From: awp@world.std.com (Alan W Pollack)
Subject: Notes on "Another Girl" (AG)
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 03:33:53 GMT

                         ================================
                        || Notes on "Another Girl" (AG) ||
                         ================================


KEY	A Major

METER	4/4

FORM	Intro -> Verse -> Verse -> Bridge -> Verse -> 
			Bridge -> Verse -> Outro
		


GENERAL POINTS OF INTEREST


Style and Form
--------------
- If you make the effort to get beyond the pedestrian lyrics and
  the by-today's-standards embarrassing visual background given
  this song in the _Help!_ film (Paul out on a beach holding a woman
  sideways and 'playing' her like some kind of anthropomorphic bass 
  guitar -- or do I misremember it ?), you find here a song that is 
  a veritable cross-section of the tricks and trademarks of the Beatles 
  to this point of their career.  

- We also find in this song yet another example of John's cross-influence
  on Paul.  Though the influence in this case is not as obvious on the 
  surface of things as it is in the case of, say, "Paperback Writer" and
  "Rain", the parallels between "Another Girl" and "You're Going To
  Lose That Girl" (YGTLTG) are as striking as they are surprising, once 
  they've been pointed out to you.
  
- The form sounds subtly more unusual than it actually is because of the 
  extremely refrain-like final phrase of the verse section.  The last time 
  we had seen this effect, way back in this series YGTLTG and "It Won't 
  Be Long" (IWBL), it had thrown us off guard quite a bit.  Once you 
  parse this phrase as part of the verse proper, the form suddenly reveals 
  itself as one of the standard forms, with two-verses, two-bridges, and 
  only one verse intervening.  The use of such a pseudo-refrain, though,
  especially when it also appears as the song's introductory section, 
  does have a unique the power to, if not outright confuse, make a 
  formalistically fluid impression.


Melody and Harmony
------------------
- The melody makes prominent thematic use of downward chromatic
  scale fragments and a certain amount of noodling around the same
  few notes in a constricted pitch range; *both* Beatles trademarks.

- Although the song is hardly a 12-bar blues ditty in terms of chords, 
  tune, or phrasing, the melodical stress on the flat 3rd (C natural) 
  and flat 7th (G natural) scale degrees projects bluesy feel overall.

- The verses rely entirely on I, IV, V, and the flat-VII deployed simply 
  as a neighboring chord between two instances of I.  The bridge, though,
  features an unusual (in context of the Beatles) full-blown modulation
  to the key of C Major whose relationship to the home key is that of
  "relative Major of the parallel minor"; the latter being one of this
  songs principal and unmistakable connections with YGTLTG.

- The emphasis on the melodic flat 3rd is sufficiently stronger than
  average here to create a Major/minor ambiguity regarding the mode of
  the home key that is somewhat reminiscent of "I'll Be Back."  The effect 
  is especially noticeable where the music returns to A Major at the end 
  of the bridge, and makes you wonder in retrospect if, in the verses, 
  it really was only the melody and not the chords too performed in the 
  minor mode; what do the chord books say there ?  Is the first
  chord A Major or minor ?


Arrangement
-----------
- Paul is double tracked on the lead vocal with the familiar
  italicizing effect of the backing voices joining him on the
  recurring title phrase.

- George supplies notable guitar fills, the frequency and raucousness
  of which both increase over the course of the song.



SECTION-BY-SECTION WALKTHROUGH


Intro
-----
- The song opens vocally with absolutely no instrumental cue, yet
  another affinity with John's YGTLTG and IWBL.

- The intro turns out to anticipate the final phrase of the verse section.  
  It's a phrase whose length comes out to be closer to five than four
  measures; at the very least, it ends on the downbeat of the fifth
  measure.  A side effect of this peculiarity is that the phrase tends 
  to suggest an ellision or overlap with the beginning of whatever follows 
  it whenever it appears:


					|Verse -->
	|A	|D	|A	|D	|A ...
A:	 I	 IV	 I	 IV	 I


Verse
-----
- The sixteen measure verse has a phrasing pattern of AABC and sounds
  almost like a non-traditional 12-bar form plus short refrain:


	------------------------------- 2X ------------------------------
	|A		|G		|A		|D		|
	 I		 flat-VII	 I		 IV



	|D		|-		|-		|E		|
	 IV						 V



	|A		|D		|A		|D		|
	 I	 	 IV	 	 I	 	 IV	 	



- The IV chord which gets sustained through four measures that *don't*
  exactly coincide with where the phrase divisions lie provides a good
  example of how harmonic rhythm can be used to strong, albeit subliminal
  effect.


Bridge
------
- This eight-measure section sounds as though entered as an ellided,
  directed extension of the 'refrain':


	|C	|G	|C	|G	|C	|E	|A	|E	|
	 I	 V	 I	 V	 I
				       a:III	 V       I 	 V
							(surprise!)


- The music briefly modulates to the key of C Major before it pivots
  back to A.  The pivot in this case relies on tricking you into
  expecting a return to a minor with the A Major chord then coming
  as a surprise twist.  

- The pivot *into* the modulation is interesting; forcing you, as a 
  listener to hear the final D chord in the preceding verse punning 
  itself as both IV in the home key as well as V-of-V in the new key, 
  the latter not being resolved until two measures into the bridge.

- As is so often the case, the bridge provides melodic contrast with the
  verses in the way that the erstwhile noodling within a small range is
  reaplaced here by an extended arch shape which supplies at its zenith
  the unique melodic high point of the piece.


Outro
-----
- The outro is a simple extension of the verse ending with the the
  title phrase repeated a canonical three times.

- The trailing guitar lick at the very end is a novel touch that
  helps unify  the song overall from the way in which it carries 
  forward both the motif of the ubiquitous guitar fills and the
  blusey undercurrent.



SOME FINAL THOUGHTS


- This song may be far from what you'd call one of Paul's career
  highlights but you've got to admire his craftmanship here even if
  the material itself is less than entirely distinguished.

- You may want to quibble with Paul from time to time over whether
  or not you think he exerts a sufficiently discriminating filter 
  on the supply of new ideas and directions which pop into his head.  
  But in terms his facility in the developing of such ideas and his
  seemingly casual and second-nature mastery of technique, you can 
  only be amazed; maybe :-)



Regards,
Alan (awp@bitstream.com *OR* uunet!huxley!awp)


---
"Give 'em a pull."						122292#72
---

                Copyright (c) 1992 by Alan W. Pollack
                          All Rights Reserved

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