ot:During These Troubling Times, We Must Not Allow Negitive Thoughts To Seep Into Holiday Party Cheer

========================================================
|| Notes on "I Don't Want To Spoil The Party" (IDWTSTP)
||
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KEY G Major
METER 4/4
FORM Intro -> Verse -> Verse -> Bridge -> Verse ->
Verse (guitar solo) -> Bridge -> Verse -> Outro (w/
complete ending)
GENERAL POINTS OF INTEREST
Style and Form
--------------
- The instrumental and vocal arrangement create a folksy, even
countrified
facade for this song, but virtually everything else about it
including the
lyrics suggests the pop/rock Beatles style. Conceptually it's
another
kind of hybrid.
- The repeat pattern of the form with its use of a bridge instead of
a
refrain, as well as the chord choices and melodic style, suggest
the
urban pop style more so than they do C&W, in spite of all acoustic
guitar and vocal harmony mannerisms on the surface of the piece.
Melody and Harmony
------------------
- An unusually large number of chords are used, including five out of
the seven naturally ocurring triads (I, ii, IV, V, and vi), plus
flat-VII and two secondary dominants (V-of-V and V-of-vi).
- For a change, the melody contains no touches of any quaint
modalism.
In fact, you could almost declare it as "purely" in the Major mode,
though the inclusion of the D# in the tune in order to maneuver
around
the V-of-vi chord does stretch the envelope a bit.
Arrangement
-----------
- As we've seen in several other folksy songs on the _For Sale_
album,
the instrumental texture is dominated by the acoustic rhythm guitar
part. Even though the lead guitar is mixed quite forward and "dry"
for its solo section and the outro, its presence is so low key the
rest of the time that you almost don't notice it's there. Even in
the intro, where it ostensibly provides a lead role, it is
inexplicably
mixed down behind the rhythm part.
- In the first half of the verse John sings the top part with either
Paul unusually singing the counter-melody on the bottom for a
change,
or else it's John down there over-dubbed with himself. The third
phrase of the verse features Paul and George switching to a very
un-folksy backing vocal of "oooohs" behind John's solo, with the
earlier folksy texture returning for the final phrase.
- In the bridge it is definitely Paul on top and John on the bottom
for
a stretch of their trademarked stridently bracing harmonies; note
especially the juicy open 5th on the word "love."
SECTION-BY-SECTION WALKTHROUGH
Intro
-----
- The intro is eight measures long and with simple chords quickly
establishes
the home key and sets the stylistic tone for the rest of what will
follow:
|G |- |D7 |- |- |- |G
|- |
G: I V I
- The rhythm and lead guitar take the prominent role in this section
with
the entrance of the bass and drums carefully held back until the
very end
of it.
- The solo work is reminiscent of the music heard in the rest of the
song
though when you look at it more closely you discover an extremely
unusual
example here where the material for the intro is in fact *not* heard
again
in the body of the song.
Verse
-----
- The verse is sixteen measures long and built out of four phrases
equal
in length to form an 'AABA' structure that is nicely underscored by
the handling of the vocal arrangement. The first pair of phrases
form a roughly parallel couplet, the contrasting and climactic
third
phrase provides both the melodic peak as well as an increase in the
pace of the harmonic rhythm, and the section is finally capped by a
repeat of the opening phrase:
|G |- |- |- |
I
|G |- |D |- |
V
|e |B |a |D |
vi V-of-vi ii V
|G |F7 |G | |
I flat-VII I
- The third phrase tends to cleave in two with the B Major chord (V-of-
vi)
particularly feeling left hanging as a sort of harmonic non-
sequitor. The
melodic D# which sits above that same B chord similarly makes for
an
indirect cross-relational clash with the D natural that is implicit
in
the D Major chord at the end of the phrase.
- The manner in which the flat-VII is deployed here is slightly
unusual.
We're more used to seeing it used *predominantly* in place of V, or
else
used in frequent alternation with V. Here, for a change, we're set
up
to expect such a clear domination by the V chord that the sudden
and
belated appearance of flat-VII so near the end of the verse section
catches us a bit by surprise, and makes for what I react to as a
