Pok: She’s Beautiful

She’s Beautiful by Pok the Bard is a brand new release! It has been added to Pok’s Anthology album.

She’s Beautiful is a very historic and wonderful creation. It seemed appropriate to release it now, following the recent 40th anniversary of Laughing Sun‘s Cander recording.

The version of She’s Beautiful on Cander has always been considered the definitive version of the song, despite all of its improvisation. The Cander version was truly inspired, and very much the template used when making the version of She’s Beautiful for Pok the Bard‘s Anthology album.

She’s Beautiful began in exeter’s grotty city centre bus station, of all places. As Pok was waiting there for his bus one day, a girl who he knew and admired from school happened to walk past. That simple event was the spark that led to this amazing song.

Pok always says that his songs are very simple, because – he says – he composes mainly using straightforward major or minor chords. If one of them has a seventh, that is an event! Although… he has shown us many wonderful esoteric chords over the years, so that’s best taken with a pinch of salt. And exactly which basic major or minor chord may come next, and when exactly it comes, can be a puzzle for other musicians.

It is true that there are no bars with odd numbers of beats lurking to trap the unwary in She’s Beautiful, but there are numerous tempo changes. These range from 66 BPM to 122 BPM, and can easily cause any musician who is not focused to stumble and fumble for a moment or two.

When the rhythm guitars were recorded, Fedax would have played the Ice Maiden, but it needed a bit of attention. Marsha had new strings and was a very similar instrument – both of them being Ibanez Roadstar IIs from 1985. Rather than waste Pok’s time repairing the Ice Maiden, Fedax simply played his parts on Marsha instead.

Marsha was subsequently stolen a few years later. What a shame, she was a lovely instrument.

Pok directed the bass part for She’s Beautiful from the very beginning and his choice of notes was both surprising and delightful. Instead of the bass playing A – D – E, he wanted it to play A – E – F#, creating an unexpected tension and a unique vibe, effectively making a C major chord with an F# as its root.

Sven does typically wonderful Sven things behind the kit and nails all the different feels with great expertise and skill.

In other Pok news, we have remixed and remastered both Fooog’z Bloooz and Freight Train/Pains. They are both available for your enjoyment at Bandcamp and SoundCloud and they are both sounding much, much better!

The next song to join them will be Summer ’83. It has been remixed and will be remastered in the next few days. We shall let you know when it is re-released via BlueSky and X.

More of Pok’s songs have been progressed a little in our studios. When the next one is ready for release, we shall inform all of Pok‘s fans in our News service, as well as our Bandcamp Community and socials. Be sure to follow us so you don’t miss out!

If you would like to download or listen to She’s Beautiful at Bandcamp, please click here.

To download the entire Anthology album as it stands right now, please click here.

If you would like to stream She’s Beautiful from SoundCloud, please click here instead.

Please note that we are in the throes of abandoning SoundCloud and our music will not be there for very much longer. See this News post for more details.