Please Clear Something Up For Me...

[EricBliss12345]

Is Morning Rain Chris's composition or not?

Under the lyrics section here it lists the song as being written by her, but it really didn't dawn on me until the other day that it REALLY sounds like a Kirwan composition, unless she wrote the basic sketch of the song and the band contributed to a lot to the arrangement. Otherwise it would be a very out of character Chris song, both lyrically and musically, unless it's a two way collaboration like Did You Ever Love Me or something.

My Future Games booklet lists nothing as far as songwriting credits so that's no help to me.

Thanks!

Eric

[wetcamelfood]

I've never heard/read anything to the contratry about this so I'd say it's a 99.9% certainty that it was written by CM.

You have to bear in mind as well that those were very early days regarding writing for Chris as well so she may not have found the style yet that she eventually became known for.

John

[chiliD]

That's a good observation...it definitely does have a strong Danny Kirwan "flavor". But, the songwriting credit on "Morning Rain" is 100% "C. Perfect" (that's not to say that DK didn't have some input in the final ARRANGEMENT of the song, though)

Same with "Bad Loser" on Heroes Are Hard To Find, it is 100% Christine McVie, yet that one sounds like it had serious input of Bob Welch.

[EricBliss12345]

Hell, it could have been co-written with one of the guys for all we know.

One thing I thought was interesting regarding songwriting credits. For "Tusk" Mick Fleetwood wrote that trademark drum intro and came up with the word "Tusk" for the chorus. Yet Fleetwood gets absolutely zero writing credit on that song, and although Lindsey may have wrote the bulk of the tune it would have never got off the ground had it not been for Mick, which I find kind of interesting.

Rick Wakeman once said "Never believe the credits you read on an album" and I wonder how far that statement should be taken sometimes. But think about all the things Wakeman contributed to Yes, those beautiful piano interludes in "Heart Of The Sunrise" (which he got no writing credit for) the whole middle piano section of "South Side Of The Sky" (once again, uncredited) and the tremendous pipe organ/synthesizer interlude in "Close To The Edge" which strangely is credited only to Steve Howe and Jon Anderson. Plus, on the ABWH album the credits are split evenly four ways even though Anderson wrote 90% of what was on that album. A 4 way publishing split was part of the deal for Bruford, Wakeman, and Howe to appear on the album, even though they wrote little or nothing.

"Morning Rain" is just VERY uncharacteristic of Chris. For her, that intro bit is complex and the transitions between the choruses and verses also out of character. Basically, her arrangement on this is much more detailed than anything else she's written. There's also a fairly long bit in the middle for some guitar solos. I'm not trying to say that she wasn't the writer now that I've had confirmations from people who know more about the band than I do, but it makes you wonder how much the song was actually shaped by somebody else. This song has way more in common with something like "Bare Trees" or "Child Of Mine" than say, "You Make Loving Fun" or even "Just Crazy Love" or something like that.

[wetcamelfood]

Like ChiliD says, you have a valid point here.

I wonder if MR was just kind of thrown together by Chris in that she wanted the domestic life, even back then, so she may have just been going through the motions to be with John as she knew he wanted to be there but since in the UK, FM seemed to be thought of as "over" the minute PG left the band, that she may have thought FM wasn't going to last much longer so she didn't put much in to her songs in the beginning (thinking once the record contract ran out they'd break up and then have to just get "regular jobs" and then she'd be happy because "setting up house and having regular jobs" is what she wanted anyways) but then once she realized this was going to be her life, THEN she honed her style?

Just some thoughts though of course we'll never really know unless Chris says so herself which I don't think she will.

John

[Cristian]

This is a very un-like Christine song, so it's a pretty good observation to note that Danny could have had something to do with it. In fact, she has used very brief lyrics to construct long songs in other places (I can think of "Brown Eyes" now), but the chord progression and the bridges are very unusual to her straigthforward pop songs. It is a very interesting composition, and I believe she could have been looking for something that would match better with Danny and Bob's material, without breaking the harmony of an album that features three singer/songwriters. Perhaps she used some elements of Danny's compositions but it is her song anyway. Or perhaps she got some help from Danny. In any case, you got me listening to that song again, and it's a pleasure.


Song of the moment - Purple Dancer

[EricBliss12345]

In any case, you got me listening to that song again, and it's a pleasure

Damn straight it's a pleasure. I don't think she ever topped her songwriting debut in the Mac. Greatness did follow, but this song is my favorite of hers and probably my favorite FM song period.