I am curious as to what the first song was that popularized this musical characteristic.
It’s fairly recent. It’s a phenomenon where the very end of the song consists of the music stopping and the vocalist continues for a little while longer.
I found three examples. They are ubiquitous and I would like to know what song made this a “thing.”
Check the last few seconds of “Despacito” by Daddy Yankee, “Look What You Just Made Me Do” by Taylor Swift, and “Shape Of You” by Ed Sheeran.
Any others you can think of? Is it unique to pop? Why, from a musical standpoint, is it done?
If we’re going to include songs with a vocal-only segment in the middle of the song, we would have to list an enormous amount of songs with rap sections in the middle.
I’m racking my brain thinking of any Queen song that does this. “Under Pressure” has those finger snaps at the end. “Having a Good Time” has Freddie vamping on the piano while he does the “yada-dada-da”. The closest is “39” which has absolutely no instruments on the final line “Pity me”, but after a beat the entire band picks up again for a couple of measures.
Not sure about these ones - Paul’s multi-tracked vocals ending just after the acoustic guitar sustain? I Will
And at the end of Because - those two really really pesky guitar notes at the very end probably rule this one out?
I kept thinking there was a funk/soul/R&B song from the 70s that did this at the end of the song, but damned if I could remember what it was. Then yesterday I heard it about half a dozen times on some TV ad.
This came to mind on reading the OP. I’m not sure, but I sort of recall Arlo doing the final refrain with the audience sans guitar on some occasion. He may do this at the end of some other songs, possibly the line at the end of the Groundhog song, “In his hole he’s furry”. As a folk singer/songwriter he probably has more latitude to vary the songs in concert.
/nitpick/But if there’s another 30 seconds of music after that, would that not open the door for other tunes with vocal-only sections that aren’t at the end of song, of which there are too many to list?* (not to mention lots of tunes with beginning-of-song vocalizing, too) /nitpick/
lol - exhausted…
ok I think I’ve gone through almost the entire Minutemen discography - no luck.
I coulda sworn there was one, somewhere, in all that awesome, groovy mass of theirs.
Black Flag - TV Party I cued this up a good ways before the end, to set up one of the more…um…interesting seques (starting around 10:48?) into a song’s ending that I think I’ve ever heard.
The heavenly yelling at the end of the song just barely outlasts the dissolving instrumental noise by maybe two seconds.