"The Way I Feel Inside"

Recently, I've been re-learning some parts that I never wrote down and have forgotten.  Last night, I re-learned and notated the bass part for "The Way I Feel Inside," and I thought I'd post it here (appropriately, on Chris White's birthday).

The bass plays only in the last section of the song, and there's a ritardando at the end.

"The Way I Feel Inside" [rehearsal version]

In archiving my old recordings of "The Way I Feel Inside," I discovered that I'd never recorded an updated version after discovering a month or two ago that I had been playing a wrong chord (what I'd been playing as an E major is actually a C# minor).

I suppose to-day was an appropriate day to record this since it's Bach's birthday and - as I mentioned in this post - the BACH motif is in the melody of "The Way I Feel Inside."

"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.

"The Way I Feel Inside"

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Fifty-one years ago to-day was the third session for Begin Here, so I have a bunch of songs to record again.

I'm starting with "The Way I Feel Inside" because it's short and I have a lot to do to-day.  I've been playing this a lot, but where my right hand does the melody, so I haven't been able to practice that extra phrase.  I'm not sure it's any more accurate than the last time I recorded, but I also don't think it's less accurate.

I discovered that I had the bass part at the very end wrong.  I thought it went down to that Bb in the Edim chord, but it stays at E, just like in the rehearsal version.

"The Way I Feel Inside" [rehearsal version]

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Because I know the bass part for the final version of "The Way I Feel Inside," it wasn't too difficult to figure out the part in the rehearsal version.  I played the electric piano part more-or-less the same as the organ part on the final version, but I'm not sure how accurate that is.

Now that I have the bass and electric piano parts, I don't think the guitar part is right.  There are some dissonances in my version that don't seem to be in the original, so I think I may have over-simplified it.  I haven't changed the way I play it in the two years since I learned it, so it's certainly possible that I have it wrong.

"The Way I Feel Inside"

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I was playing through "The Way I Feel Inside" yester-day, and I discovered that the BACH motif is in the melody of the vocals… sort of.

(disclaimer that since I did the notation myself, it might be wrong)

I'd noticed before that there are three pairs of half-steps at the end of the first two sections (the "I want to say to-night"), but yester-day, I realized that the "to say to-night" pairs of half-steps have the same intervals as the BACH motif.  It's D C# E D#, not Bb A C B, but it's still the BACH motif!

I'm not sure whether Argent consciously inserted that or whether it's just subconscious influence, but it's really exciting to find such a strong connection to Bach.

Begin Here Session

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Fifty years ago to-day (10 December 1964), the Zombies had an-other session for the Begin Here album.  They recorded "Can't Nobody Love You," "The Way I Feel Inside," "I Got My Mojo Working," "You've Really Got a Hold on Me/Bring It on Home to Me," "I Can't Make up My Mind," and "Work 'n' Play."

They also received an award for "She's Not There" - it had been #1 on Cashbox.  I'm fairly certain that most of the pictures of the Zombies in the Decca studio in West Hampstead were taken on this day, as some sort of publicity event because they received that award.

"The Way I Feel Inside"

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Over the past week or so I've been intermittently working on writing out the notation for "The Way I Feel Inside."  It's been really interesting notating the vocal part because nearly all of the phrases begin on downbeats.  But I just discovered that I have some of the note values wrong, so everything after those notes is wrong (which is further complicated because I repeated that error when those notes are repeated).

I've been trying to get better at the formal aspects of music, including notation, but I'm still not very good at the rhythms and note values.  It doesn't help that the first part is a cappella and - because of that - sort of rubato.

Begin Here Session

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Fifty years ago to-day (25 November 1964) was the second session for the Zombies' Begin Here album.  For the album, they recorded "I Don't Want to Know," "What More Can I Do," and "I Remember When I Loved Her."  They also recorded "Walking in the Sun," "Tell Her No," "I Want You Back Again" (although not the single version), and the rehearsal version of "The Way I Feel Inside" found on disc 3 of Zombie Heaven.

I think this was also the session when the band received the phone call from Al Gallico that "She's Not There" was a #1 hit.  I've read interviews where they said they got that phone call while recording "Tell Her No," which would make it the 25th, but the Zombie Heaven booklet (where I get most of these dates, cross-referenced with the liner notes of the Decca Stereo Anthology) says that the call was during the session on the 24th.

"The Way I Feel Inside"

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I forgot to note that the penultimate chord in "The Way I Feel Inside" is actually an E diminished (E, G, Bb, although it's inverted as Bb, E, G).

So far, this is the only diminished chord I've found in any of the Zombies' songs, although there's always the possibility that I've figured out something wrong and neglected one.

"The Way I Feel Inside"

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Last night, I had some time to waste, so I tried figuring out the organ part in "The Way I Feel Inside," not really expecting to get anywhere.

But in figuring it out, I realized that - duh! - it follows the same chords as the rehearsal version (which I figured out last September).  So figuring it out was actually pretty easy, but I felt really stupid for not having realized earlier that they would use the same chords.

I actually played intervals of thirds (except for the final B major and possibly the last E major to E minor transition [I don't remember]) because full chords sounded too heavy.  There's a falling third in the first section (F# to D#), which then ascends to E (I think), which I'm not sure is very accurate.

The bass was pretty easy to figure out once I had the organ chords.  Except for a few extra notes that I figured out this evening (transitional G#s), it's all in the organ part.  And, typical of Rod Argent's writing, there are two instances of sequential half-steps: B to C to C# and B to A# to A.

"The Way I Feel Inside" [rehearsal version]

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This is just the guitar chords of the rehearsal version, as heard on disc three of Zombie Heaven.  I'm a bit dubious of the accuracy of this.