"The Ace of Swords"

Last week, I learned the clavinet part in the introduction in "The Ace of Swords," so I made an updated recording:

Since I last recorded this, I got a new keyboard (a Nord Electro 5D), and some of the sounds are a lot better (for what it's worth, I used French harpsichord D and clavinet C).  I included the bass part in the audio but not the video.

"Nothing Left to Lose"

Yester-day I was thinking about "Nothing Left to Lose" and realized a small thing:  "Ways" in the line "You change your life in a thousand ways" is sung with a melisma (D C Bb), musically giving a sense of that "thousand."

"Since the Last Goodbye"

I listened to Ammonia Avenue (with bonus tracks) yester-day and discovered something about "Since the Last Goodbye."  In the version with Eric Woolfson's guide vocal, "fly" in the line "The hours, the minutes seem to fly" is sung with a melisma (D# C# A#), musically giving a sense of the passage of time.  In the final version, however, this feature isn't present.

"Damned If I Do"

I figured out a couple parts from "Damned If I Do" this afternoon.  One of them was a guitar part from ~0:29 to ~0:37, which I don't think I'd even realized was there before.  In any case, the first three notes are the same as the famous phrase from Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra (albeit adjusted for key).

Here's the guitar phrase (which I believe is played with harmonics and which I might have notated in the wrong octave):

The phrase from Also Sprach Zarathustra is C G C' in C major; this is G D G' in G minor.

"You Lie Down with Dogs"

On Jeopardy! yester-day there was a clue stating that "He that lies down with dogs shall rise up with fleas" is among "Ben Franklin's wisdom" in Poor Richard's Almanac.  The clue made it seem that Franklin coined this phrase, but according to The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, it's a proverb dating from the late sixteenth century.  In any case, it got me thinking about "You Lie Down with Dogs" from Eve, and this morning I realized something about the line "You lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas," which occurs at the end of each chorus.

Generally, the melody to which "you lie down with dogs" is sung descends (aside from regularly dropping down to an F, it's a conjunct descent from Eb to Bb), and there's ascending interval of an octave at the end to represent the "get[ting] up with fleas."  I think it's something like:

(I'm not very confident in my accuracy of the rhythm, but I am pretty sure about the notes, which is what's relevant here.)

"Nothing Left to Lose"

I recently loaded the French accordion mellotron sound on my Nord Electro 5D.  It reminded me that when I listened to The Turn of a Friendly Card back in December, I thought that the accordion solo in "Nothing Left to Lose" didn't sound too difficult to figure out.  It took a bit of effort, but I think I have it:

One of the notes in the mellotron sample (the high F) sounds a bit off, which gives a bit of credence to what Alan Parsons said about the mellotron in this interview from a couple years ago:  "I always thought that the sound was compromised by the use of mellotron over orchestration."  Still, were it not for the mellotron sounds, I probably wouldn't have learnt this part now and I certainly couldn't have recorded it because I don't know how to play accordion.  I was going to record it using melodica (which doesn't sound too different), but my melodica doesn't have the range necessary to play this part.

Along with this solo, there's also an accompaniment part (which I haven't figured out), played either with the lower register or as a second part.  I know very little about accordions, so I don't know if it's even possible to play those two parts on a single instrument simultaneously.

"Money Talks"

I'm pretty sure I noticed this before, but when I listened to Gaudi recently, I was reminded of the line "Park Lane, Boardwalk, money talk" in "Money Talks," which I believe is a reference to the board game Monopoly.  In the game, the two properties with the highest values are Park Place and Boardwalk; apparently Park Lane replaces Park Place in the UK version.

"Closer to Heaven"

When I listened to Gaudi a couple days ago, I also noticed a few small things about "Closer to Heaven."  The first line starts with "Rising and falling..." and the melody reflects these opposites: "rising" ascends (B C), and "falling" descends, sung with a melisma that emphasizes this (A G G).

When I made a note of this to myself, I remembered that sometime last year (I neglected to write down the specific date), I noticed that "heaven" in the recurring line "Closer to heaven than you and me" is sung to the highest note in that phrase (G), which musically indicates the height of heaven (although the "and" is also sung to a G note).

"La Sagrada Familia"

I listened to Gaudi two days ago and noticed a small feature in "La Sagrada Familia."  In the line "And for all those years our eyes and ears were filled with tears," the "tears" is sung with a melisma (D C# B F#).  That it's sung with a number of notes gives a sense of amount and of "fill[ing]."

"Separate Lives"

I listened to Vulture Culture yester-day and noticed a small feature in "Separate Lives."  "Go" in the line "The way we must go" is sung with a melisma (C# B A), which musically gives a sense of the movement of "go[ing]."

Eye in the Sky

I've been listening to The Complete Albums Collection box set, and this evening I listened to Eye in the Sky.  Then I figured out a cello part in the middle of "Mammagamma," so now I know at least a bit of a part in each song on the album.  This is the fifth APP album I can make that claim with.

"The Cask of Amontillado"

I listened to Tales of Mystery and Imagination this evening and noticed a small feature in "The Cask of Amontillado."  "Down below" in the line "Follow me now to the vault down below" descends (Eb D C), musically suggesting that depth.