That Lucky Old Sun (Modernised)

[Sam_BFC]

Brian has described in interviews how he changed the arrangement/chords of TLOS's title track and made it more modern sounding.  And my question is basically how so?

I hope the many intelligent musical minds on the board can shed some light on this...I find it an interesting point.

Cheers
Sam

[the captain]

When Brian says "modern" in reference to music, he seems to usually mean harmonies in styles like the Four Freshmen's vocals. So that would basically mean changing something from a I-IV-V kind of progression to use more "jazzy" harmonies. You might take the aforementioned progression and go I6/9 or Imaj7, etc. Instead of a straight IV you might go IVmaj7 or a ii-7 or ii-9, etc. You'd be adding extensions and probably additional chords or tones in passing.

The "non-modern" version of TLOS, you could:

I
Up in the morning, out on the job, work so

IV
hard for my

I
pay. But that

IV
lucky old

I
sun has nothing to do but roll around

V
heaven

I
all day.

Like Al often talks about with Sloop John B, this (like a huge majority of songs in popular culture, from folk to country to blues to rock) can be a 3-chord song. Brian adds to them through interesting extensions, substitutions, counter-melodies, etc.