"Telescope (Mr. Galileo)"

An-other thing I noticed when I listened to Into the Afterlife recently is that the "long" in the recurring line "And we will watch her all day long, my telescope and me" in "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" is sung with a melisma, giving a sense of that length of time.  There are two versions of "Telescope" on Into the Afterlife, and each has a slightly different articulation.  In track #5, "long" is sung to just two B notes, but in track #18, there's a trill (B A B).

After comparing the two, I think they feature different singers, although I can't find anything in the liner notes to confirm this.  I'm certain track #5 is sung by Rod Argent, and I think track #18 is sung by Chris White.

"Visions of Johanna"

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Collection Audit:

This morning I listened to the first disc of Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde (and I'm listening to the second disc now).  I found something in "Visions of Johanna" that both excited and confused me. 

At about 3:49, there's a short guitar riff: 

 

This is the fifth song I've found that riff in (which is the exciting part), but now I have even less of an answer to questions of influence (which is the confusing part). 

I first found that riff in the Zombies' "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" (there are two versions on Into the Afterlife, but that riff is only in the second version - the one with fuzz guitar).  Then I found it in the Moody Blues' "So Deep within You" from On the Threshold of a Dream.  A few months later, I stumbled across it in the Tremeloes' "Hello World."  And then I also found it (albeit on piano) in Colin Blunstone's "Caroline Goodbye" from One Year. 

"Visions of Johanna" predates all of those though.  It's from 1966.  "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" is from 1968 (but wasn't released until 2007).  "So Deep within You" and "Hello World" are both from 1969, and "Caroline Goodbye" is from 1971. 

I'd postulated that there was some influence between "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" and "So Deep within You" because the Zombies and Moody Blues knew each other, and there's almost certainly some connection between "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" and "Caroline Goodbye" because Rod Argent was the leader of the Zombies and played piano for Blunstone (who was also in the Zombies).  I'd had trouble fitting in the Tremeloes though. 

Finding that same phrase in this Dylan song still doesn't clear up everything, but it does introduce a new line of influence.  The Tremeloes covered Dylan's "I Shall Be Released" at the end of 1968, so they were familiar with him, possibly including that particular riff in "Visions of Johanna." 

A strumming pattern in "Visions of Johanna" also stuck out to me.  I'm not sure if I have the chord phrasing right, but it's something like: 

 

There's an Asus4 that modulates to an A major.  With a slight difference (modulating to A minor rather than A major) that same rhythm is in the Zombies' demo of "Call of the Night": 

 

"Call of the Night" was later re-workt into (and put into a different key for) "Girl Help Me," but that feature is present there too. 

I'm not sure if any of this really provides evidence that any of these musicians were influenced by an-other, but their songs at least share some similar features that I thought interesting.

I found more stuff about that riff in "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" and "Caroline Goodbye," but it doesn't really clear anything up.

I might have found a Dylan influence on "Call of the Night"/"Girl Help Me" though.

"Telescope (Mr. Galileo)"

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Two days ago, I figured out most of the fuzz guitar part for one of the versions of "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" on the Into the Afterlife album.  I have the basic phrases, and I think the parts I'm missing are just ornamentation.

I figured out the chords in September 2013, but - of course! - I didn't write them down and forgot them, so I had to re-learn those too.  I made sure to write everything down this time.  I'm pretty sure that the chords aren't actually played in the original (although some might be in the piano part), but having the chords helps in figuring out the other parts.

As Far as I Can See

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This morning, I listened to As Far as I Can See because - according to Russo's Collector's Guide - it was released to-day in 2004.  And - inevitably! - I noticed some things.  I worked on transcribing the lyrics although I later remembered that they're in the liner notes, which is helpful because I'd thought "black orchids" was "black rockets."

Because I just listened to "Imagine the Swan," I want to believe that the line "Made the colors true" in "In My Mind a Miracle" is a reference to the colors and their fading in "Imagine the Swan" ("For the colors are gone").  But more on that later.

There's the really obvious Odessey and Oracle reference in the line "In you I found my Odyssey and Oracle" (odyssey is spelt correctly in the liner notes), but more interesting is the following line: "No longer blind, I see because of you."  The blindness is linked with the oracle.  Traditionally, seers and prophets were often physically blind in a sort of exchange for their ability to see the future.  (I say "traditionally," but the only one I can think of is Tiresias.)

