Mirah (or ‘Yom Tov’ to her mum) was the first act that I ever got into solely because of the internet after I heard the epic Cold, Cold Water on SixEyes (it’s still available that post if you want to download it – and you do).

Million Miles is markedly less epic, but it does feature a ukulele.

The riff slides around a great deal which makes it tricky to play. All the notes are played with the first finger barred across all the strings. You have to use just the right amount of pressure so your finger is loose enough to slide smoothly but tight enough so you can hear the note.

It’s also a challenge to get the timing right. For example, the slide between bars two and three. You have to hit the fifth fret right on the first beat of the bar – and also play G string at the same time.

If all that’s a little too advanced for you, the chords she plays in the strummed section fit over the whole song.

Requested by Julie

Buy You Think It’s Like This But Really It’s Like This

When Spencer requested this song I thought it was the most ridiculous, inappropriate song to try to play on the ukulele – which is why I had to have a go at working it out (and it gave me an excuse to watch the ‘groovy dancing girl’ video over and over).

The intro is the trickiest part. It’s a quick change between the Bb and the C, so I suggest you use the Bb chord shape and slide it between the two. Then the main chord progression kicks in. Although the chords and lyrics remain pretty much the same throughout the song, they get squeezed as the song goes along so that the words and chords move against each other. It’s quite a nifty trick and suits the theme of the song.

The final part of the song is the only part that is hard to make work on the uke – it’s just bass and vocoder. The chords I’ve put in are at least half invention. So feel free to change them.

If you want to play along with the original you’ll have to tune down a fret to B.

Download Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger on Amazon

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain

Life on Mars
Wuthering Heights
The Good, the Bad & the Ugly
Smells Like Teen Spirit
Satellite of Love
Should I Stay or Should I Go

The Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra

Hey Ya
Take On Me

In Other News…

Those of you highly attuned to this sort of thing will have noticed that Uke Hunt has a new look. If you’re reading by email or on a reader come over and have a look.

There has also been some very scary behind the scenes jiggery-pokery. So if you find something not working as it should, I’d be grateful if you let me know in the comments or by email.

In case you missed Monday’s post, this week I launched a new website, How To Play Ukulele. The site is a companion for Uke Hunt and will have the in depth ukulele knowhow. I’ve written two ebooks so far, How To Play Ukulele Chord Progressions and How To Play Ragtime Ukulele, and you can sign up to the mailing list for discounts and a free six-part introductory course to fingerpicking ukulele.

I’ve been a busy little bunny this week. I’ve also set up the page best.musicalinstrument.ever.com. The Ever Project lets you grab a best/worst/strangest/ugliest etc. name and sets up a page about it. I had to grab best.musicalinstrument.ever.com for the uke. Head over there and rate the page, leave a comment or add a link (to your own site if you want) because they threaten to take away the name if it isn’t developed. If that happened, it might end up in the hands of a banjo player. I sure you don’t want that on your conscience.

Le Soir‘s Ukulele Sessions keep coming. Recent performances include Herman Dune and I’m From Barcelona. This might be your last chance to watch Jeremy Warmsley’s session (which is my favourite thing on all of the internets right now) before it tumbles off the bottom of the page.

Earlier this week, Christina reminded me that I hadn’t mentioned Tom Hodgkinson’s How To Be Free on the blog yet – a terrible oversight. As well as featuring a uke on the cover (in the UK), he states that the ukulele is the cure for boredom and, therefore, the cure for spending your money on useless tat. It’s an inspiring book. It made me even more unemployable than I was before reading it. Although he’s lost it recently and started saying that real life is better than the internet. You’re far freer on the net than you are in real life.

Here’s one guy who knows how to use the uke as a force for good.

I regard myself as a complete novice when it comes to Hawaiian music, so when IanB suggested I did a series of posts on Hawaiian tunes I was a bit reticent. But reading Nerd’s Eye View‘s trip to Hawaii (and particularly her visit to the Ukulele Gallery) has put me in the island mood. So, I had a go at tabbing out Papalina Lahilahi.

The arrangement is just a simple melody with the accompanying chords. If you want to work up a solo version, it’s easy to do. Hawaiian melodies are usually very strongly based on the chords. You can create an arrangement by holding down the chord shapes and strumming the chords while there are no melody notes. Here’s my attempt at it.

Download mp3

According to this article in the New York Times, “In Hawaiian songs, lovemaking is referred to poetically by mentioning mist, spray, rain.” Which makes the line in this song, “Your dainty cheeks/Always damp from sea spray,” sound decidedly icky.

