Wordless bridge

Sometimes you don't need to have lyrics in your bridge. You can just go somewhere different with the music. And it can sound really good, especially if it tells a bit of a story in itself with tension and resolution; majors and minors. I noticed this in Jamie Barnes' amazing version of Joy to the world. There's probably a technical musical name for this kind of thing, it's probably not even called a bridge. Something Italian.

Vocal samples and contextual irony

It seems like vocal samples, at least in indie music, are often used in a pretty narrow way -- ironically. I wonder to what extent this colours even samples intended to be taken at face value. The song that got me thinking was Tuung's Wind-up birds which uses samples from some creaky old BBC series. This is an example of many similar songs: the content and delivery is campy and odd, the content is probably edited to surrealist effect -- the irony is obvious. By ironic, I guess I mean that we listen to the samples in ways separate from the original intended meaning. For example: we appreciate old thespian accents, or we experience nostalgia for our childhood or we are follow a new subversive narrative stitched together from pieces of the old.

BBC series/turn-the-page stories are popular. But another favourite is the hell-fire preacher (see Sons of Apollo from Half-smiles of the decomposed from Guided by voices). The irony here seems to work in a similar but slightly different way. While the delivery may sound old-fashioned and over-the-top, the real irony stems from the seeming outrageousness of the content itself. This seems to be so self-evident, that there is little need for other guidance or commentary on how the listener is to interpret the material. The juxtaposition between the style of music, the aesthetic of the artist and the preacher seems to be enough. It seems to (probably rightly) presuppose a deeply secular audience who, along with the artist, can only wonder at, or scorn the bizarre religious convictions of another time.

I reckon indie Christian artists who insert 'straight' samples from preachers (or even Bible passages such as in Red Letter's One Righteous Man) are fighting against the way our ears have been trained to hear this kind of stuff. But perhaps it's time to start reclaiming some ground.

Using the piano as a drone instrument

Something in me shies away from using the piano or keyboard in music. The most obvious reason is that I don't really know the first thing about it. Also, often I just don't notice it in the music I listen to and so don't value what it brings to the mix. Another reason is that it just seems like too much trouble when you can 'get it done' with two guitars, drums and vocals.

Also, when I imagine the 'rock-piano' sound, I've got a kind of upfront cheesy keyboard sound in my head which doesn't necessarily bear any relation to the truth. See, piano is good. Well-placed simple chords and tinkly arpeggios can really add to the texture of a song. It also gives more options for dynamic changes. Go piano.

I was listening to Arcade Fire's Funeral today. There's a band that uses their piano well, especially on that album. I especially like it though, piano philistine that I am, when they ignore its vast melodic potential and use it as a drone or a rhythm instrument. I noticed this especially on Rebellion (lies).

There's something a bit perverse about taking such a virtuoso instrument and using it to lay down simple droney notes or as one instrument among many, filling gaps in a sinister chugging wall of sound. But it sounds really good.

Light and dark

Songs work when they are balanced; when they contain similar amounts of light and dark or opposites or when they cover different areas of the sonic spectrum. Whether you're writing a Phil Spector wall-of-sound piece jammed up with every sound you can think of or a spartan slowcore track with 4 simple elements, I think the principle is a good one. A good question to consider when writing or arranging is whether or not an additional instrument or sound is covering a new part of territory or occupying that already occupied by another.

I was listening to Breaker by Low (which definitely belongs in the latter category). Low seem to be one of these bands which do this kind of thing well. This particular song begins with a quietish beat and eventually a doubled hand clap. Later, vocals and a couple of other instruments kick in. These elements reflect the light-and-dark idea.

The beat is low-end, electronic, complex, the hand-clap by contrast is higher and brittle, human and simple. The organ chords sit on a layer above the beat and differs from it by being polyphonic rather than monophonic. They also move from major to minor. The vocals themselves are composed of opposites or distinct differences: man/woman, high/low, melody/harmony. One of the final sounds added, a warbly backwards guitar feedback kinda thing acts as a disruptor or mediator to the neat discrete sections by being none of these; it's organic and electronic, it's high and low, it falls in and out of patterns, sometimes you hear one note, sometimes a few.

This is an example of light and dark happening vertically, or in the song's layers of sound. But it's also good for songs to have light and dark horizontally, meaning as the song progresses through time. Different sections should do opposite or different things: the verse is quieter than the chorus; few instruments begin, many finish, the chorus is simple, the verse complex and so on.

The breakdown

I don't totally know where I'm going with this but I've been thinking a bit about the function of 'the breakdown' in songs. when the other instruments cut out and the bass and drums, or drums and sparse guitar play simply but confidently with vocals over the top.

It can feels like the moment where the truth is told, where decoration and tact is discarded; where you lay it on the line. It's the musical equivalent of saying: 'we've been talking for a while and it's been good, but just listen for a moment, I really just want you to understand this one thing'. Even if you don't have different lyrics for this bit, the sparseness will somehow add extra weight to the words. Perhaps, for the first time, this is where the listener is really concentrating on the lyrics. These words will somehow come to represent the whole.

Maybe this is going too far. Perhaps it's not often really intended for this but rather the added emphasis is a by-product. Maybe people use the breakdown more to give a bit of shade to the light -- to create negative space in the song, adding more drama to the final, louder chorus.

The breakdown also works as a song opener. It focuses attention on the vocals and makes a simple proposition to build on. I want to use this more but how do you do this without sounding like a hardcore band? Or Joy Division? This isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Singing too high for your range

Tim Rogers from You am I does this. He even acknowledges it (while demonstrating it) in one of his Temperance Union songs Dumb as being among his many faults. More recently, little-brother-country-indie-rocker Ben Kweller also strains to get higher than he strictly should in Sawdust Man.

But it sounds good when singers strain. We don't care when someone like Mariah Carey sings flawlessly high ; it's no big deal; we know they've got the skills, there isn't an obvious risk. When more workmanlike singers strain at the top of their voices it's like a special gift; it shows us their humanity and vulnerability. Their effort and passion is thrown into higher relief.

Tune your guitar down

I used a voucher I had for Music without frontiers recently to buy Alligator by the National and April by Sun Kil Moon. Both are great records, April especially. Sun Kil Moon is the latest project for Mark Kozelek from slowcore band the Red House Painters. It's dark quiet music that, while not sounding too much like Nick Drake, reminds you of him in a few places.

On one/a few of the tracks on April it seemed that Mark had his guitar tuned way low. The resulting sound is bassy and buzzy-metallic. It sounds like this I guess because the loose strings have more chance to rattle round on the frets and neck of the guitar. I used to do this a bit when I was younger but only because I was bored; I never really took it seriously as a different way to play your guitar. But it sounds really interesting, it gives a dark and murky tone; almost making your guitar sound like a different instrument. It also doesn't require you to navigate a different tuning; you just play it the same old way.

Often I don't take these kind of adjustments seriously. I think this is because I'm too fixed in my idea of what it is to play guitar; you pick it up, you make sure it's tuned and away you go. Also different tunings seem like too much work on an instrument which I find challenging enough. But it's a really good technique to remember I reckon.