When I mentioned Soko in my best of 2007 posts, I had no idea she was a ukulelist. Not long after that post, I Will Never Love You More cropped up on her MySpace. I decided right then I’d have to put up the chords, but it wasn’t until I saw the above video at La vidéo ukulélé du jour that I got my arse into gear.

The chords are very simple: just C and G in the verse with F and G7 for the other sections. It’s a bit trickier to recreate her strumming pattern. First she plucks the G string with her thumb, then strums up, down, up with her index finger.

The Bobby McGee’s – No Friends (mp3) via MySpace.

The Bobby McGee’s are Great Britain’s premier ukulele group (and don’t the name of any orchestra suggest otherwise). Their music has been described as, “domestic violence with ukuleles,” and, “Dostoyevsky doing Lonnie Donegan.” I interrogated Jimmy (who, along with Eleanor,is the band’s singer/songwriter/ukulelist section) to find out more.

How did the Bobby McGees come into being?

The Bobby McGee’s came into being after I met El’ at a Libertines concert in Leicester. I was sad after watching my best friend marry an idiot and needed to do something to help make the world a beautiful place again…we formed the band that night, booked 3 gigs then decided we better write some songs…the name came from Bobby Gillespie & Alan McGee (who told me to “F@@K OFF!” after calling him on his drug habits…and then asking for a record deal….the emails are hilarious!)…and of course, the Kris Kristoferson song that my gran used to sing to us from the back of the car on long holiday drives…I think she would have hated our music, but it would have made my grandad smile!

What made you choose the ukulele?

Eleanor saw the band Herman Dune playing “funny guitars” and I bought her one for Valentines day… We both fell in love with them.
First chords I found were for “Anarchy In The UK” and “King Of The Swingers” and I knew that this was what I had been waiting 33 years to discover!

I have a MAHALO concert uke…I love it…I have a SHADOW pickup fitted in it which is great and AQUILA strings really do make a big difference….Eleanor plays what I believe is an old Slingerback banjo uke (looks just like one, but no makers marks on it!)…I had a lovely little old GRETSCH uke that I bought real cheap on ebay and repaired…but I ruined it when I slapped El’ on the ass with it during a recording session….I’d love a nice uke, but I’m determined to wait until someone offers to make one for me…so I’ll probably be playing MAHALO for the next 20 years!

Which ukulele players do you particularly admire?

Duke Marmapants (and his Hot Potato Synchopators) Have you seen this video?

Malcolm is a legend…a wonderfully honest guy and a great musician…he taught me everything I know…he has a great way of teaching, he just drops things into a conversation that spark my interest…”This is a diminished chord”…”This is a triplet”….then vanishes for six months while I work out my own way to play it!

We ran an fantastic open mic’ here in Brighton for 18 months THE UKULELE RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT SOCIETY (T.U.R.D.S. if you must!)…we gave prizes to all performers and had comment books for punters to scribble their thoughts in…imagine my joy one night last year when I discovered Malcolm had written “Wow…Jimmy has finally learned how to play his uke!”….TURDS will be back in July as soon as Eleanor has finished her finals…watch this space!

I also hugely admire George Formby (Malcolm will cuff my ears!)…I love the solos he plays…they are great, I’m just begining to work out what he’s doing…one day i will work out HOW he does it….I think he’s very underrated as a musician, but that often is the case for people who write “comical” songs ;-) There’s something very English about his playing that (even as a Scotsman!) I love…and anyway, just look at all the people he made happy, isn’t that the whole point?

Are the Bobby McGees characters or is that you?

That’s a secret!

The gig last month where I spat in the guys face and threatened to punch him for walking out, that was character….

Is it true you taught Emiliana Torrini to play the ukulele? That sounds like fun.

She asked me to…but we were both really busy and never seemed to be in the same town at the same time….I didn’t recognise her at first, I was at a gig watching a friends band and when she came and spoke to me I asked her to shut up till the gig was over….”do you know who that was?” everyone asked me, but to be honest, i think she wanted me for my beard more than my uke….I still have her number.

