Final Choruses and Outros Apparently

I was going to write this super cool music thread with more songs in there than an Erik Loomis “I took time off writing my 1600th American grave post and 547th this day in labor history series to write a 27-part ‘I chance to have been listening to these songs,'” post where I talked about great bridges in songs, and start off with And Your Bird Can Sing which has the best bridge of all time, and motherf#@ker, that’s not even a bridge! Or rather, it has a perfectly excellent bridge, and that pleasant Paul McCartney fellow can certainly strum a bass and so on, but what it really has is a modified final chorus that causes horripilation every time with its glorious harmonies! And then a nice outro, all coming in at 2:01!

And what about so many other songs that I thought had great bridges, like Radiohead’s Karma Police, which actually has a great long outro.

“Phew for a minute there I lost myself, I lost myself.” My brother in Christ, it was not just for a minute. You lost yourself, well and truly. This is one of the most convincing “I am crazy” songs since Surf’s Up by Brian Wilson, or the full corpus of Syd Barrett. And yet it’s put on, I don’t actually think Thom Yorke is crazy for real. I mean, not that crazy, not like Jeff Magnum braying “I love you Jesus Christ” and then pulling the drumkit and a french horn on a stand over on top of himself while he strums furiously, lying on his back like a struggling turtle someone fed ketamine.

Anyway, here’s a song that really–OK, now, see I would have bet real money that the Raspberries song Overnite Sensation had a bridge, and it maybe kind of does, because they vastly change the instrumentation to make it seem as if their song is really getting played on the radio, which is clever and twee. And I must digress to say the song suggests Eric Carmen will put a bullet in the program director’s head if they don’t get a hit record, probably the least scary musical threat since that time Kriss Kross made people play their awful video game. But given what follows it’s just a long outro?

I mean, I’m imagining verse, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus. A solo can go in there usually before the bridge (I don’t know why I say usually when I have apparently never heard even one song with a bridge but OK) and intros and, more commonly, outros are where they should be. So, another song which I love and imagined had a great bridge is Tangerine by Led Zeppelin and it really has: verse, chorus, verse, solo, and then a modified final chorus with steel guitar, SO BEAUTIFUL (the whole thing coming in at 3:12, very nice.)

Now, one thing I like is my favourite “rock trick”, where all the instruments cut out and it’s only vocals, and then crunchy guitars and so on return. Very nice. Teenage Fanclub’s I Don’t Care is good on this. But that part isn’t the bridge (there is one and it’s good, but less good.)

You know what has a legitimate, multifaceted bridge is Hey Ya, thank god.

Everything from ‘All right now’ through the ‘shake it’ section is a for real bridge. And I know what you’ve been thinking this whole time, Isn’t James Brown’s Get on Up (among many others) an actual instructional song about bridges, in which people are repeatedly questioned about whether they want to hear the bridge, and once they answer in the affirmative they get to, and it’s excellent?

And there’s an outro as well. Phew. And Billie Eilish’s The 30th has a beautiful, spectacular bridge.

Brick House‘s first “shake it down” section is a bridge? But it’s repeated as an outro hmm. Earth, Wind and Fire’s September has a short bridge that’s nice but I’m not creaming my pants either. (Why are there no waterbenders in their band btw there’s room they have like 14 dudes? Second-to-last airbender hiding from Lord Ozai with a tasteful afro and some kind of sci-fi daishiki made of emergency blankets?) I guess I’ve learned a little something today. Wait, did I though? I learned that this was an elaborate ruse to make you tell me your favourite bridges. You are all educated people, surely.