RIFFS:
Better isn’t always better.
A ladder-braced guitar is worse than an X-braced guitar in almost every way:
less complex tone
more likely to have the bridge pull up
needs heavier bracing, which makes it less lively
And yet, when the Dan + Shay song All To Myself called for an acoustic guitar solo, Bryan Sutton put down his vintage Martin and picked up some old 1930s parlor guitar.
Its “worse” sound leaps out of the mix:
My 2012 Subaru isn’t as nice as my dad’s 2023 Mazda.
But it’s a pain in the ass to move the kids’ car seats, so we just swap cars.
His car has wireless CarPlay, a backup camera, adaptive cruise control, and all the other amenities of a modern car. It’s faster too. But I drive it tentatively—I don’t want to be the one to scratch it.
When I get back in my dinged-up old Impreza, it feels liberating.
Audio purists, cover your ears.
These days, I listen to everything on bluetooth headphones.
I took the fancy studio monitor speakers off my desk. I only get out the audio interface when I need to record something. The desk feels so much more spacious & inviting!
It’s worse, but better.
RECS:
It’s one of my favorite purchases of all time.
If they were lost or stolen, I would immediately buy another set.
The highlights:
surprisingly good sound
seamless switching between iPhone, iPad, & Mac
killer noise canceling for planes & landscaping noises
“transparency mode” turns on the mics so I can hear my guitar alongside whatever I’m listening to
Transparency mode frees me from my desk—now I can make music wherever it feels most inviting.
That same theme shows up in this absolutely delightful microphone review:
CHARTS:
Last week we looked at Whiskey Girl.
It has one of my favorite things: a key change chorus.
From my Key Change Chorus playlist…
…here’s another beauty:
As usual, Dropbox folder w/Ableton, Sibelius, PDF, & musicXML files.
SMARTS:
1/ quick hits & quirky bits
TEMPO:
starts at ~105 BPM
BRIDGE ramps from 108 all the way to ~240…
…then the tempo cuts in half for the last CHORUSes
(at ~120)
FEEL:
the BRIDGE is swung
(the rest is straight)
KEY:
INTRO is in F
VERSEs are in C
CHORUSes are in D
FORM:
VERSE 1 is 12 bars
VERSE 2 is 8 bars
PCs have an extra 2/4 bar
(oh, the things you’d never notice if you didn’t write them out…)
2/ even the key change back feels like a lift
The VERSE & PC are in C, then we modulate up to D for the CHORUS:
The banjo break is over the “five chord” of D…
…so even though we’re modulating down, it feels like we went up again.
3/ “metric modulation”
That’s the theory term for changing tempos, using a rhythmic equivalent as a bridge.
Wow, that sentence is a meaningless word salad.
Let me try again.
We’re going 240 bpm, but we want to suddenly go half that fast:
So in addition to marking the chart with ♩= 240 and ♩= 120…
…we add the relation between them:
Check it out:
Watch the BPM in the upper left (and listen to the click when it goes from BRIDGE to CHORUS 3).
4/ I included a drum chart too:
As you already know, snare on 2 & 4 is “a backbeat.”
Snare on all four? We usually call that “a Motown beat.”
That’s all I got this week.
See you next Wednesday,
Josh