Goodbye Elenore

[dacm]

Attached here is a much under appreciated TOTO song, Goodbye Elenore. 

 

The video appears to be shot mostly live, in rehearsal, with the classic line up of original members and an amazing array of 70's gear surrounding them.

 

What is of interest to me is how Jeff Porcaro counts off the tempo and then proceeds to drive the band to a powerful performance. Watch and listen to his fills and how his sense of time was so strong.

 

The emotion he shows at the end when he gets up and walks off, tells me he not only was an integral member, he was the driving force. As much as I enjoyed Simon Philips as TOTO drummer, Jeff was in a league of his own.

 

I first heard Jeff at the Springfield, MA Civic Center in 1979, if I am correct. Next, was the amazing homecoming gig for the Porcaros in Hartford, CT at the Bushnell in July 1983. Joe Porcaro performed on percussion along with his sons to an audience of 40 CT Porcaro family members and relatives. 

 

Most memorable was seeing Steve Lukather run completely around the hall on a wireless guitar during a daring solo. I went most to hear and see Steve Porcaro, but due to a massive old-style stacked PA on stage, he was totally blocked from my view.

 

Update: I have heard the latest incarnation of the band when I purchased a direct to internet, live performance in November 2021. It left much to be desired in my opinion. 

 

Example: The famous synth solo by Steve in Rosanna was totally skipped in favor of a tenor sax solo by Warren Ham. Steve is sorely missed... as is David Paitch.

 

Let's hope that they have a more finely tuned performance all these months later when they perform in Hartford, CT on March 4 supporting Journey!

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6-2jpl0qZs

[TommyRude]

Embedding the vid.  Thanks for this, fascinating.  Jeff is pumping all cylinders at the end for sure!  The gear spotters will have fun with this as well.  Not sure if those modular synth looking walls in the back are just props?

 

[kaptainkeys]

I'm a huge Toto fan and this is definitely one of my favorite songs on Turn Back.

15 hours ago, TommyRude said:

Not sure if those modular synth looking walls in the back are just props?

They are definitely not for show!  Steve Porcaro used to take his Polyfusion systems out on the road and would patch stuff between songs on stage.  You can hear him using it with an early sequencer on the title track on Turn Back.

17 hours ago, dacm said:

The video appears to be shot mostly live, in rehearsal, with the classic line up of original members and an amazing array of 70's gear surrounding them.

It was shot during rehearsals for the Turn Back tour if I remember correctly.

[Philip Clark]

LOVE this tune! Big fan. Bobby Kimball was such a badass.

[Ivan May]

The entire Turn Back album by Toto is good, one of their lesser known for sure..

 

English Eyes is also a good song from that album.

 

 

[jazzpiano88]

I love Toto, but I'm having trouble finding the tonal center of this song.

 

[TommyRude]

1 hour ago, JazzPiano88 said:

I love Toto, but I'm having trouble finding the tonal center of this song.

 

yeah... I think they got better 🙂

[Bobadohshe]

1 hour ago, JazzPiano88 said:

I love Toto, but I'm having trouble finding the tonal center of this song.

 

 

What do you mean

[jazzpiano88]

2 hours ago, Bobadohshe said:

 

What do you mean

Compositionally I can’t follow it.  I listened to it twice.  1st on iPad speakers and I couldn’t make any sense of it whatsoever. 

Gave it a second chance on the computer speakers and, it still made no sense in terms of a nice or even oblique chord progression, a hook, catchy melody…… nothing.  
 

Sorry

[CyberGene]

I also don’t get what you mean. It’s a very energetic song with a catchy melody. Do you specifically listen for stuff like ii-V-I to be able to determine a tonal center or something? I guess too much jazz can twist our perception 😀 Just try to listen to it without analyzing it. 

[jerrythek]

On one level I understand what you are saying, since it doesn't just sit in a standard key, using only scale tone chords and related functional harmony. But there are clearly harmonic figures that are repeated for each section of the song.

 

A - D, B - E intro 

slight chordal figure into E - opening of verse - sounds like "home" to me

 

But it's not E Major, due to a lot of D chords as well. E Mixolydian? 

 

I'm not going to analyze it all, but  almost all of it makes sense to me as E Mixolydian... or E Rock harmony! 😉

 

11 hours ago, JazzPiano88 said:

Compositionally I can’t follow it.  I listened to it twice.  1st on iPad speakers and I couldn’t make any sense of it whatsoever. 

