The Current Music Blog: December 29, 2008 Archive

The Stream 12/29/08

Posted at 8:19 AM on December 29, 2008 by Barb Abney

From the "shivers down your spine" department: John Lennon featured in a new commercial.

Keith Richards donates autographed Zemaitis Pearl Front electric guitar to The Rector High School Helping Hands Foundation to be auctioned on eBay.

A Monday time waster: The list of lists.

Today In Music History:
1946 - Marianne Faithfull was born.
1961 - Jim Reid (The Jesus and Mary Chain) was born.
1967 - Dave Mason quit Traffic to go solo.
1970 - Glen Phillips (Toad The Wet Sprocket) was born.
1973 - Jim Croce's "Time In A Bottle" was #1.
1975 - Paul Kantner and Grace Slick of Jefferson Airplane filed for divorce.
1980 - Tim Hardin ("If I Were A Carpenter") died of an overdose.
1982 - Jamaica issued a Bob Marley commemorative postage stamp.
2006 - Dita Von Teese (the wife of Marilyn Manson) filed for divorce.

The "Jangliest" Chord in Rock...

Posted at 8:25 AM on December 29, 2008 by Steve Seel (6 Comments)

For some 40 years, guitarists have wondered how on Earth the Beatles created it: that first chord at the beginning of "A Hard Day's Night." Does it involve an alternate guitar tuning? If so, what? Well, someone has now devised an answer, and it's not a musician, but a mathematician.

Jason Brown's theory, arrived at using something called the "Fourier calculation": Beatles producer George Martin provided some "extra" notes on the piano - played simultaneously to George Harrison's 12-string Rickenbacker guitar - that fatten the chord, and give it that sweetly anticipatory "hovering" quality.

My suspicion is that this will not end the debate. Brown might have identified the notes in the chord, but his theory about Martin playing some of them on a piano, tucked-in there behind those reverberant guitar strings, remains his own speculation. Let the guitarists commense with the rebuttal!

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My Three Songs Monday

Posted at 12:06 PM on December 29, 2008 by Jill Riley

Leslie in Boston writes "Sometimes you're just in the mood for melancholy music. These three songs are a little sad and a little optimistic at the same time."

1.) The Shins "The Past And Pending"
2.) The Replacements "Skyway"
3.) The Hold Steady "First Night"