Song Complexity

joepee · Post by **joepee** » Wed May 11, 2005 5:27 am

I always marvel at how The Beatles progressed so rapidly as song writers. To go from "Love Me Do" to "Can't Buy Me Love" in such a short amount of time.

Suddenly there is the complexity of John's "If I Fell." That song just blows me away. Think about the intro, "If I fell in love with you, would you promise to be true..."

It rambles on for quite some time before he ever gets to the..."If I give my heart.." what I consider the melody line. Yet it all fits together so perfectly.

John's low harmony is incredible, against Paul's high melody part. Very complex compared to "Please Please Me."

These guys were incredible live performers, but even in the toughest of schedules, e.g. trip to America, making a film, countless live appearances, they just take off as song writers during "A Hard Day's Night." Thoughts?

admin · Post by **admin** » Wed May 11, 2005 5:47 am

Just a great topic Joe. We should have fun with this one.

The Beatles were certainly my favourite composers. I am still picking apart their vocal harmonies and lead breaks. Lucky for me I have had 40 years to do it.

It is surprising how many Beatle songs borrowed from other music and certainly the intoduction to If I Fell harkens back to many of the old popular standards that used this same effect.

The Beatles were very creative and their original songwriting, OK and their recordings, swept me away. They were also good at taking other songs from the United States, repackaging them to a degree and then selling them back to Americans.

You can certainly hear the influence of the Everly Brothers, among others, in their harmony lines.

George Martin also had a hand in many of the arrangements and I suspect If I Fell was one of them.

Scastles · Post by **Scastles** » Wed May 11, 2005 6:26 am

I always felt like the Beatles fell into this perfect cosmic tumbler, talented composers, creative musicians and then throw in a sensational producer. All purged together. It's like aligning the stars and the moon.

Thinking of advancing skills in thier composing came with a real turn in '67 and I have to think one of most notable pieces of work had to be "Strawberry Fields'. Wonderfully written and wonderfully produced. The most interesting part of it being the not-so-advanced equipment (a basic four track) producing one song (after a number of takes) made out of two tempos and two different keys and then tieing them together into one song. Pure magic. A tremendous amount of credit has to go to George Martin but credit is also due Lennon on seeing how the 'softer' take of SFF should be spliced together with the more 'intense' version, and it all worked. A masterpiece of song-writing, creativity and production.

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Wed May 11, 2005 6:31 am

The increasing complexities in their songwriting parallels the increasing complexitities of their drugs of choice...you get the oboist from the London Symphony flyin' on acid in the control room and your career is going to evolve, baby...

Mentioning the influence of drugs may not explain everything about a phenomenon like The Beatles, but leaving it out of the analysis explains nothing...

jwilli · Post by **jwilli** » Wed May 11, 2005 8:46 am

You mean drugs make you a great songwriter? Cool. Why didn't I think of that? I wonder if they would make me a better driver...

* just being facetious here.

joepee · Post by **joepee** » Wed May 11, 2005 10:03 am

I appreciate the input. No doubt the songs got more and more sophisticated. Stan and Dane, Mind-expanding drugs definitely effected the music, or took it to different level.

And I agree Peter, just having someone as skilled in the theory of music as George Martin played a big role. I have a CD collection called "The Songs We Were Singing" that has original versions of many of the songs The Beatles covered. And you are right, the influences of Buddy Holly, Everly Brothers are all there.

Still, up and to "A Hard Day's Night," the songs seemed less complex. It seems like they just started to take their song writing to a different level with this album.

But I think "Ask me Why" showed some signs of sophistication early on. It just seems like after America some sort of songwriting Genie was uncorked, the incantation was complete, and they began writing music that was no longer just considered teenie-bopper.

rictified · Post by **rictified** » Wed May 11, 2005 10:39 am

Even their early stuff was complex for the day in 1964 compared to a lot of other stuff that was out at the time. You had to learn a lot of new chords to play many of their early songs. I think their early stuff sounded deceptively simple because they were just so good at writing and playing. Their stuff sounded natural right from the beginning, like falling off a log, and like others have said having GM for a producer didn't hurt either.

jaybic · Post by **jaybic** » Wed May 11, 2005 1:21 pm

I agree with you Bob, in that their early stuff sounded so simple. I'd listen to a song, think "gee, that's a nice little ditty" and then find out all the changes and different chords that are involved and think "gee, what a complicated little ditty"

Scastles · Post by **Scastles** » Wed May 11, 2005 1:31 pm

'Tis true. It all sounds 'relatively' easy until you try to play it.

britye · Post by **britye** » Wed May 11, 2005 4:00 pm

I seem to recall a radio interview John and Yoko did just before he died. I remember John talking about Reagan's recent election, anyway it was in this interview he said something about how they really became craftsmen(his word) was by playing those gigs in Hamburg ,where they really honed their craft. Anyone else recall this interview?

1ststatestereo · Post by **1ststatestereo** » Wed May 11, 2005 4:13 pm

I think the genius of their songs as far as complexity goes is that I am always blown away at the chord usage. Compare even the most "simple" Beatles song and then take ANY dylan song (for example) and the Beatles chords are always more intricute (it seems anyway). I learned to play on beatles songs and everytime i go back to the songs I feel so dumb regarding my own chord usage. They used 5ths and 7ths like I use my G and C

wayang · Post by **wayang** » Thu May 12, 2005 6:11 am

Brian, I remember that interview...the magic of the whole deal was that George Martin went looking for the best band he could find...he taught them a tremendous amount, but they were 100% Journeymen Musicians the day he met them. There's no short cut to get to that point...

chingnchime · Post by **chingnchime** » Mon May 23, 2005 3:15 pm

What I've gained from Beatles songs and what i love most about them is their use of relative minor chords. Though John is often depicted as the most 'simplistic', chord-wise, i think he was the most imaginative in his changes. Something as simple as CRY, BABY, CRY is still brilliantly melodic. His bridges (middle eights) were very creative, too, as in BABY'S IN BLACK. I think Paul helped accentuate john's melodic sense w/ always a clever vocal harmony.

rictified · Post by **rictified** » Mon May 23, 2005 3:46 pm

I have read many time that they matured musically in Hamburg, that when they came back they blew everyone away. Playing 8 hours a day every day can do that to any band, imagine The Beatles doing that. Any band I've ever been in gets tighter and tighter the more we play together especially if were playing 4 or 5 nights a week, you start to think alike after a while and know what the other one is going to do at certain points in new music. I believe that must have happened to them to a great degree in Hamburg.
Incidently I was on the street where the Star club was in 1981, it had been torn down unfortunately.
Dylan was a really good guitar player also, his stuff was also deceptively complex, he was a great finger picker and made up his own chords. I'm talking his early acoustic stuff, he also had a good voice. I also think Neil Young is a really good acoustic guitar player.
I thought Lennon had some great chord changes in his stuff, he would do very unexpected things. How about Number 9 Dream? Brilliant chord changes along with that single note down run and that was when he was solo.

beatlefan · Post by **beatlefan** » Tue May 24, 2005 4:11 pm

Great discussion!

Like a lot of you, I'd been brought up on Beatles tunes....knew all the songs , all the words, etc....loved every one of those songs....then when I started PLAYING the bass, I started paying attention to the chords and Paul's bass notes a LOT more. Now I have all the cd's and listen very closely and have a NEW appreciation for their creativity...... I'm blown away by "If I Fell" , "I Should Have Known Better", etc.....simple, yet brilliant....