Devine, Spalted Mango: Ukulele Window Shopping

Nice bit of floral soundhole work on this Divine ukulele. And the listing refers to both Eddie Vedder and Mike McCready of Pearl Jam playing Divine ukuleles. I wasn’t aware that McCready was a uker. If anyone knows of any video or photo of him ukeing – I’d love to know.

Spalted mango seems to be the crazy grain of choice for ukes at the moment with Lanikai’s SM range. Seems a bit hit and miss to me. Sometimes looks great, sometimes looks a complete mess.

Gorgeous taropatch, horrible listing. Pick a colour (I hear black has worked pretty well for the last few hundred years) and stick with it.

Also some layout and font issues on this listing. But it’s worth the effort because the story of the Duncan Sisters is fascinating (quick tip: after, “performers can only dream of” read the press cutting).

I’m not a fan of picks on ukes but picks this sexy could defintely change my mind.

Ukulele kitsch of the week: Orca whale, ukulele playing, ship’s captain.

Either I’m hopelessly naive or the person who listed this photo has an over-active imagination because I can’t work out why a girl playing a ukulele on her own would be of particular interest to lesbians.

Eddie Vedder/Pearl Jam – Can’t Keep

Eddie Vedder – Can’t Keep (Tab)(PDF)

Can’t Keep is my favourite of Eddie Vedder’s ukulele songs. It’s quite unusual for a ukulele song and sounds far better and more aggressive than the full band, album version.

For this song he’s at least in tune with himself, if not the rest of the world (perhaps some clever metaphor). But if you want to play along with the video, you’ll have to tune down very slightly.

The riff of the song works very well on the uke. It starts out like this:

And shifts a little for the verse to this:

The strumming for these sections is just up, down (a lot). He switches it up a bit for the ‘I won’t live forever…’ bit. Down, down, up, up, down should get you through that.

Eddie Vedder – Goodbye

Eddie Vedder – Goodbye (Chords)(PDF)

Having done one of Vedder’s mandolin songs, it’s about time I had a go at one of his uke songs, Goodbye from the soundtrack to A Brokedown Melody (pleasingly from Woodshed Films).

The tuning is a bit of a nightmare. Vedder has his uke tuned down about three quarters of a step. If you want to play along with the original, you’ll have to tune your uke to the song itself. The chord names are written up in their standard tuning names to avoid confusion (hopefully).

It has to be said, the playing is a little shoddy in places. But there are some interesting chord moves in the song, particularly how he plays around with the Bb chord. And where did that B9 chord come from?

Requested by Patrick

Neil Armstrong, ukebucket and other Ukulinklinks

Herald Tribune interviews the guy who took the infamous picture of Neil Armstrong strumming his ukulele on return from the moon.

ukebucket have just released two albums: one of originals, Bad Ukulele, and one of covers, Covered. You can download the covers album for free here. And buy the originals album, and I can tell you it’s worth it, here (although if you’re stuck in the 1920s and want a rotating disc, you’ll have to wait a while).

The LA Times comes out in defence of ukuleles.

17 Dots (the blog of eMusic) has a series on the ukulele.

Todd the Ukulele Evangalist sings of life as a Ukaholic (MP3 link).

Tab for the X Files theme on Des Cordes er Dubois.

The Curtis Covers Project is a kind of karaoke request blog. People suggest a song for him to cover and he posts his version – often played on ukulele. My personal favourite is Jet’s Are You Gonna Be My Girl.

Blogotheque’s Take Home Shows is an idea too good not to steal. The latest imitator, Shoot the Player, has some fine ukulele videos from Via Tania here and here. But my favourite is Laura Jean’s So Happy It Hurts.

Eddie Vedder discusses the uke’s size to melody ratio.

Fawlty Towers and Dream a Little Dream on Uker Tabs.

How much should you pay a menstruating ukulele player?

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

Take Me Out to the Ball Game (Chords)

Boo to you, Major League Baseball. BOOOO!!!

Baby Ruth held a contest to celebrate the 100th birthday of Take Me Out to the Ball Game. Entrants sent in their rendition of the song and the winner was decided by public vote. Obviously, the winner was a ukulelist, Adam Wilber. The prize was to sing at the MLB All Star Game. But, Gary pointed out that the ukulele was banned and he had to sing along with a belching organ. Shame on you MLB. Give the public what it wants: ukes by the barrel-load.

I suggest your protest by grabbing these chords and playing it outside the offices of the MLB in protest. If it helps you to get as drunk as Eddie Vedder when you do it, I have no objections.

Buke, UKEit and Ukulele Hero T-Shirts

The baritone ukulele site Buke has been shut down. It did have a note saying it was for copyright reasons (which makes me nervous). I tried to email Roger to find out more, but his email wasn’t working. It’s a real shame to see it go. Anyone know any more?

With the recent UKEit festival, it’s clear good things are happening with the ukulele in Italy. You can pick up a CD of Italian ukulele acts. And there’s an Italian blog with uke chords here including Pink Martini and Hank Williams (don’t scroll too far down if you want to keep things entirely work safe).

A batch of Bluegrass ukulele tabs on Uker Tabs from Ken Middleton.

Treat yourself to a Ukulele Hero T-Shirt (or a Kazoo Hero T-Shirt if that’s more your speed).
UPDATE: Thanks to Jan for pointing out you can get a 25% discount if you sign up on this page (plenty more ‘Hero’ style tees on there too).

Nellie McKay plays her ukulele for TED (Thanks to Paul, Garatth and Catherine from SUJ).

Friend of Uke Hunt, Heather will be hosting a ukulele special on her show on CJSR tonight at 6 p.m., MST. You can listen live here or listen again here (find Q Transmissions).

Hoosierhiver tells you why your ukulele won’t stay in tune.

Mirah’s new album, The Old Days Feeling, is more than a little bit brilliant. There are three uke tracks (Dreamboat, Take Me Out Riding and Birthday Present) and you can download Lone Star free on Amazon.

Map of Bosko and Honey’s Ukulele Safari.

Mike McCready (of Pearl Jam) has a page of ukulele tabs on his site including Soon Forget and The Who’s Blue, Red, Grey. (Thanks to Daniel)

Cool Hand Uke’s iPhone ringtones.

MP3s: New track, Megaman 9, from Tanguy Ukulele Orchestra, Allo, Darlin on Indietracks, Herohill has Jon and Roy’s High on a Hill.

This might be the reason God made sure there was plenty of distance between Hawaii and Australia.

Eddie Vedder – Rise

Eddie Vedder – Rise (Complicated Chords)

Eddie Vedder – Rise (Basic Chords)

I was all ready to write up Pearl Jam’s ukulele song Soon Forget, until I started getting harassed for Rise from the soundtrack of Into the Wild. And why not? It’s a magnificent song.

Rise is played on the mandolin. The mandolin is tuned in fifths (GDAE) which makes it quite tricky to transfer to the uke, so I’ve done two versions of the chords. One of them is just the very basic chords (G, C and D).

In the other I’ve done my best to recreate what he’s playing on the mandolin and make it a bit more uke friendly. The basic chords remain the same but there are notes added on to give it extra flavour (and also to match the melody in parts).

The best thing to do is take a look at both versions and come up with your own favourite way to play it. I think using the Cadd9 is pretty much essential (and easy) and the C C-5 C5 C6 rising bit sounds great.

Uke Gal Carol has done an excellent version of Rise which you can listen to here.

Requested by Andrew, Rilrod and Whitney

Rock Gods Playing the Ukulele

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 more]