Friday, December 23, 2011

From Dusty In Memphis: No Easy Way Down


Put on "No Easy Way Down" just a bit louder than you really ought to: listen to the way the piano establishes tempo, listen to the tone of that Hammond, the perfection of the drummer's groove, the way the strings and brass blend, that little guitar figure suspending the 6th and 9th in that hammer on/pull off that sounds so easy and is actually so hard, the choices the bass player makes, then that outrageous key change down to E major in the bridge, like a wave hitting you in the face, and then back to G major for those gospel changes taking in the chord of the flat 7th and that magnificent dominant 11th chord taking you back to the last verse. Listen to the words: the best lyrics about the 60s anybody ever wrote. Listen to Dusty's vocal. Imagine you were the producer listening to the final playback in the control room... Now listen to it again. Nobody's ever done it better.

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