"Little Deuce Coupe"

A couple days ago, I listened to the two-albums-on-one-CD re-issue of Little Deuce Coupe and All Summer Long, and later I realized that there's a somewhat significant contrast in "Little Deuce Coupe," specifically in the line "But she'll walk a Thunderbird like it's standin' still."  The narrator's affection towards his car is such that he's anthropomorphized it to some degree, using a feminine pronoun to refer to it throughout the song ("She's my little deuce coupe," "She'll do a hundred and forty...," "She's got a competition clutch...," and so on), but a competitor's Thunderbird is still just an object and is referred to with the neuter "it."

"When I Grow Up (To Be a Man)"

I was thinking about "When I Grow Up (To Be a Man)" a couple days ago, specifically about the recurring harpsichord phrase in the verses, which is something like:

The rhythm here seemed familiar to me, and eventually, I realized that it's the same as the rhythm of the guitar part in the first "verse" of "Shut Down, Part II," which is something like this:

While the melodies are different, the rhythm is the same, but I don't know whether this was an intentional re-use or just a coincidence.

"Let's Put Our Hearts Together"

In the line "Take your time; don't worry how you feel because you know we've got forever" in "Let's Put Our Hearts Together," "forever" is sung with a melisma (F# A# C# B A#) and lasts for nearly a full measure.  Both of these features lend a sense of duration.

"A Casual Look"

Yester-day, I listened to the two-albums-on-one-CD re-issue of 15 Big Ones and Love You.  I noticed that, perhaps just coincidentally, some lines in "A Casual Look" are identical to some lines in "I'm So Young" (from Today!).  Here's the second verse of "A Casual Look":

A soldier boy when he proposed

She said no; his face just froze

You know she loved him

But was so young

Can't marry no one

Can't marry no one

And here's the first verse of "I'm So Young":

I have a girlfriend; she says I'm her only one

We wanna get married, but we're so young

So young

Can't marry no one

Both end with "So young / Can't marry no one."  Furthermore, as I've noted before, in both, "young" is sung with a melisma, providing a sense of degree (for "so").

According to the liner notes of the respective albums, "A Casual Look" was written by Ed Wells, and "I'm So Young" by William Tyus.

"South Bay Surfer"

Last night, I figured out the chords for "South Bay Surfer," and while doing so, I noticed a small feature.  In the lines "All the boys are rough and ready / To handle anything," "anything" is sung with a melisma (A C# C# B), giving a sense of breadth.  Most of the notes are sung to different pitches, and this also contributes to the effect.

"Little Deuce Coupe"

This morning, I listened to the two-albums-on-one-CD reissue of Beach Boys' Party! and Stack-o-Tracks.  For the first time, I noticed that near the end of the version of "Little Deuce Coupe" on Beach Boys' Party!, at ~3:02, Mike Love sings, "She comes on like a rose," which is the first line of "Poison Ivy" by the Coasters.

"Whistle In"

Yester-day, I realized that in "Whistle In," the "all" in the line "All day long" has a longer value than any other note and that (along with the melismas that I noted years ago) this provides a sense of duration.  I couldn't figure out all of the precise note values (which is why I don't have notation), but "all" is sung with a half note, and the other notes are quarter notes or shorter.

"Let Us Go on This Way"

A few days ago, I figured out the synthesizer bass part in "Let Us Go on This Way."  While working on writing it out in notation yester-day, I realized the significance of some of the accidentals.

Here's the first verse (notated an octave higher than it's played):

(After this, there are three measures of rests, which I didn't include.  The second verse is basically the same; the only difference is that the eighth notes [G natural and B] at the end of the eleventh measure are replaced by a single G natural quarter note.)

Above the four measures of G naturals and C naturals, the lyrics are:

Going to school isn't my fondest desire

But sittin' in class, you set my soul on fire

and

When I leave you, I'm so depressed

'Cause you're my only happiness

in the first and second verses, respectively.  The appearance of the accidentals coincides with the narrator's mentioning what is distasteful ("Going to school isn't my fondest desire") or downright unpleasant ("When I leave you, I'm so depressed"), and to some degree, the accidentals provide a musical sense of something he would rather avoid.

I also noticed that "depressed" in the line "When I leave you, I'm so depressed" is sung with a melisma (E G A), giving a sense of degree (for "so").

"In the Back of My Mind"

I noted a significant melisma in "In the Back of My Mind" last year, but a couple days ago, I found some more.

In the line "I make her happy just livin' so plain," "plain" is sung with a melisma (A G F, I think), musically giving a sense of degree (for "so").

In the line "It'll always be way in the back of my mind," "always" (D D C) and "be" (A G F G F) are both sung with melismas, giving a sense of duration.

"Don't Hurt My Little Sister"

I listened to Today! yester-day and noticed a few small features.

In the line "She'll probably stay in there the rest of the day" in "Don't Hurt My Little Sister," "day" is sung with a melisma (D Eb D C), musically giving something of a sense of the duration of "the rest of the day."

"California Saga: California"

A few days ago, I figured out the chords and the synthesizer bass part for "California Saga: California," and I noticed a couple interesting features.

First, there are some changes in the third verse that reflect the "liberty" that's mentioned in the lyrics.  The first two verses have AABB rhyme schemes:

Have you ever been south of Monterey; Barrancas carve the coast line

And the chaparral flows to the sea 'neath waves of golden sunshine

And have you ever been north of Morro Bay; the south coast plows the sea

And the people there are of the breed that don't need electricity

Have you ever been down Salinas way, where Steinbeck found the valley

And he wrote about it the way it was in his travelin's with Charley*

And have you ever walked down through the sycamores, where the farmhouse used to be

There the monarch's autumn journey ends on a wind-swept cypress tree

but the third verse exhibits more internal rhyme than line-ending rhyme:

Have you ever been to a festival, the Big Sur congregation

Where Country Joe will do his show, and he'd sing about liberty

And the people there in the open air are one big family

Yeah, the people there love to sing and share their newfound liberty

The third verse is different musically, too.  The second half alternates between F# major and B major where the other verses have the progression B major | E major | F# major | B major (a repetition of the first half of the verse).

In both the poetic and musical structures, the third verse breaks from what comes before it, and this illustrates that "liberty."

Second, there are a number of elements that are reminiscent of "California Girls."  Obviously, California is in the title and lyrics of both songs, but there are also specific musical elements that the two songs have in common.  Both are in B major, and the bass parts for the verses use the same root, fifth, sixth, fifth figure.

The bass part in the verses of "California Girls" is something like:

and the bass part in the verses of "California Saga: California" is something like:

(The actual parts are looser than what I've indicated; the note values shouldn't be observed too precisely.)

The same figure (root, fifth, sixth, fifth) is used throughout both parts, and the chord progressions are similar but not exactly the same.  Above some of the B F# G# F# figures in "California Girls" (measures three, four, eleven, and twelve) there are A majors instead of B majors, but otherwise, the first note in each bass figure corresponds to the root note of the chord, so the majority of the chord progressions consists of B major, E major, and F# major.

Because the musical similarities are so close, I think this resemblance was intentional and meant as a nod to "California Girls."

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*In the CD booklet of my copy of Holland, it's spelt "Charlie," but the Steinbeck book that's alluded to is Travels with Charley.

"Surfin' U.S.A."

I made a video demonstrating the organ solo in "Surfin' U.S.A."  I learned it by ear, so there's the disclaimer that I may have something wrong.

Played with the "mellow" drawbar organ sound on my Hammond SKX, with the Leslie on the fast setting.  I set the drawbars at 60 8878 224.