I'm at work and pulling this from memory, so errors will occur.Blenheim Augustine wrote:Which version of Just Breathe is that?McParadigm wrote:Hell, Just Breathe uses the same progression as Stand By Me and Sam Cooke's Loveable. The only difference is that it runs I-V-vi-IV rather than I-vi-IV-V.
Transposing so that each song is being played in the key of C, the verses look something like this:
Just Breathe
starts as: back and forth between C and G
"stay with me....": Am and F
Which is really I V I V I V vi IV, but I'm simplifying here.
Stand By Me
C Am F G
Chain Gang (apologies....I said Lovable before, but I'm pretty sure Chain Gang and Cupid are the ones that best adhere to this)
C Am F G
You can change the key, or adjust the order of the chords a bit, but the basic structure that you're building from is the same. Last Kiss uses it. Unchained Melody, too. Beast of Burden. A lot of pop, rock and country songs.
Not that chord progression is the end all be all of musical connection. I'm just using it to illustrate a larger truth about the connection between what might be termed country music and what might be termed r&b or soul music.
In terms of writing, that lyrical trick of letting each verse slide its way into the title phrase at its end, and then letting the chorus sections be wordy extensions of that key thought, is a lot more common to old school country than to Stax era r&b. But....do me a favor and give this about 60 seconds while you think about the words and vocal wobble of Come Back. I think this performance does a lot to illustrate how easily Come Back would fit into Nelson's approach.Can you point to a few classic country songs that share some elements with "Come Back"? I'm just not hearing it, other than a few twangy arpeggios. I guess Ed does sound a bit like Patsy Cline.
Truth.
