The Book
Introduction What is it all good for? Scope of work Project History
Music theory in nutshell Harmony Chord notation used in the analyses The degrees of notes Chord functions Keys, Sharps and flats, neighbour keys Guitar friendly and piano-friendly keys Modulations, key changes Parallel key modulations Relative key modulations Neighbour key modulations Combined modulations Step-up/down modulations Unusual modulations Key-shifts Pivot Modulation Borrowed chords Cliche chord progressions Modes Ambigous harmony Rhythms Exercies Syncopations Shuffle beat Metrical modulations, metrical anomalies Compound meters Disorienting Rhythms Songforms General aesthatics of popular and rock music
Queen - The four of them as musicians Brian May Roger Taylor Freddie Mercury John Deacon
Songwriting Analyses
Smile
Ibex
"No Synth" era
Queen
Keep Yourself Alive
Doing All Right
Great King Rat
My Fairy King
Liar
The Night Comes Down
Modern Times Rock'n'roll
Son And Daughter
Jesus
Seven Seas Of Rhye
Silver Salmon
Hangman
Mad The Swine
Queen II
Procession
Father To Son
White Queen (As It Began)
Some Day One Day
The Loser In The End
Ogre Battle
The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke
Nevermore
March Of The Black Queen
Funny How Love Is
Seven Seas Of Rhye
See What A Fool I've Been
Sheer Heart Attack
Brighton Rock
Killer Queen
Tenement Funster
Flick Of The Wrist
Lily Of The Valley
Now I'm Here
In The Lap Of The Gods
Stone Cold Crazy
Dear Friends
Misfire
Bring Back That Leroy Brown
She Makes Me
In The Lap Of The Gods... Revisited
A Night At The Opera
Death On Two Legs
Lazing On A Sunday Afternoon
I'm In Love With My Car
You're My Best Friend
Sweet Lady
'39
Seaside Rendezvous
The Prophet's Song
Love Of My Life
Good Company
Bohemian Rhapsody
God Save The Queen
A Day At The Races
Tie Your Mother Down
You Take My Breath Away
Long Away
The Millionaire Waltz
You And I
Somebody To Love
White Man
Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy
Drowse
Teo Torriate
News Of The World
We Will Rock You
We Are The Champions
Sheer Heart Attack
All Dead All Dead
Spread Your Wings
Fight From The Inside
Get Down Make Love
Sleeping On The Sidewalk
Who Needs You
It's Late
My Melancholy Blues
Feelings
Jazz
Mustapha
Fat Bottomed Girls
Jealousy
Bicycle Race
If You Can't Beat Them
Let Me Entertain You
Dead On Time
In Only Seven Days
Dreamers Ball
Fun It
Leaving Home Ain't Easy
Don't Stop Me Now
More Of That Jazz
Live performances in the 70s
Modern-era Queen
The Game
Play The Game
Dragon Attack
Another One Bites The Dust
Need Your Loving Tonight
Crazy Little Thing Called Love
Rock It (prime Jive)
Don't Try Suicide
Sail Away Sweet Sister
Coming Soon
Save Me
Human Body
Sandbox
Flash Gordon
Flash's Theme
In The Space Capsule
Ming's Theme
The Ring
Football Fight
In The Death Cell
Execution Of Flash
The Kiss
Arboria
Escape From The Swamp
Flash To The Rescue
Vultan's Theme
Battle Theme
The Wedding March
Marriage Of Dale And Ming
Flash's Theme Reprise
Crash Dive On Mingo City
The Hero
Hot Space
Staying Power
Dancer
Back Chat
Body Language
Action This Day
Put Out The Fire
Life Is Real
Calling All Girls
Las Palabras De Amor
Cool Cat
Under Pressure
Soul Brother
The Works
Radio Ga Ga
Tear It Up
It's A Hard Life
Man On The Prowl
Machines (or 'Back To Humans')
I Want To Break Free
Keep Passing The Open Windows
Hammer To Fall
Is This The World We Created?
