Argent

Backdated, archival post

[link to original on tumblr]

---&---

I just listened to Argent's eponymous album as part of my listening schedule, and - as always - I noticed things:

"Be Free"

I'm not exactly sure where the verse divisions are, but there's some parallelism either between the first two verses or within the first verse.

I said you'd be free, didn't I?
I said you'd climb high, didn't I?
Took you out to the sky
Told you one day you'd fly

You didn't believe me, did you then?
You didn't look up, did you then?
Didn't look to the sky
Didn't believe you'd fly
Didn't believe you'd fly

There's "didn't I" in the first verse (or first half of the first verse) and "did you then" in the second verse (or second half of the first).  There's the same verb with different subjects ending the first two lines of each verse (or each section).

"Dance in the Smoke"

The second and fourth lines of the verse (which is just repeated over and over again) are identical save for one word:

We will light a giant, burning fire tonight
We will build it and dance in the smoke
Every branch we'll tie somebody's worry to it
We will burn it and dance in the smoke

but those two different words alliterate with each other, so it's not a difference that sticks out that much.

"Free Fall"

I'd noticed before that during the hand-clapping part (which ends in a difficult rhythm before repeating), someone messes up and claps before they should.  But in listening to the song this time, I noticed that that mistake is after the line "That now I'm confused inside."  So while it's a mistake, it actually fits pretty well.  It's like it demonstrates the discord of the confusion.

"Stepping Stone"

I'd noticed before that in different iterations, the first line of what I guess is a chorus changes from "I would gladly make you happy" to "I would love to make you happy."  I realized listening to it this time that - duh! - it's a progression.  The feeling becomes more ardent as the song goes on.

"Stepping Stone"

Backdated, archival post

[link to original on tumblr]

---&---

When I listened to Argent last week, I noticed this guitar part in "Stepping Stone."  It reminded me of two things: a theme in Sibelius' Symphony No. 5 in E flat major, Op. 82 and a section of the Easybeats' "You Me, We Love."  I'd noticed the connection between that Sibelius symphony and the Easybeats before (I listened to Sibelius pieces on twenty-two of the twenty-eight days of February this year), so I decided to look into them all.

First, I learned the guitar part from "Stepping Stone."  My guitar tone doesn't really match, but I always have problems with that.  I might have some of the glissandi out of place, but I'm pretty sure on the notes themselves.

Then, I looked up that part of the Sibelius symphony (this morning, I started going through what Sibelius symphonies I have, and, fortunately, I guessed the one that the phrase is in).  It's in the first movement of Symphony No. 5.  I found it most clearly in the violins just after section J begins, but I think it's in one of the brass instruments a bit earlier (and I think that phrase is foreshadowed in the flutes and clarinets at the beginning of the B section earlier in the movement too).

(notation found here)

Then I knew that there wasn't a real similarity because that phrase in the Sibelius symphony is chromatic.  In the first and second measure there, it's Bb, A, Ab, G (and then it goes back up into the third measure - Ab, A, Bb).  The guitar phrase in "Stepping Stone" is very conjunct (the biggest leap is a third - from B to D), but it's not chromatic.

But I went on and looked at the phrase in the Easybeats' "You Me, We Love" anyway.  The guitar doubles the vocals during what I think is a bridge ("But if he knew / Of the life I go through...").  Like the guitar phrase in "Stepping Stone," it's very conjunct, but it's in a different key (although I'm not sure which key either is in).  That phrase in "You Me, We Love" also has a lot of accidentals.  It switches between A & A# and D & D# in spots.

So what I was hearing in these pieces was the conjunction (diatonic in "Stepping Stone" and "You Me, We Love" but chromatic in Sibelius' Symphony No. 5).  There really isn't anything specific that connects them.

Argent/Breathe Out, Breathe In

Backdated, archival post

[link to original on tumblr]

---&---

This morning, I listened to Argent and Breathe Out, Breathe In just for the sake of it.  I didn't even work on lyric transcriptions.  But I still noticed interesting stuff.  There are a lot of things I still have to look into, but here are things I'm sure about:

Argent
Some of the guitar part at the beginning of "Like Honey" is double-tracked.  I plan on recording an example of this, and when I post that, I'll explain more fully.

