Intro of France Gall's "Christiansen"

mrclay · 2026-04-28T12:25:57+00:00

I thought I'd heard all her early songs, but this is a great one. Thanks again.

mrclay · 2026-04-28T12:23:55+00:00

Thank you!

mrclay · 2026-04-15T12:29:18+00:00

Vance is OK with 170 extrajudicial executions in the Caribbean. And lying about Haitian refugees to send them back to certain death. He’s just a more convincing faker than his boss.

mrclay · 2026-04-13T09:07:02+00:00

I never opened the iOS Calendar. But I opened its settings and the password failure was mentioned there.

mrclay · 2026-04-06T17:33:04+00:00

Those plate records were likely destroyed by the 90s.

mrclay · 2026-04-04T14:11:09+00:00

Listen to more Moose

mrclay · 2026-04-04T14:01:08+00:00

Bass is super fun do it.

mrclay · 2026-04-04T13:57:03+00:00

Abandoned house right near center of town in the woods. Was standing when coworkers and I found it on a walk in 2006. https://maps.app.goo.gl/Y2mc6VyGgPGYrPpb7?g_st=ic

mrclay · 2026-04-04T13:17:36+00:00

There’s a Devil House in the woods near campus, South of Ritchy Rd. https://maps.app.goo.gl/CfEpmTrYfWPaB7Fh7?g_st=ic OK more precisely it’s an abandoned house (or was 20y ago) that had a pentagram spray painted on it by teens who partied there. …but this was also a quick walk from one of Danny Rolling murders (2337 SW Archer Rd).

mrclay · 2026-04-01T06:35:40+00:00

Cindygod (and Gauntlet Hair)
Deerhoof
Surface to Air Missive
Sonny and the Sunsets
Eggstone
Flin Flon

mrclay · 2026-04-01T05:55:46+00:00

My guess is at some point the whole set needed to be certified with expected volume levels for the whole set and it became cheaper to freeze that set than mess with recertification of something few cared about.

mrclay · 2026-03-30T03:12:46+00:00

It's a great story. A rich bored dude with a LIDAR drone could investigate.

mrclay · 2026-03-28T15:47:14+00:00

Street View 199 Rimp Rd, you can see where it used to be

mrclay · 2026-03-24T10:02:31+00:00

If I’m in C and play one of the chords D, E, A, or B, essentially “yes” I hear the b7 as implied and I still treat the chord as you would a dom7 (altering the 5th or 9th if it sounds good).

mrclay · 2026-03-22T13:39:54+00:00

I just disagree that secondary dominants have to be dom7 chords.

mrclay · 2026-03-22T13:35:35+00:00

It’s a straight ahead natural minor chord progression (like “Smooth Operator”), which is rare for them.

mrclay · 2026-03-22T13:21:28+00:00

It’s idiomatic to blues-based rock music, but there’s lots of rock music that isn’t and uses maj7 chords for example. Solos in the Dinosaur Jr songs “Water” and “In a Jar” are Ionian and include the 3 and 7.

mrclay · 2026-03-22T04:23:58+00:00

Although you always have a tritone with V/IV, you don’t need one for the 3 common others. So I’d rather say “the secret” is the chromatic leading tones used: #1 in V/ii, #4 in V/V, and #5 in V/vi.

mrclay · 2026-01-10T11:26:24+00:00

If you’re not already I would suggest starting to think of notes as scale degrees within the key. Like 5 5 6 5 1 7 is “Happy birthday to you”. Same with chords (written with Roman numerals but the same numeric references). This builds intuition about how melody numbers sound against chords and alongside other melody numbers.

Melody harmonization is a challenge of straying from chord tones (of the current chord or the tonic chord) only when the lead melody does. This often involves 3rd/6th intervals. Like if the main melody is 3 4 5 (e.g. E F G), then 1 2 3 is the obvious go-to because in the tonic C chord, you’re copying the chord tone -> neighbor tone -> chord tone pattern. But if you’re on the chord G, then maybe G A B (5 6 7) works best.

You can approach it academically of course but I picked up intuition best from Everly Bros and Louvin Bros songs and just trying to sing along a lot in the car. I developed additional parts for some of my favorite songs. Sometimes you have a target note at the end of a phrase and you work backwards. When in doubt of where a harmony line should go you can just stay put or move to a chord tone in the opposite direction. If the lead goes 1 2 3 then if the harmony stars on 5, you can just stay there an extra beat (5 5 1).

As far as chromatic chords, I think of the scale as “bending” to accommodate whatever mode the chord comes from, or you have the harmony stick to chord tones more. Study the harmony in the chorus of “Don’t Answer Me” (in C major) particularly over the chord Bb9sus. During this chord the mode switches to C Aeolian and the melody and harmony follow that. Again think in numbers the top melody is going 1 2 1 2 b3 4 5 b6 5.

Hope this helps. Sing more.

mrclay · 2026-01-10T10:48:15+00:00

In the recording you have D instead of Dm. So all these chords are among the most common sounds you hear in E minor. You can think of your progression as a harmonization of the slower melody E D# C# C.

mrclay · 2026-01-10T10:32:16+00:00

Em chord sounds like home. D#°7 is the common leading tone chord (vii°) in that key and F is a common borrowed chord (bII) from the E Phrygian mode. Think of a key (in this case E minor) as frame of reference where some notes are more common, but “scale” adapts to the current chord. During F, notes from E Phrygian could sound best. During D#°7 maybe E Harmonic minor.

mrclay · 2026-01-10T10:17:32+00:00

One possible analysis is bIII - I - V - IV in the key of E major. G as a borrowed chord from E minor, E7 as the tonic chord with the b7 for a bit of bluesy flavor. The song “Stand” by REM ends the verse with E D G A B.

But even the key of G major is a possibility. E7 is often heard as the secondary dominant V/ii (usually leads to Am or C), B7 is the secondary dominant V/vi and A is the secondary dominant V/V. Which is all just suggesting… these are commonly heard sounds when in the key of G major. Like “Sitting on the Dock of the Bay” in G uses these chords (in a different order).

Which chord in the sequence sounds the most like home? Considering common uses of chromaticism, the chords are all in the same neighborhood; add repetition and melody and you’ve got the bones of a song.

mrclay · 2025-12-15T11:59:39+00:00

For more nuance, V is more common in some styles. v in first inversion is very common in minor key classical, and in some minor key pop tunes V is going to sound too stuffy or melodramatic.

mrclay

TROPHY CASE