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

Repetitions and variants

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

Path: Queen Songs - The Book - Songwriting Analyses - "No Synth" era - Queen: Doing All Right

Doing All Right

Composer: Tim Staffel & Brian May
Album: Queen I
Meter: 4/4
Key: E-Major
Form:

Intro (AA) | Verse (AAA') - Chorus |
| Verse - Chorus |
| BB | Bridge (BBBBCCCDD)|
| BB | Bridge' BBBB' |
| Break (EE ) | Solo 1 (E'E'- FF) | Link |
| A | Verse - Chorus |
| Break (EE) | Solo 2 (E'E'E'E'- FF) | Outro I (Chorus') - II |

This was the only Smile song that was both recorded and released as a Queen song. With its sharp changes form-wise it is remarkably progressive in context of its time (1968-69). On the other hand beside the breaks and solos the song has a traditional ballad form with a mini (one phrase) Chorus.
The accompaniment of the whole song is very riff-centric, which is a hard rock influence.
The homekey is E-Major which is inherited from the Smile-version where guitar played the main hook with pedal bass on low E string.
The mixing of the backing track is assymetric: lead guitar and piano in the two opposite stereo channels. This asymmetry was rarely used on later albums (eg. "Who Needs You").

Intro
The intro exposes the main hook of the Verse.

Verse
The 16 measure Verse can be parsed to three arch-shaped melodic phrases (AAA'). The harmony is based on the four measure main hook of the song. We don't know about the specific songwriting details, but this hook is expected to have been created by Brian May because it features one of his lasting trademarks: the harmony relies on the combination of pedal bass and parallel sixth motion of inner voices. See also: "Las Palabras...", "Hammer To Fall", "One Vision", "Mother Love".
The main hook is altered for the third phrase with some chromatic descending motions. The table below spits the last phrase.

E:
/----------- 2x ------------\
| G# | A | B | A | inner voice
| B | C# | D# | C# | inner voice
| E | E | E | E | bass
| I | IV | "V " | IV |

| G# | A | G# | G | inner Voice
| D | C# | inner voice
| B | C# | B | A# | inner voice
| E | E | E | E | bass
| E | A | E7 |A#halfdim7 | chords
| I | IV | I7 | chromatic |

| E | B | A | - |
| I | V | IV | - |

The first Verse is arranged for piano and bass. Both second and third Verse adds sweet clean toned lead guitar fills.

Chorus
The chorus can be threated as a tag of the Verse. The melodic phrase (the title phrase) is located in the last measure of the Verse and ends on the downbeat of the harmonic phrase (see also "Crazy Little Thing..."). The harmony is a variant of the main hook: in the first three measures it uses the same inner voices, but the bass is walking upwards this time.

| E | F#m | G#m | A |
| I | ii | iii | IV |

In the third cycle the bass is more melodic.

Bridge (BB)
After the second cycle we have a sharp change on more levels. The key abruptly changes to D Major, the instrumentation is stripped down to a solo acoustic guitar. The section starts with a inner introduction exposing the two measure hook of the next subsection. It subtly changes each time it is played.

D:
/----- 2x -----\
| D | G A |
| D C# | B A | :bass
| I | IV V |

The off-beat rhythmic leitmotif during the most of the Bridge and the Break with the "BIG" riff:

1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
**** * * * *

Bridge I
The first two melodic phrases (X) are arch-shaped and include two of the hooks each:

X(BB)X'(BB)

The next two melodic phrases are similarly backed with two two measured guitar figure. The pitch set (considering the harmonies on the Smile version) and the chords suggest a short lived modulation to E Major.

E:
/----------- 2x ----------\
| E | A | E | A |
| I | IV | I | IV |

The second melodic phrase closes with Bb > A melodic and chord progression suggesting a modulation to d-minor. Again we have a repeated guitar hook backing it. The second phrase is a variant of course, and closes with fermata.

/----- 2x ----\
| B | A |
| VI | V |

Here returns the guitar hook in D-Major for six cycles where the first two is instrumental the reamining four is backing two variant melodic phrases. This time the bass is providing an ascending couterpart for the descending top-voice of the guitar hook.

D:
/----- 2x2 -----\
| D | G A |
| D F# | G A | : bass
| I | IV V |

The second melodic phrase ends with a descending scalar bass figure (D mixolydian or E-aeolian) starting on D arriving on E. This scale introduces the explosive big riff (guitar and piano), with the curious chord progression with chromatic descending inner voice:

E:
| E D# | D C# | : inner voice
| E B | D A |
| I V |bVII IV |

Solo 1
The BIG riff is played twice with the same off-beat rhythm as the "B" guitar figure, then for another two cycles its rhythm is simplified to 3+5 and is joined by lead guitar.
The reamining part of the guitar solo can be divided to three phrases (4+4+4, ABB).

| E | - | - | - |

/-------- 2x --------\
| 3+3+3+3+3+3+3+3+12 = 36/8 = 14/4
| E A E D E A E D E |

The pitch set o f the solo shows mixed modality featuring bVII chord (D), b7 and both 3 and b3 degrees (D G# G respectively).

Link
After the impulsive solo a four measure link settles down the song for the placid Verse. Its harmony is a variant of the main hook with pedal bass and three part vocal harmonies:

| E | F#/E | Emaj7 | A/E |
| I | ii | I | IV |

Solo 2
After the placid third cycle of Verse-Chorus the noisy BIG riff returns once again providing a sharp change. The backing of the Solo 2 is a variant of the first with altered phrasing AAAA-B-CC instead of AA-B-CC.

Outro I-II
The second solo is followed by a settle down connector. Its harmony:

| E | B | A | - |
| I | V | IV | - |

The following vocal harmony shows a very nice example for voice leading. The individual parts move step-wise. (See also guitar work in "Brighton Rock" live version for similar concept). It's worth trying out this harmony with friends.

Top : G# - - A B - -
Middle : E - F# - - - G#
Bass : B C# - - D# E -
chords : E C#m sus F#m B sus E

The song closes with soft piano figures with fermata ending:

| E | D/E | E ...