Punk Pop Riffs (Tab)

Another one for the Riffs for Ukulele series. Usual rules apply: they’re intended to be played for a lark (even more so with these punk pop songs); no, I’m not going to write up the full song; and they’re not necessarily in the original key (although only Sum 41 in this post isn’t thanks to some capo deployment).

Paramore – Still Into You

StillIntoYou

With Paramore’s recent foray into ukulele songs it’s only right I include one of theirs. Two riffs on this one. The top one is plucked thumb and two finger style and the bottom one using alternate picking.

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Blink 182 – What’s My Age Again?

WhatsMyAgeAgain

After a bit of octave shifting the arpeggio riff in this one works way better on ukulele than I was expecting. Thumb and two finger picking for this one again. Try to emphasise the notes on the g- and C-strings.

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Green Day – American Idiot

AmericanIdiot

Capo on the first fret for this one too. The switch from G to F at the end of bar two is very fast. If you’re struggling with it you can just switch the F for playing all the strings open like at the end of bar 4.

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Sum 41 – Fat Lip


FatLip

Not going to lie, this one is pretty preposterous on ukulele. But, hey, Sum 41 were a pretty preposterous band.

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Panic! at the Disco – I Write Sins Not Tragedies

IWriteSins

I’m not sure if this one entirely belongs in this post. But I’ve become obsessed with it recently. I tried to get all the discordant bits in. Which makes it much more difficult than it needs to be. Here’s a simpler version:

IWriteSinsEasy

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View Comments

12 Comments

  1. TheUkuleleNerd October 19th, 2014 9:23 pm

    Thank you! T.T

  2. Woodshed October 19th, 2014 9:27 pm

    TheUkuleleNerd: You’re welcome!

  3. Jokktapus October 21st, 2014 12:11 pm

    I find American Idiot easier and better sounding going ADGADG, don’t even need a capo then :)

  4. Woodshed October 22nd, 2014 11:50 am

    Jokktapus: But you’ll get many messages from people calling you an idiot because it’s in the wrong key. I speak from experience!

  5. Potatoluver February 18th, 2015 8:46 pm

    Do you have a page teaching people how to read these? thanks

  6. Woodshed February 19th, 2015 12:50 pm

    Potatoluver: There’s a guide to reading tab here.

  7. shadowhunter February 15th, 2016 9:22 pm

    I started ukulele a couple months ago and I was wondering how to pluck the strings when there’s more that one note at the same time. . . like the American Idiot one.

  8. Woodshed February 16th, 2016 10:12 pm

    shadowhunter: For American Idiot it’s all just chords so I’m strumming them.

  9. shadowhunter February 18th, 2016 12:03 am

    OK thank you! Yeah I just figured out how to read tabs.

  10. Brendan March 25th, 2016 5:04 pm

    For Whats My Name Again are C5 and E1 the same note? It sounds like Im playing the same note twice, and C5 is hard to reach, so Im wondering if I can just hit E1 twice?

  11. Woodshed March 26th, 2016 10:57 am

    Brendan: Yes, they’re the same note so you could. I’ve tabbed it that way so the picking pattern is the same all the way through.

  12. eatmyuke April 5th, 2017 11:05 pm

    this comes in handy ?

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