There are some videos that crop up on the internet that really need saving. Videos on YouTube all to often disappear without warning (Roy Smeck and Jack Pepper have suffered this fate). Your net access might be limited. You might want to take the videos on your travels. Some of the shows on Midnight Ukulele Disco are worth watching over and over without the slow download. Luckily, it’s possible to save these videos to your computer so they’re available whenever you want them.

There are a number of websites that will let you download videos from YouTube and many other video sharing sites such as KeepVid and VideoDL. All you do is plug in the url of the video page.

Downloading MUD videos is a little trickier. Find the video you want to download. Here you can select Flash or Quicktime video – Quicktime is larger, better quality and will work on iTunes.

Then, in your browser, click View => Page Source (in Firefox) or View => Source (in IE).

This brings up a page full of coding (or gobbledygook as normal people would call it). Do a search on this page (click Ctrl and F) for ‘.flv’ (if you’re on the Flash video page) or for ‘.m4v’ (Quicktime).

You should find something like this:

or:

http://ukuleledisco.com/disco/MUD_lightsagain.m4v.

Select that url and copy and paste it into your download manager (or just into your browser if you’re using Firefox).

You can do a similar thing to download Aldrine Guerrero‘s Ukulele Lessons on Iamhawaii. But this time there is only the Flash video. So go to View => Page Source, search for ‘.flv’ and find a url like this:

http://s3.amazonaws.com/iamhawaii/ukulele/Uke8.flv.

Copy and paste that and you’re away.

This song is an all round mystery to me. The first time I heard it was on the SXSW session on The Line of Best Fit (it’s still available for download) but it was referred to as ‘Sunday Smile’. But it’s completely different from the ‘A Sunday Smile’ on Flying Club Cup. There are a couple of videos of it on YouTube where it’s listed as ‘Closing Song’.

The mystery doesn’t end there. I can’t work out what he’s singing most of the time. That means I haven’t be able to put together my usual chord chart. The fact that there are only live recordings also makes it a bit trickier to get the chords, but here’s my best guess.

This progression makes up the intro and carries on for the first half of the song.

Midway through he goes into a short vamp on the F and C7sus4 before switching to this progression:

He might be playing C7sus4 instead of Fsus2 or vice versa in that bit. It’s hard to make out under the brass. Try it out and decide which you think is best.

And if you see Zach Condon tell him to stop mumbling.

Requested by Sigi

More Beirut tab and chords on Uke Hunt

Buy Flying Club Cup

I’m pleased to let you know that Uke Hunt’s little sister site is now up and running.

How To Play Ukulele

Whereas Uke Hunt has the short, daily posts, How To Play Ukulele features the really in depth ukulele know-how that you can get your teeth into.

I’ve written two ebooks (in pdf form with mp3s and midi files) that now available to buy:

How To Play Ukulele Chord Progressions – This book spills the beans on all the tricks of writing chord progressions. The first part of the book deals with building families of chords which sound good together and how to fit them together to give them momentum. This section is geared towards relative beginners (people who know the basic chords).

The second part shows you more advanced ideas – playing with different types of chords. It also, in my favourite section, tells you the chord tricks that The Beatles used to create their legendary songs (with the intention of ‘borrowing’ them for your own songs).

How To Play Ragtime Ukulele – Contains full tab for seven ragtime tunes including 12th Street Rag, Tiger Rag and Maple Leaf Rag. It also comes with a pdf file with a brief history of ragtime, all the elements you need to create your own ragtime tunes, and performance notes for each piece.

This book is aimed at intermediate players and more advanced players who have some experience with fingerpicking.

So click here and head over to the site. If you have any questions that aren’t answered there or you’re experiencing any teething problems, please send me an email.

Here’s the intro tab for Fire (including the short riff that crops up through the song):

Listening to this, I think I should have included it in my Top 10 Guitar Riffs. It boggles my mind that just four notes can be so effective. If you don’t fancy playing the riff as it’s tabbed above, you can also play it like this:

The chords are simple: D and C for the chorus. There’s also an A just before the guitar solo and it shifts up to E – D for a few bars near the end.

Hendrix tuned his guitar down one fret, so if you want to play along you’ll have to do the same with your uke.

Download Fire on Amazon

It’s the annual Catholic Burning Festival in the UK tomorrow (or Bonfire Night as we’re supposed to call it now- it’s political correctness gone mad)) and Winger wanted songs with ‘fire’ and ‘burn’ in them. The suggestion alone made me scared of what she might do if I didn’t comply, so here’s the first one.

This song by the Tiger Lillies is the song with the most ‘fire’s and ‘burn’s (running Arthur Brown’s Fire into close second) and it’s dead simple to play (just C, F and G7).

Download Start A Fire on Amazon

(Dear Mr Amazon, get your arse into gear and let people outside the US download mp3s too.)