning, and I thought I'd link to and write about it here.

Each track is posted individually, but they're all accompanied by the same article.

"It's Only Money, Pts. 2 & 1"

Paste, the site that posted this, claims that "the recording begin[s] in progress" and that this is incomplete, but it's not.  It actually starts with the second movement (Prelude) of "Pure Love," and then there's "It's Only Money, Pt. 2," which transitions into "It's Only Money, Pt. 1," just like on the Encore album (which was released a year later, in November 1974).

I think it's interesting that at one point Ballard sings, "I'm the taxman" where the studio version has "Pay the taxman."  Changing that line gives this live version a bit of an echo of the Beatles' "Taxman."

"God Gave Rock & Roll to You"

"I Don't Believe in Miracles"

About three years ago, I found some Argent videos on YouTube, so I'd actually heard this performance before.  Like the article notes though, these are stereo mixes, rather than the mono mixes that were used when this was televised.

Here's the video:

"I Am the Dance of Ages"

"The Fakir"

In the set list that the article provides, "The Fakir" is the last song, but at the end of "I Am the Dance of Ages," Ballard says that the next song features Bob Henrit, the drummer, and "The Fakir" has a drum solo.  I downloaded all of these tracks, and playing the audio files back-to-back, the transition between the two is seamless.  Furthermore, in the metadata, "The Fakir" is listed as number 5, so I don't think the end of the article's set list is right.  At the end of "Hold Your Head Up," Rod Argent says, "Good night.  Thank you," which seems to indicate the end of the show.

When The Zombies Fan Club Page posted this, they mentioned a "familiar riff at about 4:50" (I'd be more precise and say 4:46).  When I listened to this, I'd forgotten about that, but I did recognize it; it's a variation on the melody from the "But it's too late to say you're sorry..." section of "She's Not There."

I dug out my copy of Henrit's autobiography (Bangin' On) because I remembered that he has a couple of interesting comments about "The Fakir."  First: "Even though it was de rigueur at the time, the real reason we had a drum solo in Argent was because of Jim's weak bladder!"  Second (but actually earlier in the book): "Halfway through [the show, a different one from this one at the Palace Theatre], at the usual spot in the show when Jim's bladder needed to be emptied, I launched into my drum solo aka The Fakir, threw my sticks away, attacked the cymbals with my belt and got stuck into the sensitive passage where I played with my hands.  I had to keep my head down and really aim accurately, so I didn't inadvertently bloody my knuckles on sharp drum bits and cymbals...."  Henrit's timeline - with "The Fakir" about halfway through the set - also seems to suggest that Paste's set list is wrong.

I found a video of this too (although at the time, I didn't know the song had a name).  It doesn't last as long as the audio recording that Paste posted, but Henrit's playing drums with his hands instead of his sticks is visible:

"Keep on Rollin'"

"Hold Your Head Up"

Paste mentions that Argent includes "The Star Spangled Banner" in his solo, and I'm sort of glad they did because he plays it at about half its usual speed and I'm not sure I would have recognized it if I hadn't been prepared.  It strikes me a bit odd though that Paste mentions his quotation of "The Star Spangled Banner" but not his quotation of "Yankee Doodle."

There's video from this too.  Three years ago, I downloaded two videos, and while the titles have different dates, they're the same performance; one just has the wrong date.  I can't find the complete performance (apparently that video was taken down or deleted), but here's the one that's still up:

In the video, you can see Ballard's swinging his guitar around while hanging on to the holes in it.  Somewhere in his book (I can't seem to find the specific passage), Henrit writes that Ballard had holes in his guitar expressly for that purpose.

–

I also have some more general comments about this.

The first sentence of the article says that "keyboardist Rod Argent and songwriter/guitarist Russ Ballard teamed up to form the progressive rock group Argent," and I think that's a bit misleading.  In the accounts I've read, the band Argent started with Rod Argent and Chris White (who isn't mentioned at all in the article).  Because White wanted to be just a writer and a producer (rather than a playing member of the band), Argent recruited Jim Rodford to play bass.  Ballard and Henrit were the last to join.

As the article mentions, the material performed here (aside from "I Don't Believe in Miracles" and "The Fakir") are from the albums All Together Now and In Deep.  I was curious about the time frame, so I lookt up the release date of In Deep and found that this is seven months afterwards.  According to Russo's Collector's Guide, the U.K. release of In Deep was 23 March 1973, and the U.S. release was three days later (the 26th).  There's some mellotron on In Deep, but this performance shows Argent expanding his instrumental palette, as it were, with mellotron and Moog.  I think the Nexus album (released in the U.K. on 22 February 1974 and in the U.S. on 22 April) is the first Argent album to have Moog, and it's on some tracks on Circus too.  Counterpoints hasn't been released on CD (hopefully it will be), so I don't know what keyboards are used there.

Paste seems to have some other period live recordings of Argent, and I'm curious about those too, but I'm going to wait a while before indulging in them.