You might notice the lack of an mp3 for this one. That’s because it’s way beyond my abilities. You really need to use a pick to play this right and I’m hopeless with those rhino’s toenails. You’ll just have to watch James Hill do it here (Thunderstruck starts around 1:00). He plays the riff in D-tuning and exactly the same way as it’s played on guitar (so it’s a fifth higher than the original).
MC: Yep, that’s about the size of it. James is the greatest uke player in the world right now. No competition.
and shall i ask him which cross roads i have to go to meet satan to aqquire such skills?
or do you think any will do?
All of this on one string. It was very addictive. I hard a hard time putting the uke down and going to sleep.
cbf: Do they have anything exciting like crossroads in Canada? Perhaps he sold his soul at a roundabout.
Jeff: I’m with you on the couldn’t put it down front. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve picked the uke up for ‘a quick 5 minute strum.’
I prefer playing the song on the last string, as I have a tendency of messing up otherwise.
I also just strum very fast with my fingers.
Variant: Good idea. Anything that makes this easier to play is worth trying.
Just thought of a good idea while watching this. If you use your picking fingers ALL on one string, you can get quite impressive speeds.
Sharpen: Yeah, you can do. I usually find it best to use just my index and middle alternating. Although I do use my ring finger as well for tremolos.
This video is highly impressive, but the part where he plays thunderstruck is by far the easiest.
With a pick it’s very easy to play this…But if you don’t like to use a pick, do some tapping without strumming (the original on the guitar is played just with the left hand). It sounds good.
Yep: Saying it’s the easiest is a long way from saying it’s easy.
Actually this as pretty easy, the speed he played it at was ridiculous. But it took me like five minutes to learn.
not joking but i found this really simple but mind you i have been playin guitar for 5 years but i can nail this
truly a rock god is he who wrote such a masterpiece… still sounds great on the uke at about half-speed
Kent: Angus is the king. No doubt about it.
Had a go at it. And it would be hard to play it at a ridiculously high speed but once you can do shifts down 9nth fret your fine, but that might be because my Uke has one of those white dots on the twelfth.
Just checked the fretts to make sure i was playing it right and its still kind of easyish once you can remeber the shifts
CountPancake: Thanks for the pointers.
CountPancake/Woodshed are you being ssrcastic?
Doomdonkey: A little. Stated blog policy is that if you declare the easiness of a difficult piece you have to provide video evidence. I was in a good mood at the time so I stuck with sarcasm.
Hey wo there. I didn’t say i was perfect at it. I just said that once the shifts are there it would be easy because the actual fretts to play are near. and anyway i don’t have web cam/ camera.
If you use hammer ons it’s quite a bit easier, which is to say it’s still really hard.
theres a much easier way to play this:
---------------
-4-7-4-7-5-8-5-8
4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4 etc., THEN
---------------
7-5-4-5-2-4-2-0
-0-0-0-0-0-0-0--0-0-0-0
---------------
---------------1-2-1-2 REPEAT
Sarah D: Thanks! I still much prefer the other way though.
hiya
a new uke nerd here, only been playing since september but loving it.
I love the sound of the thunderstruck riff and find it pretty easy to play, but is there a tab for the rest of the song ? i can’t seem to find it ..
many thanks
Richard
Richard: Not that I know of.
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Let’s face it, if James Hill can play it, the majority of the world can’t.
Though I have made headway on a very dumbed-down version of his Mario arrangement.