Dramatic stops - pre-planned or evolve over time - how do yuo feel about arrangement-craft generally

PolarityMan

One of the things which I think I have been improving at recently, but doesn't get alot of discussion is the kind of arrangement craft. One of the things I've particualrly been liking over the past 6 months or so is having dramatic stops in the instrumentation foloowed by a single line of vocals on their own.

I cant think of any good example from other peoples songs off the top of my head, even though i know theres loads but...

Think like 2:55ish in this video  

What I'm wondering is how often these kind of arrangement devices comes as part of the writing of the song. Like you're first version has that as a key device as you write it.

And how many happen after playing the song live for a bit and saying...you know what would sound really dramatic here?

Ive been including a lot of "pre-written" one lately but ive also introduced a few in older material.

As an aside, how important do you think this kind of arrange-ment craft to song writing in general? Do you view it as an integral part or just the icing on the cake of an existing song.

Grunfeld

Pete Shelley - "Homosapien"

The build starts at 1:26 and I love the stop which really enhances it about 30 seconds after that.

Cirrus

Generally I'd use that kind of thing to punctuate the melody, so chances are if I want something like that in the song it'd make itself apparent quite early on in the writing process. But as the song develops it might be suggested quite spontaneously by any of the band as a way to control the flow, dynamics and energy of the song. So, either I guess

Branshen

Imo, music dynamics is something you develop by listening to alot of music. If you listen to enough bands that do this well, it will bleed into your playing subconsciously. I really like bands that play dynamically and put alot of pauses into their music, it makes the music more alive. I reckon you'll see more of this in live situations/recordings, as opposed to studio recordings which are usually more reserved and safe.