At about 1:16 in "The Feeling's Inside," there are guitar harmonics.

"Free Fall" starts with a falling fifth, beginning the song with a musical portrayal of what the lyrics relate.  When I confirmed this, I was surprised to find that it starts with the same falling fifth that "She's Not There" features - E to A.

There's some connection between "Stepping Stone" and "Brief Candles" in that the very end has a piano part (accompanied by bass in "Brief Candles") panned to one side ("Stepping Stone" is panned right; "Brief Candles" left).  That part is still audible on the other side, but it seems more distant, so between the two channels, you get the impression of space.  I'm not sure that's the best explanation though.

Breathe Out, Breathe In
For the first time, I noticed Rod Argent's falsetto part during the second halves of the choruses in "Play It for Real."  While Colin sings, "When you feel how you feel / There's no deal to reveal," Rod sings "Feel," spreading it out to four syllables.

There are a lot of elements that evoke the feeling of Odessey and Oracle too:

I'd noticed the music that's the mellotron plays in "Shine on Sunshine," but I don't think I'd really realized that it's a mellotron.

"A Moment in Time" also has mellotron, which I hadn't noticed at all.  The lines "Life is a stage where / We all just act a part" come from Shakespeare's As You Like It.  I'm not sure if I'd really recognized their origin before, but listening to it this time, I realized that it goes well with the quotation from The Tempest in the Odessey and Oracle liner notes and Macbeth's "brief candle" in "Brief Candles."

Finally, I noticed the lyrics in one of the verses of "Let It Go":

I long to see you
Back again
In sunshine after
Summer rain
That washed away
The hurt and pain
So we would never know

It re-uses a phrase from the first line of "Beechwood Park" - "Do you remember summer days just after summer rain."  Not realizing this until just now made me feel pretty dumb.  It was literally a head-smack moment.

Argent

Backdated, archival post

[link to original on tumblr]

---&---

I listened to Argent this morning and worked on transcribing the lyrics.  And I noticed some things.

In "Like Honey," there are some lines about flying:

So rise and learn to fly
Help the lonely hour of the night pass by
So rise and spread your wings
Help the lonely hour of the night begin

And then a few songs later, in "Be Free," there are more lines about flying:

If you're gonna spread your wings
And hear the song that freedom sings
Remember that I told you to be free
If you're gonna sweep the sky
And feel the wind come rushing by
Remember that I told you to be free

Both sets of lyrics are also pretty parallel structurally.

This might even bear some comparison to "Wings against the Sun" from the Zombies' 2004 album As Far as I Can See.  I haven't explored that yet.

On the second side, there's an-other instance of this - where the same theme is present in two songs - although it's not as strong a connection as that between "Like Honey" and "Be Free."  "Stepping Stone" has the line "I would gladly made you happy," and "Bring You Joy," the next song, has:

And I'll make you feel so happy
You could cry
Yes, I'll make you feel so happy
You will die

However, while those lines are sort of similar, the songs have different outlooks.

Additionally, I found some more instances of remembering, which is a major theme in Chris White's and Rod Argent's songs.  "Be Free" has the line "Remember that I told you to be free."  "Schoolgirl" (written by Russ Ballard) starts out with "Remember when you were a schoolgirl."  And "Stepping Stone" starts out with "Remember days when we were close and warm as night turned to dawn" and later has "Remember fresh and sweet the thought of summer ways, loving eyes, lazy day."  Those lines in particular connect "Stepping Stone" to the Zombies' "Beechwood Park," specifically the first two verses:

Do you remember summer days just after summer rain
When all the air was damp and warm in the green of country lanes
And the breeze would touch your hair, kiss your face, and make you care
About your world, your summer world
And we would count the evening stars as the day grew dark in Beechwood Park

Do you remember golden days and golden summer sun
The sound of laughter in our ears and the breeze as we would run
And the breeze would touch your hair, kiss your face, and make you care
About your world, your summer world
And we would count the evening stars as the day grew dark in Beechwood Park

Both refer to summer, warmth, and the day-to-night transition (although "Beechwood Park" is day to night and "Stepping Stone" is night to day).