Lightning Bolt: the official album thread

[McParadigm]

I think both are just powerchords throughout but Habit is just 10 times more aggressive in the way it's played and in the guitar tones.

So a summary of the differences between Gimme Shelter and Mr. Jones would be "Well, they're both mostly chords, but Gimme Shelter is darker sounding and the guitar tones aren't as clean."

I just wanted to say that there are no minor chords causing the angry sound.

A power chord itself may not stand as major or minor, but how it is interpreted by the ear depends on the big picture. But my comment was probably more in response to the reductionist approach to discussing music this album seems to have brought out. There's been a lot of cutting things down to such impossibly broad summations that the actual essence is lost, in order to make comparisons that aren't particularly valid or useful.

I've never understood the hate for Supersonic.

I used to love The Ramones and to me this is an ode to them. It's fun, it's lively, it's got a cool breakdown and it's not trying to be something it's not.

I consider it as enjoyable a song as Got Some and Amongst the Waves....not unpleasant to hear, but not worth seeking out.

[CupidStunt]

I must admit I did prefer the alternative SS lyrics someone made up on the old board when it first leaked that were all about smoking weed. Anyone got an easy way of locating them?

[harmless]

Yeah, all of our guesses at the lyrics were better than the actual lyrics. A witty song about smoking weed would've been great. Another ode to rock music or "living life with the volume full" (especially when Got Some had already done it better) wasn't so great.

[Mike]

I think both are just powerchords throughout but Habit is just 10 times more aggressive in the way it's played and in the guitar tones.

So a summary of the differences between Gimme Shelter and Mr. Jones would be "Well, they're both mostly chords, but Gimme Shelter is darker sounding and the guitar tones aren't as clean."

I just wanted to say that there are no minor chords causing the angry sound.

A power chord itself may not stand as major or minor, but how it is interpreted by the ear depends on the big picture. But my comment was probably more in response to the reductionist approach to discussing music this album seems to have brought out. There's been a lot of cutting things down to such impossibly broad summations that the actual essence is lost, in order to make comparisons that aren't particularly valid or useful.

Yeah, most of the time you're implying either a major or a minor key with your powerchord riffs making the the powerchords itself sound more minor/major in context. I really didn't mean to say angry playing and guitar tones are the only difference between the two songs.

[CupidStunt]

Can you even get minor power chords? Minors aren't angry, they're sad.

Minors aren't angry, they're sad? Um... that surely depends on the song. Angry / sad / depressing. They're negative as opposed to positive, that's my point. I don't think we need to argue about the emotions they provoke.

Haha, I have no intention of arguing with you. I was just saying minor chords have always hit me as more sorrowful than angry. Angry is normally aggressive and aggressive music tends to lend itself more to brash, major sounding notes/chords. Minor chords normally belong in more delicate, intricate music in my experience.

[harmless]

Can you even get minor power chords? Minors aren't angry, they're sad.

Minors aren't angry, they're sad? Um... that surely depends on the song. Angry / sad / depressing. They're negative as opposed to positive, that's my point. I don't think we need to argue about the emotions they provoke.

Haha, I have no intention of arguing with you. I was just saying minor chords have always hit me as more sorrowful than angry. Angry is normally aggressive and aggressive music tends to lend itself more to brash, major sounding notes/chords. Minor chords normally belong in more delicate, intricate music in my experience.

"Grunge" (Nirvana et al) was mostly made up of minor chords, right? As far as I know PJ were unusual among those bands for using plenty of major chords in a more classic rock manner.

[McParadigm]

You guys are getting to be a seriously shitty way to kill time at work.

[ABNorman]

More pictures of dogs!

[McParadigm]

oh goddamn it

[CupidStunt]

Can you even get minor power chords? Minors aren't angry, they're sad.

Minors aren't angry, they're sad? Um... that surely depends on the song. Angry / sad / depressing. They're negative as opposed to positive, that's my point. I don't think we need to argue about the emotions they provoke.

Haha, I have no intention of arguing with you. I was just saying minor chords have always hit me as more sorrowful than angry. Angry is normally aggressive and aggressive music tends to lend itself more to brash, major sounding notes/chords. Minor chords normally belong in more delicate, intricate music in my experience.

"Grunge" (Nirvana et al) was mostly made up of minor chords, right? As far as I know PJ were unusual among those bands for using plenty of major chords in a more classic rock manner.

I'm not sure I agree with that. I hate the grunge box but here goes. Nirvana's music was mainly power chord based, meaning, as discussed above and explained well by McPardigm that the chords were not minor or major, neither male or female; they're hermaphrodites. The feel of a song and scale/progression is what will dictate whether you, the listener, perceive the sounds to be major or minor.

I guess what you're saying is out of all bands bundled into the grunge box, the main thing they had in common is that their music was either sad or angst, so that's where I think you're getting the impression that the whole movement was built on minor chords.

[B]

You guys are getting to be a seriously shitty way to kill time at work.

Welcome to 2010.

[Lostdog]

http://www.binaural.es/noticias/primera ... ning-bolt/

esta en español, pero es bastante descriptiva.

[ABNorman]

Mind Your Manners - The album's energetic hoot. A scourge rocker.

[E.H. Ruddock]

Has this thing leaked yet?

