Knitting A Sonic Fabric, Part 1

I listened to John Mayer’s Wildfire and was stopped dead by this line from “Badge And Gun”: Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

Why does it sound so good? Might be the internal rhyme between black and back?

  Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

Simple internal rhyme doesn’t begin to explain why this line sounds so attractive.

Take a look at the vowels:

Assonance

Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds in stressed syllables, close enough to each other to be heard.

Listen to the short i (as in it) in gimme and kick:

Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

And the long o (as in go) in those and alone

Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

The vowel repetitions create an additional layer of sonic connections to help to knit a small piece of this lovely sonic fabric.

But there’s more in addition to the simple assonance. Look:

Hidden Assonance

Many vowels contain more than one sound. They’re called diphthongs. They create hidden assonance.

First, there are the straightforward diphthongs,

oi (as in boy) = long o (as in go) + long ē (as in me)

ou (as in couch)  = ä (as in papa) + long ū (as in too)

Also, some of the long vowels are diphthongs too. Long a (as in lay) is a combination of short ě (as in end) and long ē (as in me). Say lay slowly a few times.

    l ě ē

See how it works here:

Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone.

Now say jet and lay slowly. Can you hear the short ě in jet echo the short ě in lay?

j ě t l ě ē

Pretty neat.

Long o (as in go) is a diphthong, containing two distinct sounds – short ŏ (as in hot) plus long ū (as in too):

Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

There are two long o sounds, those and alone. Both contain ū (as in “too”). Listen to the vowel sounds in down, the more straightforward diphthong. It contains ä (as in papa) plus ū (as in too). So in

Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

you can hear the long ū connecting those, down and alone. Voice leading.  Slow them down and listen:

those = th ŏ ū se down =d ä ū n alone = al ŏ ū ne

All three share the long ū in common!

Another one. The long a in lay is a combination of short e (as in end), and long ē (as in me). And the long i in nights is a combination of ä (as in “papa”) and long ē (as in me). So both lay and nights share long ē, connecting them with the long ē of gimme!

Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

Again, slow them down and listen. Notice the hidden assonance – the connection between one of the sounds in the more complex diphthongs:

Gimm ē lay = l e ē nights = n ä ē ghts

There’s one more: since the vowel sounds in down contain ä (as in papa) plus ū (as in too) and the long i in nights combines ä (as in papa) and long ē (as in me), both share ä:

Gimme those jet black kick back lay down nights alone

down =d ä ū n nights = n ä ē ghts

Easy to hear now, isn’t it.

Using hidden assonance adds yet another layer to this sonic fabric, all created by vowel connections.

Of course, that’s just the vowels. We still have to look at the consonants. Alas, we’ll have to wait for that until the next edition.

Pat Pattison is a professor at Berklee College of Music, where he teaches lyric writing and poetry.