"My Back Pages"

I listened to The Byrds' Greatest Hits yester-day and noticed a small feature in "My Back Pages."  Most of each verse is sung by Roger McGuinn alone, but more voices join in for the final line "Ah, but I was so much older then; I'm younger than that now."  In a way, these extra voices match the greater degree of the adverbial phrase "so much" and the comparative adjectives "older" and "younger."

I was thinking about the song again this morning and realized that the alliteration in the phrase "quite clear" in the fourth verse also provides a degree of emphasis.

"Old John Robertson"

I listened to the Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour recently and discovered a similarity between "Penny Lane" and the Byrds' "Old John Robertson."  In "Penny Lane," there are the lines "On the corner is a banker with a motorcar / The little children laugh at him behind his back," and the same sort of situation is described in "Old John Robertson," albeit spread across different verses.  In the first verse (repeated as the fourth), there's the line "People ev'rywhere would laugh behind his back," and the second verse specifically mentions children laughing (I think the line is "Children laughing, playing didn't know his name," but I'm not sure).

The liner notes of the CD re-issue of The Notorious Byrd Brothers briefly comment on the musical influence that the Beatles had on the album, saying that it's "dated by a handful of period-production touches that place it squarely in the immediate post-Sgt. Pepper era of future-baroque studio whimsy," but this similarity between "Penny Lane" and "Old John Robertson" seems to indicate a lyrical or thematic influence, too.  The liner notes also explain that "Old John Robertson" is based on a real-life figure from Chris Hillman's childhood, and this is similar to how "Penny Lane" is based on a location from Paul McCartney's childhood.

"Candy"

In the line "Very profound" in "Candy," "profound" is held for more than a full measure, and this long duration gives a sense of degree (for "very").

"Old Blue"

I listened to Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde yester-day and noticed a couple small features.

In the repeated line "Blue chased a possum up a hollow limb" (with "hollow" sung more as "holler") in "Old Blue," the phrase "up a hollow limb" is usually sung to an ascending phrase (D E F# A B the first time and D E F# A D the third time), giving a sense of that "up."

"She Has a Way"

I noted some melismas in "She Has a Way" in my initial series of posts, but I found an-other one:  "Apart" in the line "The way she took me all apart" is sung with a melisma (B A B A), and this sort of disjointed articulation gives a sense of the word's meaning.

"Don't Doubt Yourself, Babe"

Parts of "Don't Doubt Yourself, Babe" (roughly the second half of each verse) exhibit something that's at least close to the Bo Diddley beat.  I've been unable to find anything that defines it in precise musical terms, however, so I can't be very detailed about it.

"It's No Use"

In the clause "And she will be ev'rything" in "It's No Use," "ev'rything" is sung with a melisma (F# C# C# B A#), musically giving something of a sense of its meaning.

"I Knew I'd Want You"

In the lines "I'd like to love you / With all of my heart" in "I Knew I'd Want You," the phrase "all of my heart" is sung to notes of all different pitches (C B A G), giving a sense of the breadth of "all."

"You Won't Have to Cry"

I listened to Mr. Tambourine Man yester-day and noticed a handful of small features.

In the lines "Then, girl, you will see / That you won't have to cry / Anymore" in "You Won't Have to Cry," the "-more" of "Anymore" is sung with a melisma (E D#), giving a sense of its meaning.

Specific to the alternate version that's included as a bonus track on the CD, "strong" in the line "'Cause my love for you's too strong" is also sung with a melisma (in the harmony part:  B A), giving a sense of degree (for "too").

"Jack Tarr the Sailor"

I listened to Ballad of Easy Rider yester-day (because it was Roger McGuinn's birthday), and I noticed a small ambiguity in "Jack Tarr the Sailor."  "Poor" in the line "'There goes Jack Tarr that poor sailor; he must go to sea once more'" could have the sense of "lacking money" (because as Jack himself says in the previous verse "me money was all gone") or the sense of "to be pitied" (because going to sea is something to be avoided; in the first verse, Jack says, "But a man must be blind to make up his mind to go to sea once more," and his advice in the last verse is "get married, lads, and have all night in, and go to sea no more").

"Here without You"

Yester-day, I was thinking about "Here without You" and had a small realization about the lines "Girl, you're on my mind / Nearly all of the time," which are sung to phrases something like:

"All" is sung to a half note, and because this has a longer value (two beats) than any of the surrounding notes, there's something of a sense of the duration of "all of the time."

"Eight Miles High"

I was thinking about "Eight Miles High" this morning, and I realized that there are a couple musical features in the title line that mirror the phrase.

The words are sung to an ascending melody (E F# G), and this provides a musical sense of that height.  Together, the three words are sung to a total of eight beats (two half notes and one whole note), which obviously match the "eight" in the phrase.

