Recently, I learned a good deal of the bridges in "Shine a Little Love." Here's a recording of bass, electric piano, and violin, along with the notation of what I played:
I used the Wurlitzer sound on my Nord Electro 5, along with a phasing effect, which the original recording seems to have. For the violin part, I used the Mellotron sound.
Recently, I learned the arpeggiated synthesizer part in "Prologue." To this, I could add the synth bass part that I learned a couple years ago.
The liner notes for the CD re-issue of Time aren't very detailed in terms of the specific synthesizers used for the album. I used my Moog Subsequent 37 for the bass part and Nord's sample of the Hohner String Melody II for the arpeggiated part. I'm pretty sure that neither of these is accurate, but they're the best I could do.
I did the notation to put in my file, and I figured that I might as well put it in the video too. Note that the synth bass part actually starts before this; I just started it where the arpeggiations begin (at ~0:39 in the original recording).
I recently learned the bass part for the cover of Del Shannon's "Little Town Flirt" that's included as a bonus track on the CD re-issue of Discovery. I wrote it out in notation and put the chords in above the staff, but - as always - there's the disclaimer that I may have something wrong.
Looking into the song reminded me of some old notes I'd forgotten about, and I also found a few new things.
"Around" and "by" in the line "She plays around with ev'ry guy that goes by" are sung with melismas (E D E D C and A B A B A B A G respectively), musically giving a sense of breadth for "around" and of movement for "by." "Apart" in the line "When she starts to tear it apart" is sung with a melisma (E C A) for a sense of the word's meaning, and "go" in the line "That's when she'll let you go" is sung with a melisma (C D) for a sense of movement, although more metaphorical.
All of these features are also in Del Shannon's original, although some of the articulations are a bit different.
Last night, I figured out the synth bass part in "Prologue" from Time, and I noticed something interesting about it. I might have it in the wrong octave, but it's something like:
A section of this sounded familiar to me, and I discovered that if this part is transposed up a whole step (to D major)
measures 5 to 8 (which are played at about the same time the vocals start, at ~0:40) are exactly the same as the first five measures of the bass part from Pachelbel's canon:
I don't know if this was intentional or just a coincidence, but it is quite a similarity.
In December 2017, I learned the bass part and the rest of the chords for "Latitude 88 North." I think it was sometime in early summer when I finished writing out the notation for the bass part, and I intended to make a recording of it, but I kept forgetting or not having time. At least now it's winter, which is seasonally appropriate for the theme of the song.
Here's the notation of the bass part, with the guitar chords written in above the staff (as always, there's the disclaimer that I might have something wrong):
The electric guitar in my recording isn't meant to be entirely accurate. I'm pretty sure I have the solo right though; here it is in tablature (tildes [~] indicate glissandi):
I recorded the electric guitar part in one take, switching between pick-ups for the solo section, which I usually never do, and because of that, my timing is off a little bit.
Also, a bit of commentary: I don't remember when I noticed this, but coinciding with the line "Thirty-five below and fallin'" in the chorus, the bass line descends, musically giving a sense of the (metaphorically) "fallin'" temperature.
"Tightrope" was the only song from A New World Record that I hadn't either written about or learned a part from, so last week I figured out a synth part at the beginning:
To make my notation, I program a MIDI part and then just take a screen clipping of it. I don't know how to put in repeats (if that's even possible with my program), so I added my own repeat signs when I edited the image.
I also referenced the early instrumental mix that's a bonus track on the CD re-issue. The synth part isn't present there, so it's easier to hear the string parts. I think for the most part, the upright bass plays the same thing as the synth, but I haven't lookt into it that closely yet. I did notice that in one measure the synth plays G and B notes but the bass plays only a G (in my notation, it's the last measure in the third line).
I haven't posted anything for the last few months, but I've been listening to the albums regularly and figuring out parts here and there (just none that overlap, so any recordings I would make wouldn't be very interesting). I recently figured out and notated the bass part for "Above the Clouds," so I thought I would post that so that there's some activity here. There's a section at the very beginning of the song that's just strings and a vocal; my notation starts after that. As always, there's the disclaimer that I might have something wrong:
I finally scanned my notation for the bass part for "The Way Life's Meant to Be" (with the guitar chords written in too). I went over this a couple times, but since a majority of the song is just three chords, I might have inadvertently doubled or left out a measure. There's the usual disclaimer that I might be wrong about the notes themselves too.
I wrote out the notation for the bass part in "The Diary of Horace Wimp," and I figured I might as well post it here. I have a few other projects with this same format (just for different bands), and I've been doing the same thing for some of those.
The part at the very beginning (alternating between Bb and Eb notes before the descending whole notes) might not be entirely accurate as far as when it starts (the bass starts out quietly, and I might have just extrapolated that from when that same section is repeated later).
