The Minor Fall, The Major Lift (and Vice Versa)

Ok then! Introduction complete, hopefully this post will serve some example of what I intend for this blog:

So, one thing I listen for when I listen to music is how a song uses and transitions between major and minor keys. The typical, or at least more conventional approach, is to meander about in the minor key for the verse; brooding, building tension and intensity and then bursting into glorious, golden-hued release with a big major key chorus. One can often see the device clearly at work in big pop ballads.

"Total Eclipse of the Heart" by Bonnie Tyler, is one of the quintessential 80's uber-ballads, truly the cream of the Aquanet crop, and provides a solid example of the major/minor device at work (as an aside, I HIGHLY recommend you check out the video by clicking on the link and experience, for your own cultural edification, the truly peculiar magic of big budget music videos in their awkward formative years). Undeniable schlock-appeal of the accompanying video aside, though, what a set of pipes on Ms. Tyler, eh?

The song's structure is actually not as straightforward as I initially thought. Check, to cite but one example, the little false-lift into major key at 00:38, before collapsing back into minor. Such quirks actually come as no surprise now that I've discovered that Jim Steinman of Meatloaf hit-making fame wrote the thing. but on the whole, the song still serves as a solid illustration of the minor-verse major-chorus device. For another solid example, check R. Kelly ubiqui-ballad "I Believe I Can Fly".

The minor-verse major-chorus trope exists for a reason I think, as I mentioned above. It is undeniably effective, and people will probably milk it until the end of time, with equally unending results.

But what I began to notice were the little odd-balls that bucked the predictable trend; the ugly ducklings that, sometimes awkwardly, took the reverse approach: setting up in major key only to move into minor for the chorus.

A good example of this phenomena is provided by pop indexers The Beatles themselves, in Paul's "The Fool on the Hill". My pop sensibilities are a little jarred every time I hear this song. The explicit and abrupt shift to minor key in the chorus just seems to introduces so much tension to the song, especially after the big major key setup of the verses. It's like the musical equivalent of a feel-good movie climaxing with the disgrace and untimely demise of the likeable main character. In this case I don't think Paul really earns his little musical manipulation. The song ends up an odd sort of spiritually-bent trifle, "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" sitting in lotus position, a doofy smile on its face.

Much more effective I think is the Arcade Fire's approach in "Rebellion (Lies)". Where intensity and desperation are already the name of the game, why not write an anthem that starts in major key and then ratchet up the intensity even further with a minor key shift in the chorus? Win Butler and co. seem to have asked and effectively answered just that question, and skirts the pitfalls of "The Fool on the Hill" by augmenting their minor key chorus with (and this is all over the Arcade Fire's work) BIG everything: an enormous, stomping drumbeat, even higher pitched backing vocals chirping the titular parenthetical refrain, and a soaring wonder of a string melody (Actually, I just realized "Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)" also seems to employ this inverted, major-verse, minor-chorus structure to some extent. Anyone see another Arcade Fire song structured along these lines?).

One might be inclined to think such a compositional gambit would be restricted to the arsenals of pop mavericks like the Arcade Fire or auteurs like Mr. McCartney, but Marc Anthony's "My Baby You" puts the lie to that notion.

As a pop ballad tear-jerker expressly engineered and immaculately constructed specifically for mass consumption, I have to say that this was the most surprising of the three entries into the major-verse, minor-chorus catalog. I think it's interesting that the song's intensely minor key chorus, evocative of uncertainty and pathos, seems to undercut the intended conviction of Mr. Anthony's professions of love. Was such bi-level analysis intended? Should you take offense if your loved one dedicates the song to you? Are J.Lo. and Marc Anthony headed for stormy relationship waters? The answer to these questions is, of course, undoubtedly no, and, it is in noting that my analysis has somehow taken me into the realm of the deciphering of pop songs for their prophetic tabloid fodder content that I close this discussion.

If anyone has any suggestions or entries of their own that fit the major-verse, minor-chorus dichotomy (especially those that do so in a BIG way) please, by all means, let me know! There were a lot of songs that seemed to fit the standard, but just not as exuberantly as the above examples (Belle & Sebastian's "I'm a Cuckoo" and Arcade Fire's "Une Année Sans Lumiére" come to mind).

Also, if any standout examples of the standard "Total Eclipse" "I Believe" minor-verse major-chorus format come to mind, please let me know too! I would love to bolster the meager hard evidence I have that such a structure is even the standard at all.

If you've made it all the the way down here, kudos on your persistence! Until next time, happy listening to you all!

-Yoshi