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Parallel lyrics,parallel songs; multiple narrators occupying the same space

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    Parallel lyrics,parallel songs; multiple narrators occupying the same space

    The sad death of Andy Gill got me listening to some of Gang of Four's catalogue and while doing so I remembered that Love Like Anthrax has two lyrical narratives, sung in parallel, and then I thought of the VUs The Murder Mystery which does something similar...then on to something even weirder by Gorky's Zygotic Mynci in which two completely different songs occupy the same track (can't recall which; can anyone help?).

    Any more of these which you would like to mention here?

    #2
    One side of 'Love Like Anthrax' deconstructs the cult of the love song and the recording process, while the other side is the stark "and I feel like a beetle on its back" song, and occasionally they meet. This was revelatory to me as a young music fan and musician, Brechtian alienation turned to rock music. Other groups to attempt this kind of process in varying ways include This Heat, Scritti Politti, The Raincoats, World Domination Enterprises, Beatnigs/Hiphoprisy and Consolidated (whose 'Friendly Fascism' LP has always seemed to me like a more sloganeering and didactic, industrial hip hop version of Go4), but none do it in that specific fashion.

    Matching Mole - 'Gloria Gloom' has multiple voices, again as an alienation device (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6s7Z...sl0eY5&index=6)

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      #3
      You reference three acts whose work I don't know: World Domination Enterprises, Beatnigs/Hiphoprisy and Consolidated. So that's my listening sorted for tomorrow morning while I do mundane paper stuff. Thanks!

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        #4
        I can't listen now due to family at home etc but do The Beatnigs have anything in common with Einstürzende Neubauten? I ask because of this:

        "The band's stage performance included the use of power tools such as a rotary saw on a metal bar to create industrial noise and pyrotechnics." (wiki
        )
        Last edited by Sporting; 02-02-2020, 17:40.

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          #5
          Opera and musicals do this sometimes, I think. Like Cosi Fan Tutti where the sailors are singing a different line than their wives. Not for a whole aria though. 'Hamilton' in places. I assume hip hop would be amenable to this technique but can't think of examples offhand (where instead of call and response the two speak over each other).
          Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 02-02-2020, 21:55.

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            #6
            Same thing happens in Meatloaf's Paradise by a Dashboard Light.

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              #7
              The original Damaged Goods EP version of Anthrax has Gill talking about how to record and release independent music rather than deconstruction of ‘love’ songs, the economics rather than the ideology. But the album version is better

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                #8
                The Gorkys' tune might be Patio Song?

                Consolidated were great.

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                  #9
                  I'm sure The Flaming Lips managed to persuade their record company to release a four-CD set, where the listener was supposed to play all CDs simultaneously.

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                    #10
                    Ukulele bands like this sort of thing. It's mainly a rhythm instrument so suited to those like me with rudimentary skills, but the maestros can easily manage to play two or three songs in parallel

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                      #11
                      Originally posted by Amor de Cosmos View Post
                      Same thing happens in Meatloaf's Paradise by a Dashboard Light.
                      They're in agreement by the end, though.

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                        #12
                        Yes, but singing different lyrics.

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                          #13
                          "Father and Son" by Cat Stevens features two conflicting narrators,separately at first then together (but still clashing) at the end.

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                            #14
                            Stan by Eminem

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                              #15
                              Devil In His Heart by The Donays, covered by The Beatles

                              I Know Him So Well - Barbara Dickson, Elaine Paige

                              I've Got A Feeling - Beatles, literally two incomplete songs layered into one.
                              Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 09-02-2020, 00:23.

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                                #16
                                A Day in the Life might qualify on the same grounds.

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                                  #17
                                  “How to be Dead” by Celtic Coldplay imitators Snow Patrol is an argument through a bedroom door.

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