Led Zeppelin – Kashmir (Riff Tab)

MP3

I don’t know why this is only the third time I’ve featured the Mighty Zeppelin (Whole Lotta Love, Stairway to Heaven) they’re quite clearly the greatest band in history. Perhaps because all their songs are heroically unsuited to the ukulele. This one certainly is. It took a fair bit of fudging and key changing, but I think this version just about works.

I’m using a pick in the MP3 but that’s just because I recorded this right after Master of Puppets and forgot to put it down.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Requested by Jennifer.

Devo/L’Uke & GUGUG – Girl U Want (Riff Tab)

I smiled quite a lot as well.

This tab is taken from GUGUG and L’Uke’s excellent version of the tune. I’ve tabbed up Gus’s part. Daniel’s playing the same thing but in the rather unusual E tuning (bEG#C#). Finn is playing the chord with an E under the riff.

And, of couse, I couldn’t resist working out the solo as well.

Those chords are also the ones in the, “Look at you with your mouth…” section. So that’s pretty much the whole song.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Richie Valens/Los Lobos – La Bamba (Riff Tab)

MP3

Old-school riffery from Richie Valens. But the song is probably best known for Los Lobos’s cover version. The highlight of that version being the outro. Here’s the start of it in the same, uke-friendly, key as I used for the riff.

La Bamba Outro

If you want to play it in the original key, move everything up 7 frets – something like this. It’s much more difficult but still playable.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Rage Against the Machine – Freedom (Riff Tab)

MP3

Yep, more Tom Morello. After the whole rap/metal crossover started so promisingly – the Judgement Night soundtrack, Body Count, Rage – it’s a real shame it ended up with Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park.

UPDATE: Bugger, that 8 on the G string in bar 4 should be a 6 on the A string. I’ll try to get it fixed later.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Metallica – Master of Puppets (Riff Tab)

MP3

I surprised I haven’t been knocked up side the head for not featuring this one yet. What was I thinking doing Enter Sandman before this? It’s easily one of the best riffs of all time. I believe the correct word is ‘immense’. And the bigger a riff is the more fun it is to play it on the ukulele.

If you’ve listened to the MP3 already, you might have noticed that I’ve used a pick for this one (blasphemy). The notes come to fast to play it any other way. And you need to do a fair bit of palm muting (i.e. rest the underside of your picking hand lightly on the strings just in front of the bridge to dampen the strings).

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Audioslave – Cochise (Riff Tab)

MP3

I might have mentioned it before but it bears repeating, Tom Morello is an incredible guitar player. Or electric-guitarist at least. I can’t get into the Watchman stuff. He makes me want to buy a bunch of effects pedals and mess around with them.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Coldplay – Clocks (Riff Tab)

MP3

I was intending this to be part of the Piano Riffs for Ukulele series, but somehow it got missed.

This one is pretty straight forward. Picking: middle finger A-string, index finger E-string, thumb C-string.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Chic – Good Times/Rapper’s Delight (Riff Tab)

MP3

“Hey, they took my riff, made it a whole lot better and introduced it to a new generation. Sue them!”

The picking on this one is quite tricky. I’m playing the first half of it bass-style – alternate picking with index and middle fingers. But switching to using thumb and middle finger for the second half. Also, keep the notes in bars one and three short by muting the strings with your fretting hand shortly after you’ve played them.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Jay-Z – Death of Auto-Tune (Riff Tab)

MP3

When Ben Lee’s in trouble he asks himself, “What Would Jay-Z Do?” After seeing how he handled Glastonbury, it’s certainly sage advice. But I prefer Jomes’s suggestion that we ask ‘What would Ken Middleton do?

D.O.A. samples Janko Nilovic & Dave Sucky’s In the Space but this riff isn’t so much a sample as a complete reconstruction. A quick noodle at the beginning of the song is cut up and stapled together to create one of the best riffs around.

When Jay-Z wrote this song he obviously hadn’t heard Carl Sagan’s A Glorious Dawn.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

Red Hot Chili Peppers – Suck My Kiss (Riff Tab)

MP3

Time for another series of Guitar Riffs for Ukulele. Or riffs for ukulele at least – I’m planning to include a bit of bass and piano. The idea with these isn’t to recreate the entire song but to throw in an unexpected snippet for the sake of entertainment (and to get a, “are you playing AC/DC on the ukulele? type reaction). They’re not complete songs and they’re not necessarily in the same key as the original (so hold the, “wrong key dude EPIC FAIL lolz” comments please).

First off is the Red Hot Chili Peppers; who I really should have featured a long time ago. With its syncopated rhythm and the sliding around, this riff is a whole lot trickier than it looks. If you’re dealing with a paucity of frets, you could play it this way and get away with it.

Part of the Guitar Riffs for Ukulele series.

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