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.
After noticing a similarity between "Just out of Reach" and "Soulville," I learned the chords to "Soulville" (there are only three) and the piano part at the beginning, which is not exactly in tempo but close enough. I feel it worth mentioning that there are two sequential half-steps (A, A#, B) in the guitar part at the end of the bridges (interspersing "He'll make you nimble / He'll make you quick").
I think this is only the second of the BBC tracks I've learned, and it's a new one in the catalogue.
After listening to it yester-day, I learned the bass part for "Just out of Reach." I hadn't done any work on it since September 2013, so it was past due. I also figured out one phrase in the organ solo (pretty much just an arpeggio of A minor), but I didn't include it here.
I think there might be some connection between this and "Soulville," which the Zombies performed on the BBC. In both bridges, one phrase of the melody is almost entirely one note. In "Just out of Reach," it's "Time will show that I mean what I say, you'll see," and in "Soulville," it's "I'm gonna see all the folks and know all the tricks, oh yeah." (Little Richard's "Long Tall Sally" is an-other song with a mostly one-note phrase: "Gonna tell Aunt Mary about Uncle John / He claims he has the misery, but he has a lot of fun, oh, baby," and - as I've mentioned before - I think the Beatles' "I'm Down" and Argent's "He's a Dynamo" have this feature too.)
According to the Zombie Heaven liner notes, the Zombies performed "Soulville" on 26 January 1965 (for eventual broadcast on 6 February), and I'm assuming that it was in their repertoire for awhile before that. There's at least a full month between that BBC performance of "Soulville" and recording "Just out of Reach" (2 March 1965), so it's possible that Colin Blunstone took some inspiration from that, but - again - it's just a conjectured influence.
I totally forgot to include the BBC broadcasts in my posts about "fifty years ago to-day in Zombie history."
According to the liner notes for Zombie Heaven, the Zombies were on Saturday Club fifty years ago to-day (6 February 1965) although it was recorded on 26 January and 2 February. The liner notes mention that the show wasn't broadcast on the 30th because of Winston Churchill's funeral (the procession of which inspired the rhythm in Chris White's "Remember You"), so the songs recorded on the 26th were added to those recorded on the 2nd.
In any case, they played "Tell Her No," "What More Can I Do," "I'm Going Home," "For You My Love," "Tell Her No" (acoustic piano version), and "Soulville" - tracks 5-10 on the fourth disc of Zombie Heaven.
