To Play Or Not To Play…….
That is the question. Whether tis nobler in the arrangement to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous harmony, or to take up arms against a sea of dotted quavers and, by opposing, play them.
These and other questions have been ignored by most musos in the progressive field, but as I hurtle into my 40’s ( ouch! ) I’ve become increasing aware of the lack of a strong melody in most music these days, especially in new prog.
Being a Beatles, Genesis and Yes fan, you know you are never far away from a devastatingly catchy, simple and beautiful melody, no matter how bonkers the music underneath is. Another splendid example of sublime melody over brilliantly arranged music is The Zombies Odyssey and Oracle album, which I think is one of Damo’s favourite album’s ( mine too ).
I’ve just finished touring with It Bites, and they are a great example of a band who write complex but nevertheless accessible songs. On the It Bites tour we have been playing a song called Once Around The World which is around 17 minutes long. The last section before the coda is still one of the most taxing things I’ve ever had to play as there are accents pushes and pulls all over the place ( in fact it took me about a month to work out what the bloody hell was going on ). But when that section ends it goes into a glorious and uplifting coda, in much the same way that Suppers Ready by Genesis does. All the way through Once Around The World there are complex unison runs, time changes and accent shifts but it never feels gratuitous because it’s always serving the music and plateauing the melody.
Many of the modern prog bands fall foul of the tendency to say they are progressive just because they have long songs. A band like Cardiacs are more progressive in one 3 minute songs than many bands are in a lifetime. But enough of my yackin’!
Headspace’s album is shaping up splendidly with just a few bits of pre-production to finish, Brooky has been putting down some ace drum parts for me too lock into which will make rehearsing this material tantamount to training for the olympics. But we are of course more than man enough for the job, honest guv! Well… there is one but he knows who he is. I’ve also recently been playing a lot more of the Chapman Stick having just got a new one, so I’ll try to get that onto the new album if there is a song that’s right for it.
Off to Italy this month for one gig with Adam’s dad Rick. He’s asked me to bring the Stick along for that one too so happy days. It’s always a blast gigging with Mr Wakeman senior, especially when you have to trade solos with him ( he always wins! ).
Anyone for prog tennis? ( Like real tennis but with a beard. )
Be lucky,
Cockney bloke.