Friday, December 29, 2006

Friday Random Ten: Dead Saddam Edition

The list this week doesn't actually have anything to do with him, but I'm watching the coverage as I write this, and felt like I should at least mention such a piece of news, even though I don't really have much to say. I feel weird about the fact that he's dead. I don't really have an opinion on the death penalty as a policy issue, but it makes me feel weird, because it's the ultimate premeditated killing. Somehow, it's strange to be notified in advance that at X time, a person will be dead. Especially when it's someone who is such a cultural figure like Saddam. He's a kind of celebrity, and he was publically, openly put to death.

It's weird. That's all I know to say about it.

Anyway, the list, which I started making in my head this morning, is themed "songs with weird time signatures", because rock (which is what I listen to almost exclusively) is heavily skewed toward 4/4 with a steady tempo. With help from Wikipedia:
  1. Pink Floyd - Money: in 7/4. Conducted as pairs of 3/4, 4/4 measures, at least the way I always heard it with the triplets, and that's what the sheet music says, although David Gilmour calls it 7/8, and according to music scholars, it's technically in 21/8!
  2. Blood, Sweat, and Tears - And When I Die: I can't find anything on it, but it sounds like a mix of 4/4 and 3/4 to me, changing with the different tempos. (tempi.)
  3. Jesus Christ Superstar - Everything's Alright: one of my favorite 5/4s.
  4. Mission: Impossible Theme - not the modern version: also a 5/4, we did it in band and it was pretty nifty.
  5. Jethro Tull - Living In The Past: 5/4.
  6. Jethro Tull - Thick As A Brick: 6/8. Crazy fluteman is all about the fun time sigs. The article calls it as partially in 10/8, but doesn't say if I'm right on the 6/8 for the rest. But damnit, I can hear it! It sounds medieval.
  7. John Carpenter - Theme from Halloween: 5/4. I heard this thing way too much when I worked at Six Flags during Fright Fest. A fun change from the usual location music, which I heard so much of that I'd hear it in my dreams.
  8. Peter Gabriel - Solsbury Hill: 7/4.
  9. Styx - Fooling Yourself (The Angry Young Man): 7/4 in some of the keyboard solos. I also think some of the opening keyboard work is either in 6/8 or heavy on triplets.
  10. Beatles - All You Need Is Love: the verses are in 7/4.
Bonus America from West Side story: split 6/8, 3/4.

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