Gave it a second chance on the computer speakers and, it still made no sense in terms of a nice or even oblique chord progression, a hook, catchy melody…… nothing.  
 

Sorry

 

[Tusker]

41 minutes ago, jerrythek said:

I'm not going to analyze it all, but  almost all of it makes sense to me as E Mixolydian... or E Rock harmony! 😉

 

That's how I am hearing it also Jerry. E Mixolydian but it's triadic (no seventh) one would not be faulted for thinking the tonal center is E major, especially during the verse. The tonal center ambiguity appears to be part of the charm ... just like the duck-rabbit illusion.

 

[Philip Clark]

16 hours ago, JazzPiano88 said:

I love Toto, but I'm having trouble finding the tonal center of this song.

 

It's in E. 🤪

[Bobadohshe]

13 hours ago, JazzPiano88 said:

Compositionally I can’t follow it.  I listened to it twice.  1st on iPad speakers and I couldn’t make any sense of it whatsoever. 

Gave it a second chance on the computer speakers and, it still made no sense in terms of a nice or even oblique chord progression, a hook, catchy melody…… nothing.  
 

Sorry

 

I get what you mean. Kind of tonicized to E mixolydian for most of it. But you could technically say it's in A. And yeah in terms of having a huge dominant hook - this song isn't really it. You can tell Turn Back was produced by the same dude who produced some Queen stuff. This side of Toto doesn't have to be for everyone, that's all good. 

[jazzpiano88]

20 hours ago, CyberGene said:

Do you specifically listen for stuff like ii-V-I to be able to determine a tonal center or something? I guess too much jazz can twist our perception .

Jesus Cyber!   Mellow out…  None of your aspersions are remotely accurate and not sure why you would make them. 

I know you are chomping at the bit to go all anti Jazz recently, but you picked the wrong person, who is vehemently anti Jazz police himself.  

 

[CyberGene]

4 hours ago, JazzPiano88 said:

I know you are chomping at the bit to go all anti Jazz recently

That’s correct only to a certain degree and is why I made my comment indeed. I still believe dismissing a rock song which is fairly accessible, through some jazz terms is a bit snobbish but I see you’re being offended and I apologize. I may be wrong about your intent but when I made my comment I was sure it was rooted in the jazz mentality. Again, I also see why such a direct attack isn’t appropriate. Maybe it’s because I’m a fan of Toto and would prefer if people who dislike them, dislike them in the context of this style of music, and not  using implicit or explicit references to other genres or music theory devices that have nothing to do with Toto.

 

P.S. When I’m criticizing jazz elitism, I’m criticizing myself too. That’s what I used to be, a jazz elitist. And I’ve seen that in so many people around me. But I had no right to extrapolate that to people I don’t know, in this case to you. Apologies again. 
 

✌️

[Tusker]

Recently I used jazz (6/9s, upper structures, quartal harmony) language to describe a piece composed by a classically trained musician who responded quite indignantly. As far as he was concerned, the harmonic theory of classical music was sufficient to explain the piece. It was not a jazz piece, so why bring jazz terminology into it?

 

The conversation was amicable but it reminded me that we are all blind men making sense of an elephant from whatever vantage point life has given us.

 

 

[CyberGene]

BTW, my question to @JazzPiano88 whether he seeks ii-V-I was serious. (Yes, I was annoyed that he looked for a tonal centre and I explained why but my second part of the question was genuine). How do you seek a tonal centre? To me the piece is apparently in A since the E sounds very dominant-ey, and the many D chords are the subdominant. Maybe it's because in my native Bulgarian folklore music (and to an extent Spanish Flamenco and other European Folk traditions, also Middle Eastern music) this is a very common thing to use the dominant as a hook (sometimes without playing the implied tonic even once), but it's not ambiguous to my ears, it's just a plain vanilla thing.

 

And going back to my other question. And this time I'm not nagging, just genuinely interested. If you just try to listen to the song without analyzing or trying to figure out chords (and scales), isn't that just an almost straight forward and highly energetic rock song? I am not expecting that everybody likes it, but among those who like rock (and to an extent progressive rock), does that really sound ambiguous or lacking tonal centre? It's really hard for me to look at it from that angle. Which is why I decided it was probably a question of jazz-elitism, for which I apologized since it was an unnecessary reach on my side. And I apologize again.

