Best Song of 2005: Heat #4
Kanye, Gorillaz, Daddy Yankee and the Chemical Brothers qualify for the next round. Kanye also wins the run-off from Heat #2. But guess what? Yes, ANOTHER run-off follows heat #4, which is FULL OF BANGERS.
( Rules reminder - SIX TICKS only. )
( Rules reminder - SIX TICKS only. )
So one technical feature of a lot of rock confessional is that it's modal music where major/minor is in flux. That means that the use of thirds is crucial. "Rush" (pretending it's in C for now): "Don't let nobody tell you" gravitates around the fifth in the minor scale (in C minor it's G) and the major third in the major scale (in Eb major it's G). But when they come down to what should be the root (essentially V-I, traditional harmonic resolution), that Eb makes the resolution minor (V-i), because they hit the minor third.
"I Live for the Day" does something unexpected by setting the chorus in an indirectly related key, from B minor to E minor/G maj and carrying over the vocal melody. In the chorus, the vocal rhythmic pattern (and to some extent the melodic pattern, it's a third below Kelly C.) is "Since U Been Gone," "I-live-for-the-da-ay," with the second "syllable" in the extended "day" resolving in a similar way. Imagine what "Since U Been Gone" would sound like if, instead of blasting GOOOOONE, Kelly had patterned it like this: "Since U Been Gone! Since U Been Gone! I can breathe..." (she does do this with a double track at some point, but it's not the primary melody). It would be a bit more desperate, more frantic, less immediately cathartic. That's what Lindsay's doing here. And -- didn't notice this until yesterday -- there's an almost imperceptible key change at the end, up a whole step to F#min/A maj, so that the intensity has been increased considerably (it's the classic climactic modulation that takes the song over the top) but covertly.
Plus Lindsay KICKS ASS.
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