High N Dry is my favourite Def Leppard album. I remember cruising around with my older brother in his car playing Def Leppard-High N Dry, The Scorpions-Virgin Killers, Motorhead and Judas Priest-Point Of Entry in the summer of 1982. That was the year I was first introduced to all those bands.
That same summer me and my older brother were in a Metal/Punk band and one of the songs we played was Let It Go (Def Leppard). Our band played an outdoor show on Canada day with the then unknown Shania Twain on the same bill. Her band Longshot were the headliners and they played all pop-rock music. Songs from Pat Benatar, Toronto, Loverboy, etc. I was kind of struck by how attractive she was back then.
I used to think that the bridge was right before the chorus (also called the change in the middle of the song āthe bridgeā). Thatās what we used to call it but in recent years Iāve been referring to it as the pre-chorus.
Yeah, High N Dry is my favorite too! And Point Of Entry is one of my favorite Priest albums, though it was quite a departure from their previous stuff. So much so that the critics blasted it terribly and fan response was generally pretty weak. It still rocked, but it was a more thoughtful and laid back thing for them which was really cool IMO.
Ha, cool! I like Shania, though not so much for her country/pop music but just who she is. And how she bounced back after her divorce from Mutt Lange, he really did her wrong. Heās both hero and bastard now, thatās a tough one to reconcile.
Hereās an easy one to categorize: Iāve Just Seen A Face by the Beatles. Verse followed by pre-chorus where McCartney sings or hums syllables instead of words, followed by chorus, then another verse and pre-chorus, then chorus, then a middle eight guitar break repeating the theme of the verse, with the end of the guitar break duplicating the pre-chorus, then back to the chorus. Fairly classic earlier Beatles arrangement.
Dave, there are no Beatles coming back anytime soon. I would think for someone involved in the space program you would be more inclined to develop a completely new song format, and in the words of Ralph Kramden, take it āTo the moon, Aliceā.
Bob, this is a GREAT example, thank you! And the best part is that I know this song so well that I can hear it in my head on demand and followed your description to a tee! :beerbang:
My pleasure, sir. Now you can write a song about GAIA, with saucers coming out of middle earth, and figuring out a proper song structure to get aliens to want to do the love thang. Stretch out a little and take one giant step for music.
If you use the words literally, a middle 8 cannot possibly be referred to as a bridge. The function of a literal bridge is to cross from one side to ANOTHER. The middle 8 does not serve this purpose at all. In fact if you analyse middle 8ās theyāre essentially ādeparturesā ā¦ little interludes as it were. Brian May also refers to these sections in Queenās music as middle 8ās.
The logical use of the bridge label would be to describe the section between the verse and the chorus. Why on earth it inherited the title āpre-chorusā and found itself replacing the middle 8 label is beyond me.
Perhaps people got confused because the middle 8 isnāt always 8 bars long.
So I disagree that the labels are interchangeable. I have found several reliable sources that concur (producers, engineers, musicians etc) ā¦ take a look at this article:
Iāve always referred to the part leading up to the chorus as the bridge but just in the last year or two Iāve started calling it the pre-chorus after reading forum members opinions about exactly what is a bridge. Thereās a thread somewhere hear (or was it on Facebook?) where we discuss pre-chorus, bridge, interlude, etc.
After reading the article linked above, maybe I should go back to referring to the part before the chorus as the bridge.
Wow, when I replied to Bruceās post it appeared as though he had started a new thread. There were no preceding posts that I could see, and I had checked this thread a few times before posting. Either Iām losing my mind or there is some weird behaviour happening with this thread. Iām probably just going crazy.
Hmmā¦ very strange that a poster comments for the first time out of nowhere on 5 year old Zombie threadā¦ for a Mod, this kind of thing tends to raise a spam flag - especially since Bruce has spent only 9 minutes reading 28 posts. Nevertheless, the post is spot on topic, which is unusual for a spam postā¦
Yeah, that struck me also. Usually I wonāt click on a link that is posted by a brand new member. Something about his post felt legitimate and as you said, it seemed very āon topicā. The guy seemed to hang around the forum for quite a while too, which maybe prompted me to let down my guard more than I normally would. It did seem like an uncharacteristic way of introducing oneself into a new forum, though. Hopefully nothing malicious has taken place.
Lately it has been pretty hard to get into trouble here, so I will just say his post is on point and suffer the consequences. In my opinion, the middle 8 generally implies an instrumental interlude using the general chord structure of the verses of the song. The middle 8, (regardless of length) brings you back to the structure of the composition, and can lead to a pre chorus, a chorus, or even a bridge. It is an interlude in the structure of the song that will generally not rely on vocals. If Iām in trouble for responding Iāll gladly take my lumps.
Hey, weāre all trying to record classics, so we should recognize the formats. I wonder if the section in Hotel California that switches back to acoustic and finishes with āYou just canāt kill the beastā would be considered a middle 8 construct in the format of that song?