[jazzpiano88]

2 hours ago, CyberGene said:

BTW, my question to @JazzPiano88 whether he seeks ii-V-I was serious. (Yes, I was annoyed that he looked for a tonal centre and I explained why but my second part of the question was genuine). How do you seek a tonal centre? To me the piece is apparently in A since the E sounds very dominant-ey, and the many D chords are the subdominant. Maybe it's because in my native Bulgarian folklore music (and to an extent Spanish Flamenco and other European Folk traditions, also Middle Eastern music) this is a very common thing to use the dominant as a hook (sometimes without playing the implied tonic even once), but it's not ambiguous to my ears, it's just a plain vanilla thing.

 

And going back to my other question. And this time I'm not nagging, just genuinely interested. If you just try to listen to the song without analyzing or trying to figure out chords (and scales), isn't that just an almost straight forward and highly energetic rock song? I am not expecting that everybody likes it, but among those who like rock (and to an extent progressive rock), does that really sound ambiguous or lacking tonal centre? It's really hard for me to look at it from that angle. Which is why I decided it was probably a question of jazz-elitism, for which I apologized since it was an unnecessary reach on my side. And I apologize again.

 

Thank you.    It's all good.  On to your questions...

 

I didn't think my reply had anything to do with jazz.  I said "I love Toto" but can't follow this piece musically.  "Lack of Tonal Center" was my un-analytical way of saying I can't follow the chords in terms of the direction that they move.   Bobby probably came the closest to explaining why I feel this way.  In general, I don't really analyze music except as a response for understanding why I really like something.    In this case, I disliked it, and shared my reason.

 

On your second question, I didn't even try to dissect it in terms of chords or scales.  Other people did that.  I'm mostly a play by ear person and have never used scales as a way to analyze or compose.    Again, musically the chords don't sound like they have any rhyme or reason.  Also, melodically this piece doesn't work for me, precisely because the underlying chords in their totality aren't musical.   And I think a telling effect of this is the "pitchiness" of the vocal performance.  

 

Also, in your other post, you said, "I was sure it [my critique] was rooted in the jazz mentality".  Nothing could be further from the truth.  I'm more of a Pop/Rock person than a jazz person, although not by a whole lot.

 

[Docbop]

To me it sounds like something they came up with jamming in the studio and decided this could be a song let's see what we can turn it into.   

[TommyRude]

Off topic for a moment..  the Porcaro brothers, Paich & Lukather all went to Grant High School in the Valley.  A bunch of other musicians and actors went there, including Micky Dolenz, Jim Gordon, Tom Selleck and more.  North Hollywood was a stomping ground for rock musicians back in the day, there were several clubs, including Filthy McNasty's and the Palomino.  Filthy's later changed to FM Station, a good place to hang out. 😁

[Docbop]

8 minutes ago, TommyRude said:

Off topic for a moment..  the Porcaro brothers, Paich & Lukather all went to Grant High School in the Valley.  A bunch of other musicians and actors went there, including Micky Dolenz, Jim Gordon, Tom Selleck and more.  North Hollywood was a stomping ground for rock musicians back in the day, there were several clubs, including Filthy McNasty's and the Palomino.  Filthy's later changed to FM Station, a good place to hang out. 😁

 

A lot of musicians and clubs in the Valley since cheaper than living in the city.   Filthy McNasty's I thought that was across the street from the Whiskey there was a club there that had many names over the years and quite a popular spot in 70's-80's. 

[TommyRude]

37 minutes ago, Docbop said:

 

A lot of musicians and clubs in the Valley since cheaper than living in the city.   Filthy McNasty's I thought that was across the street from the Whiskey there was a club there that had many names over the years and quite a popular spot in 70's-80's. 

You might be thinking of the Viper Room.  I played at the Whiskey, The Roxy and the Troubadour back then, along with a bunch of other places... Coconut Teaser, China Club, Madam Wongs West, probably a few others that I can't remember 😎 - and of course, hanging at the Rainbow now and then.

