Roller Coaster
Help - can anyone tell me the beats per minute (BPM) for Walter's recording of Roller Coaster - damned if I can figure it!!
Thanks M, good info - much appreciated
That unvarying guitar line is the glue for the whole piece. Walter keeps changing which beat is the "1" and the drummer follows him. But that guitar just keeps going (in beat counts) 1, 2, 1 (rest), 1, 2, 1 (rest).
By the way, the shifting downbeat aside, the piece is in 2, not in 4.
Listening to the guitar and tapping along on my Boss DB-90 (a sort of metronome/drum machine hybrid), I get a reading of 116 at the start fo the tune. Near the end I get 124, so they speed up some, which is not unusual for amid-up tune, especially as the excitement level rises.
Thanks - that's a good idea - I've now used a metronome and yes, it starts 116 then shifts up to 124-5. It's not an easy instrumental to keep time with when drums and guitar are backing. I spent a few weeks learning the whole song in isolation and then when I tried to play along with a ShoBlues backing track I realised how hard it is to find a solid, constant reference in the backing, especially when the exciment rises. Walter seems to set the pace but at one point he speeds up like he's trying catch up with the backing. The shifting beat seems to be part of what makes Roller Coaster such a fresh sound. Listening to the simple backing without any harp it's hard to imagine how Walter got inspiration for Roller Cosater - I guess that's his genius.
It varies a little, but if you assume the snare is the on the upbeat, you could count it at around 125. If you try to count it as if the snare is on the downbeats of 2 and 4, it would be double that, which is what it feels like at times, because of all the notes LW plays. But listen to the "bass" line, which stays the same, alternating from the root to the 5th (below), nice and calm at around 125 (slower at times), while LW goes crazy.
There is an Android app that is pretty cool, called "Simple metronome." You can tap in time on one of its buttons while you listen to a song, and it will tell you what the tempo is. Then you can hit "start," and it will click at that tempo (and "flash as well, or instead of clicking, if you want).