Swoon alert!

[annathepiper]

This is simultaneously a Crowe swoon and a musical swoon. And mostly for the amusement of flashfire, shaylith, and ssha, but what the hell, it's an equal opportunity amusement-at-Anna-swooning opportunity. ;)

"Painted Veil" is the first ballad on the new Crowe/TOFOG record, and it's very lovely. It has an acoustic guitar line as well as some meltingly lovely trumpet playing from Mr. Kirwan, as well as some fairly swoonable lyrics and harmony. Last night, this thing grabbed my hands, forcibly attached them to my guitar, and refused to leave me alone until I'd figured out a majority of the chords necessary to play it. I couldn't quite get them all, though, and had to leave off the rest of them until today.

And there's a surprisingly large number of chords in it, too. Nine by my count, if I'm hearing the weirder bits in the chord line properly: C, Am, Em, F, G, Cadd9, Am7, D, and Dm. I pegged the C, Am, Em, F, and Dm fairly easily, but the rest gave me something of a challenge.

Especially the D, since for some reason I'd had it in my head that a D chord couldn't possibly be played in the key of C--possibly because with all the other songs I know how to play, the "second" position is generally minor. E.g., in "Trois Navires de Ble" all the A chords are minor ones. But, I wound up tryiing to pick out single tones to follow the melody line, and found myself hitting an F#--so I had to figure out what chords want an F# in the key of C. The chord I wanted turned out to be D.

The strum pattern's really easy, though. And I must remark that having Mr. Crowe sing the words "gently caress my face" into my headphones is simultaneously an immense inspiration to properly play the requisite F chord that passage wants, and an immense distraction. ;)

Comments

[flashfire.livejournal.com]

You = silly ;-)

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[annathepiper]

Hey, I swoon for nine-chord ballady goodness, what I can say! ^_^

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[flashfire.livejournal.com]

Ah, but which do you swoon for more - that or a certain Mr. Crowe?

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[annathepiper]

Hrmm. That's a tough call. Especially when he's singing at me about his face being caressed. >:)

Though I am also deriving just an inordinate amount of pleasure from figuring out the trickier chord passages anyway. ^_^

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[flashfire.livejournal.com]

Yes, he's definitely singing at you... ;-)

Actually, this brings up a point I was thinking about stemming from playing the CD for that friend I mentioned a couple weeks ago when I told you I wasn't going to tell her who it was at first.

She liked the CD well enough and was surprised when I told her it was Russell Crowe singing. But she's also someone who knows a thing or three about music, and Mission Beat was her favorite song on the first listen. Oddly, it was my coworker's (well, ex-coworker since she resigned this week) favorite as well.

But, one of her first comments about Inside Her Eyes was how it was in 3/4 time (right?) and she immediately thought of it being a great song to cross-step to, or whatever it's called. I hadn't thought of that at all.

She also thinks she's heard Full Length of the River once on the radio.

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[annathepiper]

*chortle* Well, a girl can fantasize.... ^_^

I like the "I'm not going to tell you who this is singing, but what do you think?" game. Hee hee.

"Mission Beat" IS very musically solid. I like it muchly.

"Inside Her Eyes" is either in 3/4 or 6/8. I'm not sure which. I'm slightly more in favor of it being in 6/8. Though I'm not listening to this version since it's just not as good as the previous one. :) And since that version was the first TOFOG ditty I fell in love with, I claim the right to be picky about it. ;)

I think your friend might be mistaken about "Full Length of the River" on the radio unless some station or other got adventurous and played that song because they liked it--last I heard, the only song that's officially supposed to be showing up on playlists is "Never Be Alone Again". But well hey, maybe somebody digs that song. :)

[flashfire.livejournal.com]

I like the game, too. It's interesting to see what the reaction is once they find out who it is, especially if they wind up liking the music. You should try it sometime, though I don't imagine you know a whole lot of people who are still unaware of your Crowe & TOFOG affection. Oops - I'm a sell-out for putting his name in front of the band!

I don't know what it is, but the whole album just works for me, top to bottom. Oh, there are a couple bits I don't necessarily care for in a song or two, but on a whole it's just quality stuff. It still surprises me to hear a band that sounds so good fronted by a famous actor. My friend and I were talking about that a little and it's not that big a stretch to believe it - actors do normally take voice lessons, and it's reasonable to figure some of them have talent in other areas - Crowe has been doing this since before he became big in the states, and didn't he say something about how acting is his "day" job and the band is more of his real passion?

It's been years since I did anything related to reading or playing music. What's the big difference between 3/4 and 6/8? I can't recall.

I couldn't tell you what's been on the radio out here, though. I haven't heard 'em on it and I don't listen to the radio much for music anyway.

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[annathepiper]

I'm pretty much reduced to trying it on coworkers, of which I have none at the moment. Oh well. :)

I'm really amused by one of the recent reviews of OWOS that someone posted to Gruntland--the reviewer mock-complained about how it wasn't fair that, quote, "the greatest actor of our generation," unquote, was both so good at acting and capable of doing music, too. ;)

In technical terms the difference between 3/4 and 6/8 is that with the first, the quarter notes get the beat and there are three beats in a measure. With the second, the eighth note gets the beat but there are six beats in a measure. On some songs there might not be too terribly much of a difference to the ear... but there's sort of a difference in that with a 3/4 song, you get an even 'feel' of ONE-two-three, ONE-two-three, ONE-two-three... but with a 6/8 song, it's more ONE-two-three-four-five-six, ONE-two-three-four-five-six. If that makes sense.

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[flashfire.livejournal.com]

Actually, now that you bring up the quarter vs. eighth notes and the counting, a little of that comes back to me. I played the trombone for a few years in middle and high school, but I was never that good at actually reading the music and understanding it past knowing "This note means I need to have the thing at this position." But obviously, I understood counting and how long a note was supposed to be played.

And yes, that's an amusing review. ;-) I shared that Crowe/Elvis comparison with my friend (the one about Crowe as a great actor and good musician, and Elvis as a great musician and good actor) and she definitely agreed with it.

She also seemed to like Folsom Prison Blues.

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[annathepiper]

I think the Crowe/Elvis comparison is the best I've heard of Mr. Crowe's musical ability. Me, I'm just happy he entertains me, and amused at the high levels of Elvis connection with the guy anyway--I still periodically giggle that he was shown on the Texas DVD holding up an Elvis record I do in fact OWN.

Not to mention that he's channeling Elvis hardcore in "Folsom Prison Blues"--there's a part in there at the end of the first verse, especially. The part where he lets out a little "uhhh". Now if he'd only stretched that out to "uh huh huh", he'da nailed it. :>

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[flashfire.livejournal.com]

And then after that, he could've asked for a quarter pounder with cheese and large fries along with a HOOO-AHH! and he'd have completed the Elvis Transition.

*grins, ducks, and runs*

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[annathepiper]

*hits Flashfire, hard* :P

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[flashfire.livejournal.com]

Owie.