[Floyd Tatum]

On 2/15/2023 at 9:46 PM, JazzPiano88 said:

Compositionally I can’t follow it.  I listened to it twice.  1st on iPad speakers and I couldn’t make any sense of it whatsoever.    Gave it a second chance on the computer speakers and, it still made no sense in terms of a nice or even oblique chord progression, a hook, catchy melody…… nothing.    Sorry

 

I agree the tonal centre is slightly ambiguous, but so what?  Try listening to Monk's Bye-Ya.   Totally ambiguous, but still an engaging tune.   https://youtu.be/pVkPWUsFIe0

 

Not trying to make you like it if you don't.  I like it.  I've played plenty of jazz but also pop, rock, and blues over the years, and I find that songs don't always have a clear tonal centre (<- Canadian spelling!).   Doesn't bother me, but I respect your right to dislike it - I dislike a lot of music that others seem to love.  That's life.   This was my first time listening to this tune,  and the first things that struck me were: the energy, the tight rhythmic feel, the high level of musicianship, and the interesting lyrics/melody/vocal harmony.   Didn't really notice the chord structure being ambiguous until you mentioned it!

 

[o0Ampy0o]

On 2/17/2023 at 9:53 AM, Docbop said:

To me it sounds like something they came up with jamming in the studio and decided this could be a song let's see what we can turn it into.   

Heavily influenced by coke.
 

Brutal song for a vocalist to tackle on tour. 

[jazzpiano88]

4 hours ago, Floyd Tatum said:

I agree the tonal centre is slightly ambiguous, but so what?  Try listening to Monk's Bye-Ya.   Totally ambiguous, but still an engaging tune.

https://youtu.be/pVkPWUsFIe0

Not trying to make you like it if you don't.  I like it.  I've played plenty of jazz but also pop, rock, and blues over the years, and I find that songs don't always have a clear tonal centre.   Doesn't bother me, but I respect your right to dislike it - I dislike a lot of music that others seem to love.  That's life.   This was my first time listening to this tune,  and the first things that struck me were: the energy, the tight rhythmic feel, the high level of musicianship, and the interesting lyrics/melody/vocal harmony.   Didn't really notice the chord structure being ambiguous until you mentioned it!

 

 

I think where I went wrong was trying to explain why I didn't like the tune.   Lack of a tonal center was a poor way to describe it because I like a lot of music without a tonal center if the changes sound good to me.   Bye-Ya is a perfect example.   Even with ambiguous tonal center, Monk outlines the changes up front so clearly that the audience is almost forced to engage because he's effectively saying, "here's what I'm going to do....".  And while quirky, to me it's very musical.  Thanks for pointing out this tune.

 

So with Goodbye Elenore, my complaint is more, I don't like the changes and how the song is constructed.   For me it's not musical and is rammed down your throat for good measure :).

 

So here.  Let me edit my original post:

   I love Toto, but I'm having trouble finding the tonal center of this song.

   I love Toto, but this one is not my cup of tea.  I don't find it musical.

 

 

[Floyd Tatum]

11 minutes ago, JazzPiano88 said:

So here.  Let me edit my original post:

   I love Toto, but I'm having trouble finding the tonal center of this song.

   I love Toto, but this one is not my cup of tea.  I don't find it musical.

 

No problem!  So be it.   So be it Union  😀

[Floyd Tatum]

14 minutes ago, o0Ampy0o said:

Heavily influenced by coke.       Brutal song for a vocalist to tackle on tour. 

 

"Heavily influenced by coke" - 😃

 

I too noticed he was reaching hard for some of those high notes.  Not sure why they didn't drop the key by a tone.   I guess some critics would notice that and complain.   <Rant> Wait until age gets to them, then we'll see how much they complain! </Rant>

 

[Docbop]

4 hours ago, o0Ampy0o said:

Heavily influenced by coke.
 

Brutal song for a vocalist to tackle on tour. 

Oh yes it was like a blizzard in the studio when they were in.      Artist I was worked for we finished tracking our album and moved to a smaller overdub and mixing room,  Toto came in to where we were tracking.   Our engineer was also working on the Toto sessions during the day and mixing us at night.  He would tell us the insane stories about Totos sessions I'll just say they knew how to party hard. 

[Bobadohshe]

Yeah it's funny - being an obscene Toto fanboy I initially bristled at Jazzpiano88s comments. Doesn't he know how great these musicians are? Is this some jazz snob? Then I realized I was the one bringing all those notions to the table and considered the piece by itself and played through it myself. And yeah I could see why this piece isn't for everybody. Not my favorite either really. (Though I still love it and it's not my least favorite of theirs by a long shot).