I Go Crazy
A Kind Of Magic
One Vision
A Kind Of Magic
One Year Of Love
Pain Is So Close To Pleasure
Friends Will Be Friends
Who Wants To Live Forever
Gimme The Prize (Kurgan's Theme)
Don't Lose Your Head
Princes Of The Universe
The Miracle
Party
Khashoggi's Ship
The Miracle
I Want It All
The Invisible Man
Breakthru
Rain Must Fall
Scandal
My Baby Does Me
Was It All Worth It
Hang On In There
Chinese Torture
Hijack My Heart
My Life Has Been Saved
Stealin'
New Life Is Born
Dog With A Bone
Guess We're Fallin Out
Innuendo
Innuendo
I'm Going Slightly Mad
Headlong
I Can't Live With You
Don't Try So Hard
Ride The Wild Wind
All God's People
These Are The Days Of Our Lives
Delilah
The Hitman
Bijou
The Show Must Go On
Lost Opportunity
Face It Alone
Self Made Man
My Secret Fantasy
Made In Heaven
It's A Beautiful Day
Made In Heaven
Let Me Live
Mother Love
My Life Has Been Saved
I Was Born To Love You
Heaven For Everyone
Too Much Love Will Kill You
You Don't Fool Me
A Winter's Tale
My Life Has Been Saved
It's A Beautiful Day (reprise)
No-One But You
Live performances in the 80s
Appendix Special instruments Special effects Special playing techniques Classical quotes Musical terms Index References
Hammer To Fall
Composer: Brian May
Meter: 4/4 (occassional 6/8 meter)
Key: A-major, C-major
Form of the album version:
| Intro (Verse) | Verse - Chorus || Verse - Chorus || Bridge |
| Break - Solo 1 | pre-Solo 2 | Solo 2 (Chorus-ext.) || Tag (Verses) - Outro |
|| : Spacer (Verse riff)
Single version drops the Break, Solo 1 and pre-Solo 2 sections.
Extended version adds pre-Intro (pre-Solo 2') section, Solo 3 section.
"Hammer To Fall" is one of Brian's rather simple hard rock songs with just a few chords, catchy melodies, a famous riff, and really artistic lyrics with more than one possible interpretation. In terms of style, close "relatives" of this song are "Put Out The Fire" and "Tear It Up", plus "I Go Crazy" the latter having been left off The Works probably because of the stylistic similarity with this song.
For his Another World tour (1998) Brian May re-arranged the song for only one clean guitar and slowed down the tempo drastically to fit the "ballad" interpretation better.
The form is a non-unusual variant of the One-Bridge model. The short length of the Verse and the way the Chorus and the Verse have two similar phrases (half-phrases) make these two closely related. Each Verse and Chorus section has different lyrics, except the title phrase that closes every Chorus.
The single version (available on GH2) drops two instrumental sections to give the song a shorter and more radio-friendly shape.
The tune and the guitar riffs are shot through with off-beat accents. The home key is A-major and most of the time only the three basic chords (A, D, E) are used. The middle part has a bit more interesting harmony. The way some parts of the song can be described with riff- rather than chord-progression shows a metal influence.
The whole track is slightly pitched down.
Walkthrough
Intro, Spacers
The Intro is the instrumental version of the Verse: two iterations of the four-measure main riff. The first one features the double-tracked hard rocking rhythm guitars with drum hits on the 4th beats. Second phrase adds bass and hi-hats. The main riff uses accents with 3+5 pattern of eighths, and the famous May-favorite guitar lick: A - D/A chord change (see also in "It's Late"). Second phrase features guitar pedal bass A. The I > IV > V progression with pedal bass is also found in the intro of "Las Palabras De Amor" (1982, D-major). Intros with chord progression based on parallel-sixth motion over pedal bass were kind of a Brian trademark ("Doing Alright", "One Vision").
The spacers consist of the guitar riff only.
Verse
Like the Intro, the eighth-measure Verse has two phrases with the same backing track. The lead melody has ABCB' form (half-phrases). The backing track has a (AAAB) x 2 form; the harmony of the phrases is closed at both ends.
A:
/--------------- 2x ---------------\
| A D/A | A D/A | A D/A | E A |
| I IV | I IV | I IV | V I |
The lead vocal is pentatonic. The "B" half-phrase is arch-shaped. The range is only one octave (A-A'), still we can find octave-steps in the lead vocal.
