The Freshman Experiment

All right. So here’s my new bridge beginning to accommodate all those pesky little 8th notes. Actually, I like it better. Changes in bold.

Nobody can fathom the price tag of my perfection.
No one knows the beauty queen’s plight.
With the manicures
The pedicures
Preventative botox, vegan,
No-tox chemical face peels every night
to keep my skin tight.
I got a new haircut.
I got a new haircut.

At long last, we have finished pretty girl blues.

What you missed: tiff btwn kk and bl regarding the size and scope of the song and therefore the bridge including but not limited to a heated discussion about just how many key changes a song like pretty girl blues is allowed to have.

In this corner: Kait says 1 key change tops. Maybe zero. It’s a small song and why can’t it be? It’s inherently small. It’s an ironic little ditty about a pretty girl who has the blues. Oh boo hoo pretty girl.

In this corner: Brian says 1 key change minimum. Perhaps 2. In fact, I’ve written 2 so smell you. There’s 2 key changes. Wherefore no high notes? Why can’t the song expand? Don’t we want people to want to perform this song? It might be small but need it be trivial?

Oh the drama. Oh the verbal spars. Oh the right hooks (literal right hooks like in boxing not like appropriate song titles)! Oh the boredom that you would have felt if you watched this argument progress from heated to downright embroiled: highlights include Brian telling Kait that the song would become inherently unperformable and did she really want that? Kait resisted (but then I guess passive agressively fine fine, whatever, yes, ok? passive agressively told him what she was going to say after the fight had ended…) saying that Brian was only saying any of this because of the recent sheet-music-perfecting bender he’s been on and everything is about performability for him. What about art? Hm? Cuz pretty girl blues is clearly the highest of art. There was no hyperbole here. Not used by either of them. No. Of course not.

Finally boredom or some higher power turned the page on their fight and they came back to the bridge they had already come up with (the one that was half way between 2 key changes and 0 - in that it was ONE), and they realized that it worked actually quite well.

I like this song. I think it is inherently performable. It does not have really high notes. No. But it’s so much fun to sing. I challenge you not to walk down the street singing it about how pretty you are and how no one understands. Go ahead. Don’t sing it. (But I bet you do.)

Enjoy fresh Xers. Enjoy.

pretty girl blues
I look so fine that no one likes to walk with me.
My hair’s so poker straight I go to clubs for free.
But when I get inside there’s not a girl as pretty.
No one understands my plight in this whole damn city.

I got a new haircut, new dress, a pair of new shoes.
I got an attitude that might be rude but that’s how I cruise.
I got a palpitating heart in my itty bitty chest
So I’m the best dressed whose (whose) got the pretty girl blues.

I’m not complaining bout the fringe benefits
I’m stuck with this dilemma cuz the Prada shoe fits.
I know I know I know I got a good thing going.
But up here on my pedestal it’s not so easy knowing.

I got a new haircut, new dress, a pair of new shoes.
I got an attitude that might be rude but that’s how I cruise.
I got a palpitating heart in my 32-C chest
So I’m the one who’s getting lonely feeling she’s the only one
whose (whose) got the pretty girl blues (blues)

Nobody appreciates the lengths I go to.
No one understands my plight.
With the manicures
The pedicures
Preventative botox, vegan,
No-tox chemical face peels every night
to keep my skin tight.
I got a new haircut.
I got a new haircut.

I got a new haircut, a new dress, a pair of new shoes
I got an attitude that might be rude, but that’s how I cruise
I got a palpitating heart in my itty-bitty chest.
So tell me true is that a way to treat a lady
who is only tryin’ to find a man who understands
that she’s only one whose (whose) got the pretty girls blues.
I got the pretty girl blues.
Got the pretty girl blues.

Brian has now had a chance to look at this, and he says that I screwed up the scansion in the bridge (1st two lines of the bridge - the 2 that start with “nobody”) but that’s ok. I figure I’ll show this to you anyway and I’ll make the slight change tomorrow.

Hey guys, I’ve been working on finishing off Pretty Girl Blues.

This first files is me bitching about the key change problems I got myself into, and the second file is me having it figured out. The truth is, however, that I’ve basically got 90 percent of it figured out and probably need to be in a room w/ kait to figure out the rest. ‘Cause we may not want a big musical build and key change into the 3rd chorus, we may want a spoken line, a little joke, something else… anyway, enjoy. I project that there will be a finished song and sheet music for this in the next week or so…

At long last Brian found the lost “Pretty Girl Blues” footage. I am probably more excited about this than you are because I heard the song and it has been stuck in my head ever since. I love this song. I think it’s so much fun. You should most definitely try humming it to yourself when you’re walking around campus or New York City or wherever it is that you walk. I think I’m exaggerating when I say you will feel prettier.

In the video, Natalie Weiss (recent Penn State grad whom you might recognize from her sillygood YouTube videos where she sings her face off) and I sing the first half of the song. Brian was having some difficulty with the bridge at the time, so we couldn’t sing the whole thing. Keep in mind, that she arrived at Brian’s house, learned 2 other songs, recorded a song, and then learned this one. We made up some harmonies on the spot and sang it immediately.

There is no sheet music. The girl just happens to be a musician too.

Enjoy!

I look so fine that no one likes to walk with me.
My hair’s so poker straight I go to clubs for free.
But when I get inside there’s not a girl as pretty.
No one understands my plight in this whole damn city.

I got a new haircut, new dress, a pair new shoes.
I got an attitude that might be rude but that’s how I cruise.
I got a palpitating heart in my itty bitty chest
So I’m the best dressed whose got the pretty girl blues.

I’m not complaining ’bout the fringe benefits
I’m stuck with this dilemma cuz the Prada shoe fits.
I know I know I know I got a good thing going.
But up here on my pedestal it’s not so easy knowing.

I got a new haircut, new dress, a pair new shoes.
I got an attitude that might be rude but that’s how I cruise.
I got a palpitating heart in my itty bitty chest
So I’m the one who’s getting lonely feeling she’s the only one
whose got the pretty girl blues.