lazy, shoulder-shrugging impression in contrast to, say, the V9
chord
you might have sooner expected in its place. Note, by the way, the
freely dissonant 7th made by the E in the melody over this F chord.
- There is something ironic about the composition of the guitar solo;
superficially much choppier, less melodically continuous, and more
dissonant than the sung tune, yet remarkably closer to the abstract
outline of it if you bother to compare the two of them side by
side.
Bridge
------
- The bridge is twelve measures long and is built out of a repetition
of
the same unusual six-measure phrase:
|G |- |e |A |C |D |
I vi V-of-V IV V
- This six-measure phrase *could* have been coerced into a more
standard
(not to say rushed) four-measure model by a doubling up of the
harmonic
rhythm starting in measure 3, but the way it stands with the sudden
drawing out of the *melodic* rhythm, makes a more dramatic,
rhetorical
effect.
- In contrast to the verse which is closed in harmonic shape (in
spite
of the adventurous third phrase), this section is open-ended in
order
to better motivate the return of the verse which follows it.
- This is yet another one of the songs on this album to feature the
"classic" Beatles gambit of "V-of-V moves to V by way of IV", with
its concommitant cross relation. _For Sale_ features enough close-
together examples of this device to make you feel as though this
must have been a "new toy" kind of thing for them at the time,
comparable
to their apparent fixation with Major/minor combinations on the
_Hard Day's Night_ album.
- We also have another good example here where the bridge provides
not only a change of pace from the verses but also the unique
melodic
peak for the song overall. The verse had topped out on G (i.e. the
second syllable of the word "dis-a-ppear"), whereas the bridge here
stretches it up to A (on the word "be" in the phrase "I'll be
glad.")
Outro
-----
- The outro is primarily a recap of the same material heard in the
intro though this time it is scored for the entire ensemble. The
two sections nicely function like symmetrical bookends to the rest.
SOME FINAL THOUGHTS
- The party that *should* have been a blast but which turned out to
be a supremely hurtful confrontation with romantic disappointment
or betrayal is one of the archtypal scenarios of the top-40 pop-
song
genre.
- The extent to which the Beatles were capable of transcending the
nominal
bounds of the cliche is effectively brought home by comparing our
current
song with one of the more popular examples in this model done by
another
roughly contemporaneous "artist"; I'm thinking of the one about
"*my*
party" and "I'll Cry If I Want To" -- yes, go ahead and flame me for
even
thinking about mentioning this one in the same article :-).
- The crux of the matter can be summed up as a case of "less is
more."
The "other" song spells out a kiss-and-tell tale of woe in almost
embarrassing detail. What John gives us, in contrast, is much more
internally ruminative, sparse, and ambiguous.
- Just one example to get you thinking about it and then I'll take my
own advice about less/more and get the heck out of here: it's
impossible to tell for sure from just the lyrics alone what kind of
relationship existed between the protagonist and his beloved prior
to "the party". The truth might lie anywhere along a broad
spectrum
of possibilities that includes at one extreme the open betrayal by
a
significant other, and at the other extreme, the case of a secret
admirer merely disappointed over a lost opportunity to gaze from
afar.
- The interesting thing about such ambiguity is that it not only
is more "poetic" by nature, but also opens up the likelihood of
the song which contains it to strike resonant chords in the hearts
and experience base of the largest possible number of individual
listeners. And this latter point has implications that are
marketing
related as well as merely aesthetic.
Regards,
Alan (a...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx *OR* uunet!huxley!awp)
---
"It's all your fault, getting invites to gambling clubs. He's
probably
in the middle of an orgy by now." 071592#62
---
Copyright (c) 1992 by Alan W. Pollack
All Rights Reserved
This article may be reproduced, retransmitted, redistributed
and
otherwise propagated at will, provided that this notice
remains
intact and in place.

.

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