The Regular Friday Post
Rando Lyrics: You gotta face that erases The need for the buyin’
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Last week’s rando lyrics: The lyric, “Fly the great big sky, see the great big sea Kick through continents bustin' boundaries” is from the song "Roam”, by the B-52s. Written by Cindy Wilson, Robert Waldrop, Keith Strickland, Fred Schneider & Kate Pierson, it’s Track 6 on the album “Cosmic Thing", released in December 1989. “Roam” was the fourth single from the album, and hit #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart during March 1990. Produced by Nile Rodgers. Credit: Genius Link >Roam<
Welcome to The Regular Friday post!
For Today:
I didn’t make “Roam” by the B-52s A Song To Play for this week because the guitar part is in a very non-standard tuning. I didn’t even try to play it, and I think trying to play it with standard tuning would just be a mess, but if you have a subscription to Ultimate Guitar (or decide you need a subscription because just can’t go on without playing “Roam” in an odd tuning), have fun!!
But I did make a…
Song To Play:
I ended up choosing this song because it’s actually in a minor key: A minor. That gives me a chance to talk about minor keys, and since I’ve more or less promised to keep the boring music theory stuff to at least more of a minimum, I’m taking the opportunity. A minor is the relative minor of the Key of C Major, so you’re going to see a lot of chords in the chart above that look like they belong in C Major.
They do.
They also belong in the relative minor of A minor. “Relative minor” is synonymous and interchangeable with the term “Natural minor”. I highlight “Relative (Natural) minor” because, unlike Major Keys, there are two other kinds of minor keys: “Harmonic minor” keys, and “Melodic minor” keys. An explanation of these two keys (along with Natural/Relative minor keys) can be found here: >Minor Keys<. (Ed. - there is a useful picture of the Circle of Fifths in the gallery below - note the outer ring is for the Major Keys, the inner ring denotes the relative minor.)
For now, let’s just leave it at a relative minor key uses the same chords as it’s relative Major key, it’s just that the minor key starts at the sixth of the Major. Since Aminor is the vi- chord of the Key of C Major, that’s where the Key of A minor begins, and the chords of the Key of A minor are now notated as the i-, ii(dim), III, iv-, v-, VI and VII) or Am, B(dim), C, Dmin, Emin, F, and G. So what’s the point? Writing in a minor key, we sorta tend to stay with the scale degree progressions we’re familiar with, so a 1, 3, 4, 5 progression in A minor gives us an Am, C, Dmin, and Emin chord progression - definitely a more melancholy, sad “sound”. And that’s kind of the purpose of minor keys.
So I had to break my own rule about posting complete chord charts. The YouTube video for the commercial version of the song “Under The Milky Way” seems pretty conceptual - there is some footage that might be studio play (Ed. - probably isn’t - likely just for the cameras) but it isn’t very helpful for figuring out chords. Live performances seemed to concentrate (understandably) on the band’s vocalist, Steve Kilbey, who plays bass, so again, not much help there. Where the backing guitar players in live performance videos can be seen, they’re sorta helpful, sorta not. Chordify seems to have a lot more chords than necessary, I assume without knowing its algorithm is doing the best it can tracking two different guitars, but ended up with a ton of unnecessary chords. A chart I found on Ultimate Guitar seems to strike the right balance, so that’s pretty much what you’re seeing above. I offer it as a fair use exception for educational purposes only; any commercial use will require royalty payments to the copyright holders.
Mr. Kilbey, along with Karin Jansson wrote the song, which is Track 2 on The Church album “Starfish” released in 1988. In addition to being a hit in its own right, the song was also featured in the movie “Donnie Darko”, though there were issues with it’s placement in the film. See link: >Donnie Darko Soundtrack<
A note on the chord chart - If I can’t fit the lyrics and chords on a single page, I prefer to print the chart using two columns. So, play the left column first, then up to the top of the right (second) column. I find this preferable to stapling pages together (they always fall apart), but if it’s a long or complicated song columns may not be an option. When I have to use columns I try to break the columns on the beginning of a section. In this case the left hand column ends on the chorus and the right hand column begins on the solo, so if you’re singing along, the column doesn’t break in the middle of a vocal line. FWIW, your mileage may vary.
Also that Asus4/F# chord seems intimidating from the chord name. Two ways to play it in open position (hint: if you’re able, just curl your thumb around the back of the neck at the second fret to hit that F#):
The “ME!” Section…..
What I’m Listening2: >April Showers Make Me Crazy<
Shameless Self Promotion Section:
My song is out! Link: “Long Road Back”click on link for streaming options, then scroll down for links (or just click on these links) to Amazon, Apple, Pandora, iTunes and even (boo, hiss) Spotify
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Disclaimer Section
This Substack is free, I receive no compensation of any kind from companies or products I mention. Some linked or quoted material may be copyrighted by others, and I credit them. I rely on the “Fair Use” doctrine for educational purposes (Link: Fair Use). *I do not use AI, things I link to might though. -Michael Acoustic
*Exception: For the next few weeks at least I’ll be testing out a beta feature offered on Substack that produces an AI image based on a text input - the image of the week can be seen in the upper left corner of this post…
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Some Links for today
ED. None of these result in compensation to me in any way, and I’m not endorsing any of them, but some of my readers may find them interesting
From Blues Guitar Unleashed:
Learning Note Names - This isn’t what you might think. It’s an exercise for learning where every note on the fretboard is by starting with every instance of a note (example: every place there’s a C one day then the next day every place there’s a C#/Db and so on). Pretty cool.
The Dorian Scale - “A way to use modes with the blues” - not for the faint of heart, but…
How To Jam By Yourself - Friends flew south for the winter? Yeah, they weren’t your real friends. Mr. Hamlin is your real friend and he’ll teach you how to snub those losers.
The Blues Start Here - Stop looking over there! The blues start here.
From the Disc Makers Blog:
SEO for musicians - Yeah, it means “Search Engine Optimization”. I had to look it up too. Pro Tip, Disc Makers? Explain your acronyms upfront, don’t make me read all the way to the second paragraph!
Set List Tips Mostly tips for set lists…mostly….
From Songtown:
Verses Are The New Choruses Are they though? Interesting but I’m not entirely convinced…Your mileage may vary.
9 Universal Emotions There are probably more than this in the whole universe, but these are likely a good place to start…
Co-writing With A Band It’s complicated….
Some Videos:
From Sean Daniel, who, IMHO, is the best video instructor out there and he makes me laugh:
Some More Videos:
Thank You To Our New Subscribers!! This Week’s Conversation With Mika, the Cat:
Me: “I edited a close up crop of this picture last week and told everyone you thought you were a Shaolin ninja and could walk through walls.”
Mika : “You’re pathetic…Shaolin priests are from China, ninjas are from Japan. You make no sense whatsoever. Also, I CAN walk through walls.”
Cheers and keep playing!!
Michael Acoustic
“It’s never really final - you just run out of things you can bear to change…”
Love "Under the Milky Way." It's one of my all-time favorites from the '80s. And The Church is still going strong. Their latest (from 2023), The Hypnogogue, was in my top albums of the year. And when I went to look it up just now, I saw that they have a brand new album! Eros Zeta and the Perfumed Guitars. I'm playing it right now and so far it sounds great! Check it out!
I knew a girl when I was a teenager who used to talk to me the exact same way Mika talks to you… 😂