ABSTRACT
Paul McCartney was able to write some of the most remarkable songs of his time by complicating and enriching the simple forms of music and song. In doing so, he transformed the possibilities of rock music and helped determine the standards by which rock ballads are written today. To help show how the Beatles changed the face of music, this chapter examines their deceptively simple and not overly popular song 'For No One' from Revolver. It shows how McCartney's use of a plain 'walking bass line' in both the piano and the bass guitar, reminiscent of baroque counterpoint, confuses the relationship between bass and chord type found in the early rock 'n' roll music of the 1950s. The chapter explores how the story implied in the ballad dissolves the rhyming and narrative structure of ballad. The governing structure – the 'base' – of the traditional ballad story line is the rhyme scheme.