Is it possible to buy your stuff on anything but vinyl?

Yes….write to us and ask…. I think you can also get them on itunes or something like that, check on our “ubercool” wee record label CHERRYADE:

I have two solo albums: “68 Love Songs (and a poem about shagging)”….and “Love Song 101″….that’s 170 songs all together (but if I’m honest, only 165 of them are any good)…I am desperate for someone to release those on vinyl, if anyone wants a “sampler” write and I’ll send them one….I love listening back to them and hearing all the wee improvements in my playing or thinking “How did I do that?” as I try to remember what chords I was playing!

Radio One have promised to play all the songs from the first album…but I think it would get them closed down!

Eleanor also has 14 new songs to record after her finals, most of which I haven’t heard…her music is beautiful, her uke playing is everything that mine isn’t, but she can play any instrument (well, anything but flute and clarinet!)…she’s getting really into Klezmer rhythms and chords so it will be real interesting to hear her new stuff.

We get to play with Kimya Dawson at Ladyfest in London next month…We’ve followed her for years and played with her 4 or 5 times, but I think post JUNO, things will be different!

A big thanks to Jimmy for answering my questions. You can visit The Bobby McGee’s MySpace (you can always judge a band by their MySpace friends, theirs include Uke Hunt favourites MJ Hibbett, Kimya Dawson and The King Blues and personal favourites of mine The Duloks and Spinmaster Plantpot) and buy their EP S’Amuser Com Des Fous on vinyl at Cherryade Records and the mp3s on iTunes.

This song has been a theme tune twice over. It was used in the soundtrack to A Clockwork Orange and, more recently, featured in a Marks and Spencer’s ad. The ad features some of the world’s most beautiful women and Myleene Klass (Heather: I’m doing it just to wind you up now) doing what supermodels do: watering plants in unusual positions, playing golf in their undies and ensuring the smooth passage of sea-going vessels.

If there’s not enough uke in this version for you, the song was covered to great advantage by Shorty Long (the ukulele heroes rather than the R&B guy).

The chorder is a classic retro-20s/30s chord progression. It’s definitely worth setting the sound of this one to memory. You’ll hear the turnaround section (“I’ll polish his lamp…”) all over the place.

Three performances from the Ukulele Caravan Tour (Alan Drogin, Craig Robertson and John Kavanagh) along with plenty more.

Alan Drogin – Classical Ukulele Read the rest of this entry »

Some very nice ukes on eBay at the moment. The first one I was tempted not to mention so I could try to snaffle it myself. It’s what appears to be a Dias ukulele. I’d love to have one of these things. They’re the perfect ukulele shape.

The price tag is crazy, but this 1920s National steel resonator ukulele would be welcome in my collection. I’m sure I could adjust that monogrammed bridge cover to read AW. A more modern and more affordable (but still pricey) National Reso-Phonic style 3 is also up for sale.

No bids so far on this very sweet Gibson UKE-1. Scratched it maybe, but it’s cute. And I can’t be doing with the Gibsons that have that horrible scrawl on them.

This Zemaitis ZUK3 describes itself as being, “George Harrison style.” I know he had a Zemaitis guitar or three in his collection, but I’m not aware of a Zemaitis uke. It’s certainly not the first thing I think of when I see a Zemaitis (that would be, “I couldn’t be seen with a ukulele that looks like that.”)

MGM has got a tenor KoAloha Sceptre up for sale.

Ukulele Muxtape.

eMusic has a Friday afternoon time waster quiz. Apparently, I’m a Mix-Tape Master (123/180). And I’m still cursing myself about a couple I got wrong.

The Ukulele Project draws our attention to ‘Little Bill’ Cosby’s ukulele.

Almost certainly the coolest cushions you will ever see.