[Lostdog]

11 - 'Yellow Moon' - For us the most great song on the disc. An instant classic Pearl Jam that starts with a chord progression similar to 'Low Light'. Vedder's voice enters in a unsettling stretching. The warmth of the subject reaches the zenith both in the moments that Vedder exclaims 'Born To Rise' as in the various sequences featuring the solazos of McCready. These somewhat reminiscent of Pink Floyd, like the whole somewhat stylistic refers to 'Parting Ways' (or even 'Long Road'). It seems the perfect song to start the next concert tour of Pearl Jam. Total Joya. Mike is insane,completely after 3 minutes.

[Mike]

11 - 'Yellow Moon' - For us the most great song on the disc. An instant classic Pearl Jam that starts with a chord progression similar to 'Low Light'. Vedder's voice enters in a unsettling stretching. The warmth of the subject reaches the zenith both in the moments that Vedder exclaims 'Born To Rise' as in the various sequences featuring the solazos of McCready. These somewhat reminiscent of Pink Floyd, like the whole somewhat stylistic refers to 'Parting Ways' (or even 'Long Road'). It seems the perfect song to start the next concert tour of Pearl Jam. Total Joya. Mike is insane,completely after 3 minutes.

[harmless]

Can you even get minor power chords? Minors aren't angry, they're sad.

Minors aren't angry, they're sad? Um... that surely depends on the song. Angry / sad / depressing. They're negative as opposed to positive, that's my point. I don't think we need to argue about the emotions they provoke.

Haha, I have no intention of arguing with you. I was just saying minor chords have always hit me as more sorrowful than angry. Angry is normally aggressive and aggressive music tends to lend itself more to brash, major sounding notes/chords. Minor chords normally belong in more delicate, intricate music in my experience.

"Grunge" (Nirvana et al) was mostly made up of minor chords, right? As far as I know PJ were unusual among those bands for using plenty of major chords in a more classic rock manner.

I'm not sure I agree with that. I hate the grunge box but here goes. Nirvana's music was mainly power chord based, meaning, as discussed above and explained well by McPardigm that the chords were not minor or major, neither male or female; they're hermaphrodites. The feel of a song and scale/progression is what will dictate whether you, the listener, perceive the sounds to be major or minor.

I guess what you're saying is out of all bands bundled into the grunge box, the main thing they had in common is that their music was either sad or angst, so that's where I think you're getting the impression that the whole movement was built on minor chords.

Well, yeah. Which I acknowledged. I'm not a guitarist, the only thing I'm contesting is that "sad" or "angry" aren't really mutually exclusive things. All I know is that the guitarist of my old band differentiated hard / heavy / "grungy" songs from typical rock songs because they had minor chords. How wrong or right he was, I have no idea. Whether "grunge" existed is another conversation, I'm using the term as a shorthand for stuff we probably both associate with the term.

[harmless]

11 - 'Yellow Moon' - For us the most great song on the disc. An instant classic Pearl Jam that starts with a chord progression similar to 'Low Light'. Vedder's voice enters in a unsettling stretching. The warmth of the subject reaches the zenith both in the moments that Vedder exclaims 'Born To Rise' as in the various sequences featuring the solazos of McCready. These somewhat reminiscent of Pink Floyd, like the whole somewhat stylistic refers to 'Parting Ways' (or even 'Long Road'). It seems the perfect song to start the next concert tour of Pearl Jam. Total Joya. Mike is insane,completely after 3 minutes.

Total Joya!

[guitar_davey]

11 - 'Yellow Moon' - For us the most great song on the disc. An instant classic Pearl Jam that starts with a chord progression similar to 'Low Light'. Vedder's voice enters in a unsettling stretching. The warmth of the subject reaches the zenith both in the moments that Vedder exclaims 'Born To Rise' as in the various sequences featuring the solazos of McCready. These somewhat reminiscent of Pink Floyd, like the whole somewhat stylistic refers to 'Parting Ways' (or even 'Long Road'). It seems the perfect song to start the next concert tour of Pearl Jam. Total Joya. Mike is insane,completely after 3 minutes.

Total Joya!

A new "go-to" show opener maybe? That's kind of exciting.

[Jaeti]

11 - 'Yellow Moon' - For us the most great song on the disc. An instant classic Pearl Jam that starts with a chord progression similar to 'Low Light'. Vedder's voice enters in a unsettling stretching. The warmth of the subject reaches the zenith both in the moments that Vedder exclaims 'Born To Rise' as in the various sequences featuring the solazos of McCready. These somewhat reminiscent of Pink Floyd, like the whole somewhat stylistic refers to 'Parting Ways' (or even 'Long Road'). It seems the perfect song to start the next concert tour of Pearl Jam. Total Joya. Mike is insane,completely after 3 minutes.

I really, really want this song to be good. I've kind of subconsciously let people's objections to Sleeping By Myself being on the album, along with the lame-ish Wrigley performance of Future Days, convince me that the last quarter of this album will be kind of crappy.

But I never got into the uke album and only listened to SBM (once) after hearing it would be on this Pearl Jam record, so I come to it with no previous attachments, and by all accounts it's good on the uke album, so it should still be good here, especially to someone like me who doesn't have it ingrained in another form. Future Days has to be better than the version we have, so if Yellow Moon can be very good or better, I think my largely unfounded fears about the end of this thing won't be realized, and I might even be rather pleasantly surprised.