For this tribute, I went with Jawbreaker’s response to sell-out accusations: Boxcar.
The arrangement is just blasting out chords with a few picked notes here and there. The only thing that makes it tricky is the speed. I found the G-Am change in the chorus particularly tricky to get the hang of.
Here’s a tab for probably the biggest hit of the indie folk era: Home.
Intro: Straight in with the trickiest part of the song. If you wanted to make this easier, you could just chug out the chords rather than tackling the fingerpicking.
Verse: I’ve tried to keep the feeling of a duet in this section. For the female part, I use bends and play close to the bridge to give it a raspier sound. Then play away from the bridge to get a fuller tone for the male part. You can judge for yourself whether it works. I’m not sure.
If you don’t want to play the bends, you can replace them with the open A-string.
Chorus: Nice and easy. Just picking a simple melody and strumming the chords.
Solo: Nothing difficult here either in terms of fretting. But there are a bunch of bars of 2/4 which make the timing tricky to keep track of.
The Black Key’s Tighten Up, like most of their songs, is a very straight forward blues rock song. But there are a couple of oddities. The first is a rogue bar of 3/4 in bar 38.
The second starts at bar 48 when the song, ironically, loosens up and the tempo slows. I think you could switch the 3/4 bar to 4/4 and no one would notice. But the tempo change feels integral to the song.
A massive thanks to all Uke Hunt’s Patreon backers for keeping the site up and running this month. And double thanks go to these legendary patrons of the arts:
And extra thanks to March’s Tenor level backers:
– Arthur Foley
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– Dennis Boutsikaris
– Elizabeth Beardsley
– Ely Fletcher
– Ivo
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– Kelby Green
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– Margit Stadlmann
– Mary
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– Robert
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– Tina Knight
Here’s a fun version of Blink-182’s infectious (in the good sense and the bad sense) earworm All the Small Things.
Intro: All strums. I’m using my index finger a bit like a pick here (and in most of the song).
For all the strumming parts in the song, don’t worry about hitting the exact strings so long as you’re holding down the chord.
Verses: I’m using a bit of palm muting on the strings during the strums (i.e. resting the side of my strumming hand lightly on the strings). That allows the melody to stand out more.
The only tricky part here is in bar 17. I like the harmony on “At my show” so I’ve included that with the lower note picked by the thumb and the higher note by the index finger.
Pre-Chorus, Chorus and Outro: All very simple strumming on standard chords.
Solo: Similar to the intro but with a little melody on the g-string. So try to emphasise that as much as you can.
Break: Starts of with strumming then switches to fingerpicking which builds into the outro. The picking isn’t complicated but it is fast. If you’re only it for the strumming, you can skip this bit entirely and just play the first four bars of the break.
I can’t say Hozier’s massive hit Take Me to Church fits nicely on the uke. But it is well worth learning if you’re up for a challenge.
Verse: No mucking around with an intro. The verse starts in 3/4 time and switches to 4/4 at the end. If you know the song, it shouldn’t trip you up.
Pre-Chorus: Back to 3/4 for the “Amen” section. And again switching to 4/4 at the end.
This is the most sparse section of the song. Creating contrast with the chorus.
Chorus: Staying in 4/4 for the most challenging section of the song played high up the neck. Reaching the 14th fret for the falsetto on “death”.
Bridge: Some movement up and down the neck in this section, but it’s still easier than the chorus. And it stays in 4/4 time but with a cheeky bar of 2/4 that threw me off when I was first learning the song.
Intro: Starting off with an incongruous country lick. Then moving into a descending line played on the g- and C-strings with the thumb. Set against static notes on the E- and A-strings (plucked by the index and middle fingers respectively).
It fits nicely on the uke and sounds more intricate than it actually is.
Verse: Carrying on the descending line but now played with one finger per string picking.
Pre-Chorus: Building up the tension with a strum each time there’s a chord change.
Chorus: Bringing in more strums, slides and ventures up the neck. Stepping things up in terms of intensity and difficulty.
Break: This little acoustic break is my favourite part to play. It’s a challenge to play at speed but it suits the ukulele very well.
Solo: The big electric solo is less suited to the uke but still fun to play. I haven’t been particularly faithful to the original, so feel free to adjust it to your own taste.
Coda: The coda is just like the end of the chorus, but there are an extra couple of beats on the F chord that add a little suspense.