"Oil in My Lamp"

Originally, I noted that "Oil in My Lamp" is based on the Parable of the Ten Virgins in Matthew 25:1-13.  That passage is still applicable, but there's a stronger resemblance between the repeated line "Give me oil in my lamp; keep me burnin', burnin', burnin'" and Luke 12:35, where Jesus tells His disciples, "Stay dressed for action and keep your lamps burning."

"Fido"

In the lines "Wide awake, stayin' up late / Wishin' I was not" in "Fido," there are some poetic features that complement the meaning.  There's assonance between "Wide awake" and "stayin' up late," which highlights the relationship between the two phrases, and all of this contrasts, both semantically and poetically, with "Wishin' I was not."

"Pretty Boy Floyd"

In the lines "And along come a deputy sheriff in a manner rather rude / Using vulgar words of language; his wife, she overheard" in "Pretty Boy Floyd," there's a slant rhyme between "rude" and "overheard," and this indicates the indirect manner in which Pretty Boy Floyd's wife heard the sheriff.

"You're Still on My Mind"

In the lines "The jukebox is playin' a honky tonk song / 'One more,' I keep sayin', 'and then I'll go home'" in "You're Still on My Mind," there's a slant rhyme between "song" and "home," indicating that because the narrator is "Alone and forsaken," his home is incomplete.

"Dolphin's Smile"

In the line "Rainbow's end ev'rywhere" in "Dolphin's Smile," the three syllables of "ev'rywhere" are all sung to different pitches (B A E), musically giving a sense of that breadth.

"Get to You"

"Get to You" may have been inspired in part by Elvis Presley's "Trying to Get to You," written by Rosemarie McCoy and Charles Singleton.  The title phrase is nearly the same, and the songs also have a similar structure in that each verse ends with a variation of the same line.  The verses in "Get to You" end with the lines "But I really only want to get to you," "All the time it took me tryin' to get to you" (which contains the entire phrase from Elvis's song), and "But it took me twenty years to get to you."  Most of the verses in "Trying to Get to You" end with the line "Baby, tryin' to get to you," but the last ends with "When I was tryin' to get to you."

"Get to You" was written by Chris Hillman and Roger McGuinn.  I don't know if either was familiar with "Trying to Get to You," but in this interview (at ~3:17), McGuinn talks about how hearing Elvis's "Heartbreak Hotel" made him want to get a guitar, so in general terms at least, Elvis was an influence.

"Goin' Back"

In the line "I think I'm goin' back to the things I learned so well in my youth" in "Goin' Back," "well" is sung with a melisma (C# B), giving a sense of degree (for "so").

"Artificial Energy"

The first two lines of "Artificial Energy" are "Sittin' all alone now / I took my ticket to ride."  Since the words in the phrase "all alone" alliterate, there's a sense of the singularity of being alone.  The phrase "ticket to ride" in the second line seems to be a nod to the Beatles song of the same title.

"My Back Pages"

In "My Back Pages," the lines "Ah, but I was so much older then / I'm younger than that now" are sung to a melody something like

The first syllable of "older" (the C#) is sung with a longer value than any of the other notes, so musically, there's a sense of that greater degree (for just the comparative adjective itself or the modifying "so much").

"Renaissance Fair"

In the line "I hear music ev'rywhere" in "Renaissance Fair," the three syllables of "ev'rywhere" are sung to all different pitches (A E C#), providing a sense of that breadth.

"C.T.A. - 102"

In the lines "We just want to let you know / That we're ready for to go" in "C.T.A. - 102," one of the backing vocal parts sings "Go" with a melisma (E D C), giving a sense of movement.

"Psychodrama City"

In "Psychodrama City," the end of the line "Me and my friends got on a plane" ascends, and the end of the line "One of my friends got off again" descends (I'm not sure of the specific pitches for either line).  That the phrases go in different directions illustrates these opposites.  To some degree, the ascent and descent could also represent going up into the plane and down out of it.

"I Know My Rider (I Know You Rider)"

In "I Know My Rider (I Know You Rider)," "rollin'" in the lines "She's gonna miss her lovin' daddy / From rollin' in her arms" is sung with a melisma (F E D), giving something of a sense of movement.

"I Come and Stand at Every Door"

During the last month or so of 2023, I listened to all of the Byrds albums from Fifth Dimension to (Untitled) and noticed some features I plan to write about in a series of weekly posts.

The first half of the fourth verse of "I Come and Stand at Every Door" exhibits anaphora (the repeated "I need no..."):  "I need no fruit; I need no rice / I need no sweets nor even bread."  I think its function here is simply to emphasize that the narrator "ask[s] for nothing for myself."

In the last verse ("All that I ask is that for peace / You fight today..."), there's a second vocal part (initially just doubling the lead vocal but then harmonizing with it).  This extra voice highlights the earnestness of the narrator's request ("All that I ask...").