Second Verse adds chordal synth track. During the last Verse the synth is mixed down, the guitar is played in a muted style, while the bass stays throughout on the pedal A. This subdued arrangement makes the last Chorus "explode".
Chorus
The square eight-measure Chorus is almost like the second half of the Verse. Different articulation includes: vocal harmonies, "legato" guitar chords contrasting with some "staccato" D/A chords in the Verses.
The phrasing is AA where the lead vocal of the second half-phrase is varied for the second time. The "half-phrasing" is ABAB', and the "B" half-phrase comes from the Verses.
A:
/---------------- 2x --------------\
| A E/A | D/A A | A D/A | (E) A |
| I V | IV I | I IV | V I |
The second half-phrase mirrors the chord progression of the first. The three-part vocal harmony is pretty simple: it strictly follows the chord progression, and the lead part is in the middle. Off-beat accents during first two measures:
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
** * * * **
The last Chorus is followed by a Tag-section where the backing track (with little modification) repeats the Verse progression five times. The last of these features that characteristic quick stop on "2-and".
During measure 3-4 Freddie sings falsetto (reaching an A note), and the guitar riff plays also one octave (12 frets) higher than before. The last chord is let ring throughout with feedback. Some drum fills, bass runs, and Freddie-shouts close the song.
Bridge
The phrasing is AA'B (6+5+3). The second half of the A phrases is sung in harmonies. "Fingerpicked" guitar can be heard in the first half-phrases. With the 'vi' we now have four chords on the palette.
| E | F#m7 | E/G# | A (D)| A (G) | D |
| V | vi | V | I (IV)| I (IV-of) IV |
| E | F#m7 | E/G# | A (D)| E |
| V | vi | V | I (IV)| V |
| E/G# | A | E/D |
| V | I | V |
The harmony is open at both ends in each phrase. The gravity-center of the lead vocal shifts to a higher level. Note the seventh in the bass in the last measure. The chords are played in eighths before the downbeats; moreover the harmony singing has a disorienting off-beat rhythm. "Oh no":
* * * *_..
3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
Break - Solo 1
The phrasing of the backing track is AAA (4+4+4). The two-measure solo enters on the downbeat of the second phrase. The chord progression drives the harmony towards a modally inflected B or E-major. The pitch set of the solo is A-major with occasional feature of the modal flat-7th (G).
A:
/-------------- 2x -------------\
| B | E | B E1 F#1| G5..A5 |
|V-of-V V V-of-V |bVII I |
The tonic-role of A is very weak due to the short air-time it gets and the way it seems to be a transition chord between G5 and B(5). The rhythm uses 3+5 patterned and off-beat accents.
Note the last notes of this segment of the solo where the C# gets a "clean"-C ornament.
Pre-Solo 2
This eight-measure section hijacks the harmony from A-major to C-major. Pumping pedal-point on C is played throughout the whole section without chordal support. The guitar in the live version (and also in the pre-Intro of the long version) plays I-IV-V progression over the pedal point. The tone set of the lead guitar part is mostly Mixolydian C-major, but we can find occasional flat-3rd degree too. The pre-solo (which is not melodic enough to be a real solo) is ascending in flavor except the descending ending. I collected the notes where the rise is interrupted even for a moment: F, A, A#, D, D#, F, A, E. Except the last E, which marks is the peak of the arch, every note is an appoggiatura in the context of the basal C chord, and this is what creates the unresolved feeling that motivates the solo to move on higher and higher. Roger spices this section with some asymmetric patterns (eg. 3+3+2).
/------ 4x -------\
| C(1) |(F/C G/C)| (live version)
| I |( IV V )|
Solo 2
The solo section is an instrumental Chorus added a tag-like extension of four measures. The ending of the solo is reminiscent of the original lead vocal melody. The first of the four additional measures repeats the previous one. The second one is in 6/8 (3+3). The last two leave the section open on IV (D).
Compared to the other Choruses, the backing vocals are modified in the second phrase. The guitar solo itself is different between the single and the album version (at microscopic details). The single version also adds vocal harmony parts.
Solo 3 (only in long version)
The section is six measures long, and the solo itself starts in measure two, stops for a moment at the end of measure four to continue for the rest of the section. The tune features variants of short motifs taken from Solo 2.