Monday, September 16, 2024

"Funky Pretty"

Off and on over the last three months or so, I transcribed the lyrics from the liner notes of my edition of Holland into Google Documents for each of the songs so that they're easier to reference.  When I transcribed "Funky Pretty" this morning, I noticed a significant structural change in the third verse.

There are two vocal parts in the verses.  Each sings different lyrics, but they converge on the last word in each line, which is either the same or a perfect rhyme ("romance" and "romance," "glance" and "dance," and "dance" and "glance" in the first verse, "gold" and "gold," "old" and "bold," and "told" and "told" in the second).  This structure is broken in the third verse, though, where these simultaneously sung words are "ours" and "hours," "hours" and "stars," and "stars" and "powers."  This difference in the structure matches the theme of some of the lyrics in that verse:  "Her calendar is not like ours" and "The hieroglyphs mark changing hours."