My Two Sense

I know just what you mean, Brian , by the end of Rocks Off. It's like the song, which bops along with verve aplenty until then, just blasts off into the stratosphere at that point. A perfect opener to a pretty magical album.

Anyway, since the Stones have been established as a recurring example of this moment discussion, I'd like to add Charlie's first snare hit in "Start Me Up." It's deafeningly loud in the mix, and so confidently delivered that it's startling, as if to say- ya'll best be ready to rock, cos here comes some rockin'.

I feel like I've mentioned this other one before but it's THE ONE. Just My Imagination by The Temptations, last line of the bridge before the chorus comes back in. Throughout the bridge, bassist James Jamerson keeps the bass line a steady mostly one-note heartbeat-like rhythm. Then Eddie Kendricks, with his smooth falsetto voice sings "But in reality she doesn't even know me." The rapture is established in how the bass keeps the steady rhythm while Kendricks pulls "doesn't even know me" across the rhythm so that it doesn't synch up but each syllable is stretched as far as it can go. The effect is the saddest, most aching sung moment I've ever noticed in a song before. I can hear the history of human heartache in that one moment. And it's not that he's lost the girl, it's that he is desperately infatuated with her and she has no idea. Reminds me of some of the songs on the great Van Morrison "Astral Weeks" album where an older man is in love with a schoolgirl that passes by his house or the older transvestite is in love with the young straight men, each of them knowing that their loves can never be realized.