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Originally Posted by wisdom
It's my thread, and I like analysis. It helps me learn.
The precise meaning of the song was not something I wanted to learn and I can't relate to that scenario, but I think I'll get past that. The lines will still resonate with me, basically my views on love. Yes, the song is sad but with some hope, not totally gloomy like how I perceive Jeff Buckley music to be. I wouldn't want many minutes of misery.
"Estranged" isn't as good lyrically, but I like how it involves a third emotion, anger. It basically has my moods covered =/ It delves into the singer's psychology much more than most mainstream songs do. Also, it has the unusual features of lyrical intro and whispering, and I think it's without strings, which can sound overwrought with frequent listens. Plus, I have attachments to it that are based in nostalgia and the relative obscurity factor. Geez, I loved that song and video from the first time I saw it.
The most valuable part of the analysis is noting that neither GNR song has a true chorus. As suggested with "Wherever I May Roam," that can get annoying as the minutes add up. That indeed is a reason "Keep Coming Back" gets on my nerves. Same with "Sowing the Seeds of Love," by Tears for Fears.
For a few days, I'd been thinking of posting an analysis of that interesting song. I'd even had the "builds" observation. Obviously a lot of effort musically and lyrically went into it. Part of the problem is the chorus, with the line "Sowing the Seeds of Love" being rather annoying to me and also showing me that I don't like Roland's voice as more than an occasional few lines.
By the way, another one of my favorite long songs hereby pops up, "Woman in Chains," by Tears for Fears. Adding in some good backing vocals (why are backing vocals by extra vocalists almost always female?) is a way to help a long song avoid being irritating.
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I like analysis, too, for the same reason.
I can hear what you hear in
"Estranged." Additionally, I hear that it not only lacks a typical chorus (by "typical" I mean a distinct musical passage with repeated words), but also, like "November Rain," contains many short instrumental solos (six of them, with the longest occuring at 4:00) to break up the song and increase the energy. Having many short instrumental solos, therefore, is another common feature of these two longs songs that you like.
Finally, like "November Rain," "Estranged" has a few repeated lyrics but not many. One verse gets used twice in the song, and the intro (the whispered singing after the seagulls) gets repeated as a reprise around a third of the way through the song. These features weave the song together and help it feel cohesive, while the lack of repetitive lyrics makes the song feel spontaneous. Predicting what would come next lyrically and musically in the song was difficult to do. And you're right: no strings.
"Sowing the Seeds of Love" starts off interesting me...but then the song repeats its "seeds of love" chorus a whopping 24+ times before the song mercifully ends!!
If I listened to that song more than once, I'd be crawling up the walls. It's a great example of too much repetition for my tastes. Like Dominantdominion said recently in the thread, "Pop songs [...] should never break the 5 min mark! It's just too much torture, lol!"
(About why
back-up singers, who can add variety and change in a long song, are so often female -- I think there are three likely reasons: (1) Many lead vocalists are male and so a higher female voice does not compete with their vocal frequency range; (2) a higher voice sounds more childlike, innocent, ethereal, and people like that "prettiness"; (3) bands like having attractive women to serve as eye-candy on stage during performances.)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Rjinnx
Just because you made the topic doesn't mean it's your decision of what goes on. I never said you couldn't analyse, but merely that this never ending over-analysis picking apart structures, choruses, verses and what or how many strokes hooks formulas equations they have = boring has made this topic more dull and dull to read. Which is quite ironic actually.
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When you find yourself starting to feel bored while reading a post, I recommend you do what I do when I begin to feel a long song is dull or unpleasant: stop and move on to something you like better.
The advantage of only spending your leisure time doing activities you find interesting, Rjinnx, is that you never inflict boredom on yourself. For example, I am never bored listening to music or reading posts here, because I only listen to songs and read posts that I enjoy.
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Originally Posted by Janszoon
It really is. I've been thinking the same thing.
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By this reasoning, one could also say it is ironic that people who like long songs get bored by a detailed analysis of them.
There's nothing wrong with enjoying music without knowing why. I prefer to go beyond "I like it" or "I dislike it" to understand the reasons a song appeals to or repels people.
A song that "works" for me is like a movie that engrosses me so much that my disbelief in the story or mood it presents is suspended. When you watch a movie with your disbelief suspended, you forget you are watching a movie because you are involved in it, as if you were in the characters' minds. When something about the movie causes your attention to wander, you break out of the "trance" and realize you're sitting in the theater surrounded by strangers.
A long song is more likely to "lose" me so that I realize, instead of being absorbed in the song, that I am listening to it. A song that I deem "good" makes me feel that the emotions I hear in the song are actually there, existent...when really I'm just listening to a pattern of sound frequencies. So then I start to wonder: what causes a long song to lose my interest? What causes a long song to retain it?
I guess I'm lucky that I enjoy not only listening to music, but also
thinking about it, because I get twice the joy from every song, and I can enjoy music even when I hear nothing at all.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Titancross
Funny, as I saw this thread I was listening to 2112 by Rush
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The song "2112" by Rush actually supports the viewpoint that music truncated into increments less than 6 minutes long is more palatable, since "2112" consists of seven distinct movements unified by a storyline but differing musically from each other, the longest of which is less than five minutes long. The song even comes to a full stop after the second movement, "Temples of Syrinx" and before the movements "Oracle: The Dream" and "Soliloquy."
Rush - "2112"
I suspect Rush attempted to prevent boredom by creating distinct movements each of which lasts around 3 minutes. "2112" is an example of a long song that I dislike in part because it is musically disjointed rather than being a cohesive whole...but it's better than it would have been if Rush had taken the first movement and extended it for 20 minutes!
Rush 2112 (Full Song) - YouTube