Pssst. You didn’t hear about this secret page of Jacob Borshard mp3s from me.

Yet more naked ukulele art from Amy Crehore and MiniKim.

March was quite a month for albums with unexpected ukulele tracks. As well as Portishead’s Deep Water and Van Morrison’s Keep It Simple, there was Panic at the Disco’s I Have Friends in Holy Spaces from the album Pretty. Odd. Needless to say, it’s a trend I heartily support.

I’ve lost track of whether I should be calling them Panic! at the Disco or Panic at the Disco (I’m sure one of my younger, hipper readers knows the score). They seemed to have dropped the ! recently, which is a shame. I like bands with punctuation. !!! in particular.

Like Deep Water, PATD go with a retro sound for the song. But the chord shapes aren’t as traditional as those in Deep Water. They jump up and down the fretboard in a much more guitar-like way. There are also a few little embellishments such as the F#7 – F#sus4 – F# move.

Requested by Brian, Mike and Gary.

There are two types of boys at school. Those that want to grow up to be footballers and those who want to be Rock Gods. I was firmly in the second group performing wailing guitar to a stadium full of adoring fans, but I ended up strumming my ukulele in my bedroom.

Guitar Gods it turns out – for all their Marshall stacks, packed stadiums and hordes of groupies – envy me playing my ukulele in my bedroom. So, I’ve put together a few videos of guitar superheroes forsaking their wailing Lescasters and Stratopauls for the joys of the humble ukulele.

There are, of course, many who got started with the ukulele: Jimi Hendrix, Dick Dale and that to your right is a picture of wee Eric Clapton with his ukulele. But, there are also those who continue with their uke or come to it later in life. Read the rest of this entry »

Anyone who’s been following the blog for a while will know I’m a big fan of Brian Hefferan‘s playing and this tune is certainly no exception.

Unlike a lot of Brian’s ukulele pieces, this is a strummed song – which makes it much easier to play. There are a ton of interesting chord shapes in the tune. The trickiest part for me was working out what the chords were best referred to as (Brian steered me right on a number of them).

The trickiest part of The Mama Bear Bounce, particularly if you’ve never tried it before, is the string bending section. It’s not a technique you come across often on the ukulele – the nylon strings and short scale length are suited to it – but Brian uses it very effectively to add an extra moan to the chords. You play these by holding down the chord shape, grabbing the note that is to be bent, strumming the chord, then pushing the C-string up towards your head. This sharpens the note. Ideally, you should bend the string so it’s one fret higher than played. For example, when you’re holding down the C7 chord, the note bent on the C-string at the third fret should have the same pitch as the open E-string.

This tune is huge fun to play. It’s now one of those tunes I play whenever I pick up the uke ‘just for a quick strum’ before I do whatever I’m supposed to be doing.

Visit heftone.com.

I love Google. It’s about the most fantastically useful product there is and it’s free. And it sends me more people than anyone else. AND it keeps coming up with little gadgets that I can’t help but test out. The latest one I’ve taken advantage of is Google Custom Search to create this:

Google Ukulele Tab and Chord Search

You type in the band or song you want to play on the uke and it searches the trusted ukulele sites for tabs and chords for that song. I haven’t decided whether it’s useful or not. But, it’s there if you want to test it out.

Other Interesting Google Stuff

Google Books has free previews of a number of books. Most exciting is Jim Beloff’s The Ukulele: A Visual History.

Google Patents has plenty of weird and wonderful ukulele inventions such as Maccaferri’s button press chord doohicky and a ukulele on one side/mandolin on the other mashup.

Google Sets is a strange one. You type in a few words and it spits out more words in the same group. I tested it out out with “tenor, soprano, concert” and it came up with the right answer.

Google Experimental Search lets you search ukulele history by date or find places of ukulele interest wherever you are.

It might be possible to use these for non-uke related purposes. Although I’m fairly sure that’s the original intention behind them.