music analogy

Music Analogy
“The final years of the 1970’s saw the emergence of a new style of pop music that
would continue in popularity into the early 1980’s. This music was known, by its
fans at that time, as New Wave” ( />“New Wave” had a particular style that utilized the synthesizer as a main
instrument. The synthesizer was a machine that electronically produced music. It
gave a certain artificial and metallic feel to the music. The Cure and Erasure,
bands formed during that period of time, were some of the bands that
implemented the synthesizer into their music. Though both bands fit into the
category of “New Wave” the feel of their music is somewhat different. To explain
the difference I would have to analyze their songs. Two examples of their music
that I will analyze are “Friday I’m in Love” by The Cure and “Always” by
Erasure. The song “Friday I’m in Love” by The Cure had a 4/4 meter. The song
began with a pickup by the guitar and led into a backbeat by the drums. The
synthesizer played a continuous riff providing the “tinging” artificial sound and
there’s also bass in the background. There were also sounds towards the end of
the song that sounded a lot like the “theramin.” The beat subdivisions seemed to
be triplets because the song seemed to swing and the other subdivisions didn’t
match. The correct sequence and lengths of the sections in this particular song
can be best labeled as I8+8 A8 B8 C6 B8 Solo8 B8 C6 D8+8 A8 B8 Solo8 Solo8.
The labels A and B are to distinguish the two different verses, the label C stands
for the chorus and the label D symbolized the new section (the bridge). The
vocals within this song have a deeper and a more wailing kind of voice than that
of the band Erasure. The song “Always” from Erasure also had a 4/4 meter, but
unlike The Cure the song did not start out with a pickup and instead of the guitar
the song began with the synthesizer. There didn’t seem to be any other
distinguishable instruments besides the synthesizer and the drum, though I did
seem to hear the use of the theramin for the eerie effect. There were also these
clicking sounds, but I’m assuming the synthesizer made it. The groove of this
song was more harmonized and brings to mind the music of the early Beatles.
The subdivisions of this song were 8th notes. The sequence and lengths of the
sections for this song can be labeled as I8 V8+8 C8+4 V8+8 C8+4 CFADE. The

label V symbolizes the verse of the song and the label C symbolizes the chorus of
the song. Although both these bands are categorized under “New Wave”, the feel
of their songs is very different. While Erasure’s song had a more “spaced-out”
feel to it, The Cure’s song seemed to have a faster beat and seemed to be less
eerie. I think the difference was from the bands’ distinct way of using both the
synthesizer and the theramin. While Erasure used the synthesizer throughout the
song, as the main instrument, The Cure used the synthesizer along with other
instruments. Therefore, The Cure’s piece was less “artificial” and the beat fit in
more with the category of rock and roll. But the category of “New Wave” music
is not always associated with the artificiality of the songs, thus The Cure’s
interesting way of manipulating the vocal pitch of the vocals (a kind of a deep
wailing sound), the “eerieness” of the music stands out.