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

Great King Rat

Composer: Freddie Mercury
Meter: 4/4, (occassional 5/4 and 7/4 measures)
Key: (E-?), a-minor, D-Major, (e-minor), c-minor
Form:

      Intro I-II-III | Verse | Chorus ||
                     | Verse | Chorus |
               Solo 1 (Verse - Chorus -
                     - Verse)| Chorus |
    | Bridge 1 (AA') | Break | Bridge 2 (Verse') | Solo 2 |
             | Solo 3 (Verse)| Chorus - Outro |


Great King Rat is an early-type heavy metal song with a touch of progressivity regarding the long form that includes long solos and sharp changes. On the other hand the form shows cyclic desing until the Bridge 1 section.
Mercury wrote the song on guitar, no wonder the harmony is simple within the sections. Most of the song (the verse-chorus cycles) are in a-minor. This is the first time we run into a key (c-minor) with three flats, which afterwards became a favourite of Mercury for his piano songs.



Intro
The intro has three subsection. The first one starts with guitar feedback on E followed by some riff-work.

| E1  | -   |

| E5  | D5/E | E7-8 | -   | E1   |

The pitch-set (E, D, A) is too limited to determine the mode used, but the key-center is definitely E. Retrospectively it can be interpreted as the dominant of a-minor.

The next subsection is characterized by chomatic descending parallel fourths altered with palm muted low E notes. While the tecnique resonates with Roger's Jazz-era riffs ("Fun It") this intro riff is not really a riff to be repeated.

                                    5/4
| D4-E1 | C#4-E1 | C4-E1 | B4 A#4 | A4   |

Drums enter in the last measure.
The third subsection exposes the homekey of the song. The ensemble is completed with more guitars. Electric guitar mimicks here the sound of a slide whistle.

a:
| Am  | -   | - F  E |
| i   | -   | - VI V |

Verse
We have two vocal and two instrumental verses the latter two as a part of the first guitar solo. Plus the Bridge 2 and Solo 3 sections too use a close variant of its chordal backing. The phrasing of the verse is 4+4, AA' harmony-wise, AB melody-wise.

| Am  | G   | E   | Am /G |
| i   | VII | V   | i     |

| Am  | G   | E   | Am    |
| i   | VII | V   | i     |

The second Verse adds a guitar fill after the first vocal phrase. The second phrase adds lower harmony singing by Mercury.


Chorus
We have four vocal choruses and an intrumental chorus built in the first guitar solo. We have some irregular phrasing here: 3+2+4. The harmony flirts with the relative-Major key (C), but without its strong establishment. The last chord which closes the song is non-tonic.

| C   | Em  | C   |
| III | v   | III |

| D5  | -   |
| IV  | -   |

          half
| C   G  | Am | D   |     |
| III VII| i  | IV  |     |

The second phrase adds marimbas. The lead melody is changed for m.2-3 creating a b9 dissonance in m.2. The third phrase adds three-part backing vocal harmonies.
The third chorus prolonges the D chord for four measures instead of two.
The closing chorus is extended by a fading out drumroll that serves as the outro of the song. The drum roll is first slowing down then starts again in "tremolo"-style. Before the end of the track Roger drops in a 3+3+3+3+4 patterned puntuation.


Solo 1
The first solo incorporates the framework of three sections (Verse-chorus-verse). We have two lead guitars mixed left and right one equipped with wah-pedal. The guitars play simultaiously most of timehout the section, but one is always leading while the other guitar is mixed lower. The wah-pedal guitar leads the last subsection (verse) and m.3-4 and m.7-8 of the fisrt subsection (Verse). The rest is led by the "normal" guitar.


Bridge 1
The bridge is preceded by a "section intro" exposing the new tonic (D) four measures long (plus the preceding extended phrase ending). This length is necessery for one's ears to re-interpret the D chord as the tonic.

D:
/---- 2x ---\
| D   | -   |
| I   | -   |

The Bridge 1 itself consists of two melodic variant "verses". These "bridge-verses" can also be divided to two subsections that paralelling eachother. The phrasing is of the whole section is roughly 2+2+4 + 2+2+6 + 2+2+4 + 2+2+4. The harmonic rhythm is dotted. Taking away the "dotting" chords the harmonic rhythm is very slow.
The melodic phrases start on the second beat of the phrases. The melody uses major 7th, the rhthym guitar fills on the end of the phrases use minor 7ths.

| D   | - G |
| I   | - IV|

| D   | - G |
| I   | - IV|

| D   | - G | A   | - D |
| I   | - IV| V   | - I |

| A   | - D |
| V   | - I |

| A   | - D |
| V   | - I |
 
| A   | -   | D   | -   | Dadd2 | -   |
| V   | -   | I   | -   | I     | -   |

The ending of the second "bridge-verse":

| A   | -   | G   |     |
| V   | -   | IV  |     |
         e:   III

Break
Next to the Bridge we have an spanish flavored acoustic ad-lib rhythmized guitar interlude. With its placid mood it's in sharp contrast with the neighbour sections. The arpeggios don't outline the chords clearly. We have two phrases, the latter can be divided to two variant subphrases. The harmony table below refers to the two phrases:

| Em        |
| i         |

| Am - F/A  |
| i  - VI   |


Bridge 2
The section is introduced by two measures of strummed acoustic guitars exposing the tonic.

| Am   | -   |

The harmony and phrasing is a close variant of that of the Verses. The last (8th) measure is overlapped by the start of an instrumental connector, that leads the harmony from a-minor to c-minor through b-minor. The a > b transition is executed by a descending blues-scale riff shifted up a whole step. In the demo version the guitar plays an ascending counterpart for the bass playing the descending figure.


Solo 2
The second solo is 24 measures long (37 in the demo version) long dominated by two-measure phrases. The repetition pattern of the melodic phrases:  A A A'B  C D D' E  A A A
The harmonic phrases: H H H H - H'H'H'H'- H"H"H"
The A-phrases start with 6+6 groups of 1/16-s. Both of the D phrases have 3+3 + 3+3 + 3+3 + 3+3 + 3+5 = 32/16 groupings of triadic notes. The next phrase (D') starts as a shitfted down variant of it.
We dont have a minor tonic chord, but the minor-pentatonic guitar work use exclusively minor thirds and sevenths. The rhythm guitar work:

/------ 2x ------\
| C5  | C5 F5 D# |
| i   | i  VI III|

/------ 2x -----\
| C5  | C5 F5   |
| i   | i  VI   |


/---- 4x -----\
| C5   | F5   |
| i    | VI   |


/------ 3x ------\
| C5  | C5 F5 D# | -   | -   |
| i   | i  VI III| -   | -   |

Fragments of this solo (D, D', E) in variant form apperaed earlier in the demo version of "Liar".


Solo 3
Right next to the Solo 2 section there is another solo backed by the same chords as the Bridge 2 (verse') section. So we have an abrupt modulation back to a-minor. Another contrast to the preceding solo 2 is the melodic design is very static dominated by prolonged unisono-bent notes joined mimicked by Mercury in the last measures.