Moby "Why does my heart feel so bad?"

Mostly in the dorian mode on A

Music is entirely diatonic. The verse uses four chords each lasting for two bars - A minor, E minor, G major and D major.

The chorus uses C major and A minor, and when it's looped, an F major chord as well.

The verse (why does my haert) sounds minor whereas the chorus sounds major (these open doors).

Moby doesn't think to much about the theory behind the particular chors he uses - he chooses chords for their emotional effect.

Sus2chord - a triad with the third replaced by the second degree of the scale.

Sus4chord - 3rd is replaced with the fourth degree of a scale.

Moby uses two different vocal samples from a recording of The Shining Light Gospel Choir.

One sample is "why does my heart feel so bad? why does my soul feel so bad?" (verse) and the other is "these open doors" (chorus).

The first sample uses a male voice, the second uses a female voice.

Moby minipulates the first sample to change the meaning of the original words - from when i should feel so sad, why does my soul feel so glad, to why does my heart feel so bad?

The recordings are not changed at all - any background noise has been left in - Moby wanted an authentic, non-clinical, realistic sound to hia pieces.

4/4 time - typical of 'four to the floor' used in electronic.

The start does not have a clear pulse but the rest is in a steady quadruple metre.

All of the parts except the synthesised strings make use of syncopation.

The texture is built up - more instruments are added in each section.

Uses piano, voice samples, sub bass, drums, synthesised strings and a synthesised organ.

Strings add melodic interest during the rests in the vocal line.

The only time we hear the synthesised organ is right at the end, for the last 'why does my heart feel so bad'.

Accompainment based on a large unchanging drum loop with an emphasised backbeat.

Made explicit by instruments, lyrics and texture.

Uses a verse and chorus structure with an intro and an outro.

There is a one bar bridge where all you can hear is a pedal point - everything elso stops.

Starts off with 8 bar piano introduction. Then the verse starts playing the first vocal sample four times.

At first it's just the piano playing, then the hip hop drumbeat, sub bass and synthesised strings come in.

Regularity of 8 bar sections contrasts strongly with buckley.

Echo, delay and reverd are used in the vocal samples.

Sampling and looping are used on the vocals.

You can tell the piano and the drums aren't live because thay are too mechanical and too precise - plus the dynamics are artificial sounding.

Moby uses EQ - for example, if you listen to the opening eight bars of the piano intro, you can hear how moby has created a sense of movement from side to side.

All the timbres are either synthetic or sampled.

Male and female vocals are edited samples taken from old recordings of gospel music.

drum sounds include claves and shaker as well as the usual snare drum and bass drum - produced on a roland drum machine.

Bass and string parts produced on synthesisers.

Piano sounds are generated oon a digital sound module.

You can tell that the piano in the intro is a sequenced sound because of it's precision. Moby has also created a sound of movement from side to side.

You can tell that the drum part is a synthesised part because of it's precision.