Dua Lipa – Don’t Start Now (Tab)
About once a year a pop song manages to pierce my grumpiness and make me grin. This year it’s been Dua Lipa’s Don’t Start Now.
There’s a lot to recommend the song: the jazzy chords, the funky bass, the cowbell. But my favourite aspect is the one-note chorus. Adam Neely recently made an outstanding video about the worst solo of all time that’s a must-watch on this subject.
Contrary to whatmorons like Ben Shapiro will tell you, not having a melody doesn’t mean it isn’t music. The static A note (in this arrangement) adds a different flavour to each chord. So it changes the Em into Emadd11, the C into C6 and G into Gsus2.
It also means there’s more room to play about with other aspects of the song. So there’s a little chromatic run-up to the root note of the chord (inspired by the bass line). And, in the second chorus, I throw in some harmonics on the E-string 5th fret to imitate the cowbell. I don’t think I entirely pull it off but it is fun.
