Thursday, August 20, 2015

R.E.M. - "Pilgrimage" (1983)

I'm counting fourteen different structural events that happen in this song. Let's look at what they are.

There's a fourteen second intro consisting of the chorus melody sung over just the bass. The song proper then begins with vamping on the verse riff as a lead-in to verse number one.

The part consisting of the lines "Your brown eyes" etc. seems to suggest a new segment, but then the chorus itself, "Take a turn" etc., sounds like a new entity once again. Call the "Your brown eyes" part a pre-chorus perhaps.

Verse number two follows, then the pre-chorus, chorus, and...what's this? Oh yes. Make that G chord a dominant like it certainly can be in an F-C-G progression and, boom, you've got a route into an entirely new, second chorus - a chorus delayed through two buildups and finally attained at 2:16.

Repeats of the second verse, pre-chorus, chorus, second chorus, and there's even a little bridge in there before they vamp on the first chorus a couple of times to wrap it up. It's the longest song on Murmur. ("Shaking Through" has been listed as two seconds longer, but that includes the little snatch of instrumental song sequenced between it and "We Walk.")