Better Days

I chose to describe the song "Better Days" by the Goo Goo Dolls. After listening to the song several times I was able to find out some information about the sound, harmony, rhythm, melody and form. The texture of the song was clearly homophonic in its entirety, there was one single voice with many instruments accompanying it. The harmony seemed to be in major with a diatonic key; the music harmonized well and always seemed to sound "happy." The rhythm in this song changed a few times from fast to slow and back again led by the accompanying instruments. While the lead singer was singing, the piano that was accompanying him used a lot of up to down contour along with both stepped and skipped notes. The lead singer sang the chorus nearly the same everytime, but there were a few changes to the lyrics in each chorus. The rest of the lyrics are contrasting because they are all very different from each other and the chorus. The accompanying instruments seem to be playing repeated portions, with some additional contrasting parts. While listening and trying to find details about the song I heard the song differently than I ever have before. I was concentrating on what the individual instruments were doing and how they were the same or different from how the lead singer was singing. This exercise gave me a new respect for how complicated music is.