Knowing that the Beatles made an abortive attempt at recording this song for Please Please Me, then tried again for With The Beatles, it’s no surprise the results are fairly uninspiring.
Did you catch the title?
The most interesting songwriting aspect is in the lyrics.
We get the title at the beginning and near the end of the verse. The echoing BVs drive it home even more strongly.
Lyrical bookending
We also get the kind of lyrical bookending (Ticket 24) that I’m noticing in more and more Lennon & McCartney songs (From Me To You, All My Loving, I Want To Hold your Hand)
Alone (in the bridge) echoes The lonely one (v1)
And in verse 2 Loving you echoes making love
Subliminal repeats? Rhyming ideas? Does anyone know what this sort of thing is called?
That chord
The minor 4 chord crops up at the end of the verse in a very doo-wop progression
F F7 Bb Bbm F
(I, I7, IV, iv, I)
which is exactly the same as the one in Devil In Her Heart. The repeated tune (hold, hold, me tight, me tight, tonight, tonight, tonight etc..) over the changing chords is effective.
Fail
Where the song falls down is on the end of the verse and bridge. It meanders; losing it’s way harmonically, lyrically, and melodically. The ritard ending sums it up - for all the driving rock n roll riffing the song just runs out of steam.
"Subliminal repeats? Rhyming ideas? Does anyone know what this sort of thing is called?"
ReplyDeleteI'm gonna dig through some textbooks and get back to you on that.
Thanks!
ReplyDeleteI've got something about chiastic structures rattling around in my head from Hebrew poetry...(man I sound sooo intelligent typing that!)
This website is great. Your content is interesting, but I looove your links.
ReplyDeleteEvery Nine Days is a great blog. I hope to visit and listen to each track from the white album, over the next 29 days in which I have itnernet access.
And thanks for your link to the Fab Faux doing the second side of Abbey road medley. Now that's what I call a Beatles tribute band.
Thanks David - been checking out your many blogs! Love Aussie Musician
ReplyDeleteI've always felt sad about this song and how it didn't realize its potential. I like the harmonies and the straight-ahead eighth-node driven beat, but it does get weak in the middle, and the song ends like it ran out of an idea.
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by Gary
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you. One of the things I've discovered from going through all 211 tracks is that they very rarely wrote a bad song, per se, rather a lot of the weaker songs had some great parts that they never fully realised.
And early on, it was definitely bridges that let them down most often.