For years now, I've wondered if "I tried my best, but I could not cope / From the end of a telescope" in "Southside of the Street" is a reference to "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)" from Into the Afterlife.

"I Want to Fly" is interesting in that there's an internal mosaic rhyme that's dependent on a caesura:  "Some lay sleeping / Deep inside a lullaby"  The way Colin Blunstone articulates this, there's a pause after the "in" of "inside," so that "sleeping" rhymes with "deep in."

There's also mosaic rhyme in "As Far as I Can See" in the lines "From a blue horizon / That I keep my eyes on."  I haven't looked into the lyrics as much as I'd like to, but I don't remember any instances of mosaic rhyme in the "classic Zombie" catalogue (from 1964 to 1967-ish), so I felt it a technique worth noting here.

"As Far as I Can See" also seems to have a reference to home:

There's a safe house waiting
That I know is waiting
Some way down the line.

It's not called a "home," but the same idea is still presented.  Rhyming "waiting" with "waiting" further emphasizes the safety.

There are more typical Zombies themes in "With You Not Here."  There's crying in the lines "No feeling left beyond the tears" and "Don't know where I go from here / 'Cause there's really nothing clear / Beyond the tears," and there's dreaming in "There's only an empty space / Where once we crowded our hopes / And shared all our dreams."

More interesting than those though are the lines "The color's faded now / The world is grey."  This is a stronger allusion to the lines in "Imagine the Swan" – "For the colors are gone / You've become kind of grey," but even if that's just a coincidence, there's still the connection between those lines in "With You Not Here" and the line "You turned me round and made the colors true" in "In My Mind a Miracle."  So regardless whether there's the connection between eras of the Zombies catalogue, there is a connection within this album itself.

"Wings against the Sun" also has some elements that I think are references to past Zombies songs.  The first two lines are "In your eyes appear the mystic roses of spring / Inspiring songs of approaching summer," which I think includes two references: "A Rose for Emily" (which also mentions summer) and - because of the resemblance between "mystic" and "misty" - "Misty Roses" from Colin Blunstone's One Year album.  The word mist is in the preceding song "With You Not Here," which I think provides a shred more evidence that they were thinking about past songs while they were writing these.  The "Odyssey and Oracle" in "In My Mind a Miracle" certainly testifies to it.

In listening to "Together," I found an-other one of those sneaky historical references - one that had gone over my head for the six years I've owned this album.  I'm fairly certain that the last part of the couplet "And I've come to need you like flowers need the rain / Have to love you as much as seasons have to change in time" is a reference to "Time of the Season."  (Incidentally "I've come to need you like flowers need the rain" strongly resembles "I need you / Like the flower needs the rain" from America's "I Need You.")

"Golden days" from "Look for a Better Way" also appears in "Beechwood Park," but because it's not such a distinctive phrase, I'm not sure if this is a reference or just a coincidence that illustrates how consistent the Zombies' writing has been (despite the fact that "Beechwood Park" is a Chris White song and "Look for a Better Way" a Rod Argent song, although Chris White does contribute backing vocals for it).

In looking through the liner notes to confirm the lyrics I've quoted, I also discovered that Andrew Powell helped with scoring the orchestral arrangements.  I'm fairly certain this is the same Andrew Powell who arranged and conducted the orchestra for all of the Alan Parsons Project albums (excepting Vulture Culture).

"Telescope (Mr. Galileo)"

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After doing the guitar parts for "It Never Fails to Please Me" yester-day, I got thinking about the Into the Afterlife album.  Back in November, I had apparently figured out the bass part for "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)," but I don't really remember it and I didn't record a version.

But I think I figured out the chords for it.  I'm pretty sure these aren't actually played in the original version, but I find that it helps to figure out the parts if you know the chords.

It's interesting that the verses and the chorus use the same chord progression - just different melodies - but that doesn't make this any more interesting to listen to.

Into the Afterlife

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I listened to the entirety of Into the Afterlife to-day, and I'm pretty sure I learned the whole bass part for "Telescope (Mr. Galileo)."  I think I've figured out the little bass riff in "She Loves the Way They Love Her" too, which is the only part of that I had to figure out before I learned the whole bass part.