Justin Bieber – Sorry
Wet Leg – Wet Dream
Fat Joe and Remy Ma – All the Way Up
Harvey Danger – Flagpole Sitta (aka Peep Show theme)
100 gecs – Hollywood Baby
Culture Club – Karma Chameleon (Tab)
In keeping with the theme of the song, Culture Club’s Karma Chameleon is a mish-mash. Including some country harmonic, funky bass, cheesy 80s keyboards and a catchy pop chorus.
Intro: A bit of everything here: the guitar riff, muted strums for the drums and a bit of harmonica.
Verse and Pre-Chorus: A fair bit of sliding up and down here but nothing too challenging.
Chorus: This is where it gets tricky. The melody notes here are very fast. You’ll need to use alternate picking to get them up to speed.
Bridge: I forgot this section existed before I relistened to the song!
Solo: A brief solo that I cobbled together based mostly on the chords.
Links
Tracklist
Aline Kelly – Consolação
Max & Veronica – If You Want the Rainbow
The Mood Swings – He's A Tramp
Chipped Nail Polish – Rut
The Bookshop Band – All My Wild Mothers
emily the band – all the good girls go to hell
CocoCapitainePoulet – Sentier
BoyWithUke – Rockstar
Jon’s Ukulele – Off to California
Billy Bragg/Kirsty MacColl – A New England (Tab)
A New England was originally by Billy Bragg and made more famous by by Kirsty MacColl. This arrangement starts with a riff inspired by Johnny Marr’s intro on Kirsty MacColl’s version. After that, it’s closer to the Billy Bragg version.
I’ve reduced the tempo for my recording. There are a lot of fast notes in it. With the most challenging run being bars 59-60. If you can play that at the tempo of the MacColl version, you’re a way better player than me.
Links
Why Don’t You Do Right? (Tab)
Why Don’t You Do Right? has a colourful history. The tune started out as Weed Smoker’s Dream in 1936. It was adapted and released in 1941 by Lil Green (with guitar by Big Bill Broonzy). The most famous version was the Peggy Lee’s uptempo take. At least it was until Jessica Rabbit’s sultry version in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
Tempo-wise, this version is most similar to the Lil Green version. But I took inspiration from all three versions.
There are a heap of places in the song for little licks, and I’ve included a solo as well. As always, I recommend using the tab as inspiration for your own ideas rather than slavishly following each lick.
When soloing, I mostly thought in terms of the D blues scale (D – F – G – Ab – A – C – D). In addition to that, I threw in a few notes that crop up in the chords: Db and Bb. And a couple of chromatic runs (in bars 31-32 and the blues turnaround in bars 35-36).
Links
I spend most of my time here posting angry, cynical songs. But I do occassionally deal with matters of the heart. So for Valentine’s Day, here’s a rundown of some of some of my favourite love song tabs. And for those of you celebrating St Skeletor’s Day on the 15th, there are some songs of rejection, scorn and infidelity for you to play between pushing couples holding hands into a puddles.
Valentine’s Day
The Beach Boys – God Only Knows
Definitely the best love song ever written and a strong contender for greatest song of all time.
Tom Waits – Johnsburg, Illinois
Written by Tom Waits for his wife Kathleen Brennan who did grow up in Johnsburg, Illinois. Such a simple and beautiful song.
The Temptations – My Girl
I’m not usually a fan of songs that are this sweet but this has an irresistible melody. And David Ruffin’s voice is buttery.
Mama Cass – Dream a Little Dream of Me
You can’t have love without at least a tinge of sadness.
Dolly Parton – I Will Always Love You
If you asked 100 people to name a love song, I guarantee this would be top answer.
The Zombies – This Will Be Our Year
I listen to this one every year. And it never is our year but there’s always hope.
St Skeletor’s Day
R.E.M. – Losing My Religion
Losing My Religion cropped up my favourite movie of last year, Aftersun, in an excruciating karaoke scene. Pro tip: when selecting a karaoke song, don’t go for one with an outro that’s just one note over and over at a crawling tempo.
alt-J – Fitzpleasure
This has to be the nastiest song I’ve ever covered. I can’t believed they played this on the radio.
Nirvana – Heart-Shaped Box
You could make an argument for this being a twisted Valentine song. But I think its violent images of obsessive love make it a good one for St Skeletor’s Day.
Hank Williams – I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry
A good contender for the most pathetic song of all time.
Lizzo – Truth Hurts
Lizzo is leaning a bit too far into the positivity stuff these days for my taste. I prefer her songs that have a bit more “fuck you” mixed in with the self empowerment.
BLACKPINK – Kill This Love
Putting these lists together, it was very clear that the Valentine’s songs were mostly older and the Skeletor songs were much more recent.
Simon & Garfunkel – The Sound of Silence (Tab)
A tab for The Sound of Silence by the duo with a guy who was never heard of again and Garfunkel from the world famous ukulele duo Garfunkel and Oates.
Because the song is just a verse repeated, I’ve arranged it slightly differently each time. First time is just a straight ahead melody and chords. Second time introduces harmony to the melody line. And third time is the harmonised melody with a bit of strumming.
There are a couple of bars of 6/4 in each verse that might trip you up. I found the one in bar 9 quite natural to play. But the one in bar 13 tripped me up much more.
Links
Weezer – Buddy Holly (Solo)
The Specials – Ghost Town
The Smile – The Smoke
Eiffel 65 – Blue
Kool and the Gang – Jungle Boogie
Armani White – Billie Eilish
Lipps Inc – Funkytown
Nirvana – Heart-Shaped Box (Tab)
Nirvana’s ever-present quiet-loud-quit-loud dynamics are in full effect on Heart-Shaped Box. So using fingerpicking for the quiet bits and strumming for the loud bits is a must in this arrangement.
All the picking is one-finger-per-string style. That means you’re picking consecutive notes on g- and C-strings (e.g. in bar 5). I’d usually avoid that as it’s less natural than using thumb then index finger. But it works out much better for the rest of the verse.
There are a whole bunch of bends in the song. The trickiest of them are in the chorus where you’re playing chords on the 2nd/3rd fret then bending at the 9th fret. You’re also bending whilst fretting the C-string for an extra challenge.
On the upside, the bends sound better if they’re a little out of tune so you don’t have to worry too much about that.
Links
Tracklist
Kamakakehau Fernandez – Koali
Mig Martins – A Voz Do Morro
The Bygones – Honey Pie
Natasha Ghosh – Eye Of The Tiger
Jackie Mendoza – Pedacitos
Sinner Friends – Sweet Mama, Hurry Home
Peter Madcat Ruth – 500 Miles
George Elmes – Nile Rodgers Medley
Junichi Moriyama and Swingy Sakano – Days of Wine and Roses
