Deeper Questions: The Tingles!

Hey, Deeper Cuts fans! We’re excited about upcoming season 2 of our show which we’ll be recording very soon.

In the meantime, we thought we shouldn’t keep you hanging.

So, this is a new series that’s exclusive (at least right now!) to this site; Deeper Questions! Every week, or as often as we can anyway, we’ll present a musical question to each member of the Deeper Cuts Trio and share it with you.

Here’s this week’s question:

What song, album, or moment in a piece of music gives you the tingles – a wonderful, actually physical sensation that gets you every time. Here’s what they said.

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Rob’s Pick – “You Really Got Me”, The Kinks

There are many I could mention. But, one notable moment in all of music history that literally gives me the tingles whenever I hear it is the guitar break in The Kinks’ “You Really Got Me” (around 1:15). There’s just something incredibly wild about it, as if lead guitarist Dave Davies (who was seventeen at the time!) suddenly lost control of his guitar as it was seemingly trying to tear itself away from his body. It is an utterly feral sound.

This is in part thanks to his experiment with distortion, one of the earliest of its kind at the time. He pushed a pin through one of the cones in his amp and then slashed it with a razor to get the effect. Needless to say, I get tingles of excitement right up my spine and into my brain no matter how many times I hear it. It was covered by Van Halen many years later, and for all of Eddie Van Halen’s skills, nothing beats the original.

Shannon’s Pick  –  “Alexander Hamilton”, from the Hamilton stage show

Similarly, there’s a lot I could go with here. But it’s got to be the opening measure of Hamilton. Its “buh buh budduhbumbum” followed by the first sweeping string notes has become the most iconic four seconds in modern musical theatre. It’s a thrill EVERY time, and it signifies so much in the blink of an eye.

In the macro sense of the play’s subject matter, it immediately sets a loud, brassy scene of building a nation out of nothing, followed by a graceful acknowledgement of where we began. More personally, it fills me with a tangible sense of wonder and pride – at what my favorite art form can do in the right hands AND of the journey I’ve had with that majestic score playing in the background. I get a physical sense of adventure, inspiration, wonder, the past and the future – all in four seconds.

Graeme’s Pick – “The Planet Krypton”, from Superman the Movie soundtrack

Okay, I’m going to move in similar territory to Shannon in that it’s a piece of instrumental music at the start of something. Only for me, it’s a movie. It’s “The Planet Krypton” by John Williams’ score for Superman The Movie (1978).

The first minute and 23 seconds of it are used during the establishing shots of Kyrpton as a planet of snow, and massive canyons of ice and crystal. And it only works because of the music. Because the music, particularly that first minute and 23 seconds with the string prologue and then lonely strains of trombone that builds into the trombones and trumpets echoing off of each other, with the strings and woodwinds complementing it.

It’s so stirring, majestic, moving and powerful. In the function of the film it makes you believe that this panorama of gorgeous model shots is real. As music it just leaves you breathless.

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What about you, faithful reader?

What piece of music moves you physically, and gives you the tingles?

Let us know in the comments!