Finishing off cartoon week with an exceptionally catchy tune that set the standard for yelling “woo hoo!”. And it’s particularly relevant to give it a ukeing now that the rejiggered series features Uke Hunt favourite Kate Micucci.
The song includes a subtle key change with the chorus being a whole step higher the second time around. To keep things easy to memorise, I’ve arranged it so it’s played exactly the same but two frets higher second time around.
While writing up Sweet Victory earlier this year, I decided I had to do a tab of this classic SpongeBob ukulele song.
I’ve kept the arrangement very simple. There are just three underlying chords: F, Bb and C. And I’m only using my thumb for picking. Although you could very easily use fingerpicking or a pick. Using those might help with the quick thumb work in bars 5 and 6.
Matt Berry is best known for his roles in The IT Crowd and Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace plus my favourite sketch of all time: Snuff Box‘s guitar instruction DVD. But he’s also a prolific musician releasing seven studio albums including an entire album of TV theme covers.
The theme tune to Toast of London is a shortened version of his 2011 tune Take My Hand.
I first tabbed up this tune 11 years ago (almost to the day) but never got around to doing a video of it. But having finally got around to watching the final season (I dropped out because season 8 was so awful) I finally got around to making one.
I made some minor changes so I’ve redone the tab.
While I was at it, I also felt the need to tab the Dunder Mifflin jingle from the Local Ad episode. I’ve tabbed the first version from the episode. Which was written by, BoJack Horseman composer and brother of BJ, Jesse Novak.
I don’t know what possessed the nabobs at the Thomas corporation to replace the fantastic original Thomas theme with a piece of detestable ear-dreck. The new one has nothing as tasty as that chord change from C to Ab, the chromatic runs and the syncopation.
I’m not being strict with the fingerpicking in this one. I’m mostly using thumb and two finger picking but switch to one finger per string picking where notes on the g- and C-strings are played together.
This song has quite a story behind it. When working on the MASH movie Robert Altman attempted to come up with, “the stupidest song ever written,” for the funeral scene. But failed to come up with something suitably idiotic. But told the movie’s composer Johnny Mandel, “All is not lost. I’ve got a 15-year-old kid who’s a total idiot.”
So his son poured his heart into a dark poem about how suicide is the answer to a life full of pain. To which his dad presumably chortled, slapped him on the back and said, “This trash is absolutely perfect, you tiny moron.”
But the joke is on Robert Altman. His son made far more money from the song than Altman did for directing the movie thanks to it being used in the TV show and being covered by acts as diverse as Bill Evans and the Manic Street Preachers.
I’ve kept my arrangement pretty straightforward. There are lots of familiar chord shapes and it’s one finger per string picking all the way through. The only tricky part is the big leaps up the neck in bar 18. Also, watch out for the bar of 2/4 on D7 chord in bar 13. That D7 chord lasts for a bar longer in the original version but it feels a bit over the top to me so I cut it short (as the Manics did in their version).
The picking starts out very simple. It’s sedately played and uses thumb and two finger picking. Things get a little more complicated for bars 15-22 where I switch to using one finger per string picking (with a quick return to in bars 27 and 28).
The picking gets much more involved in the second chorus. But the chords are the same so you can play them the same as the first chorus. Or mix and match to come up with your own version.
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With the song being four part harmony it makes sense to use all the strings for this one. So I’m mostly strumming the tune here. Just a few notes here and there picked out.
I also throw in a few triplet strums inspired by the banjoleling. For the triplets I’m doing: down with index, down with thumb, up with middle.
Mostly fingerpicking in this one with just one bit of strumming in bar 5. After the intro everything else is one finger per string picking.
Two songs bashed together here. The opening, Dr Zaius, song is mostly strumming and the second, Chimpan-A to Chimpanzee, is all fingerpicking apart from the triplet strums at the end. I’m using a different triplet strum here. I’m doing: down with middle, up with index, up with middle.
A double bill of classic British comedy themes today. Starting with the Fawlty Towers them by Dennis Wison. Not the Manson loving Beach Boy. The composer of music for many British sitcoms including Till Death Us Do Part and Rising Damp.
My arrangement has two parts: the lead part in standard tuning and a baritone part playing the backing. I’m having fun with this set up at the moment so don’t be too surprised if you see more of it.
The backing is mostly arpeggios with a couple of runs thrown in. Here’s a recording of just the backing if you want to play along. The metronome taps out a full bar for the intro and you start playing on the third beat of the second bar.
Dennis Wilson also wrote music for Steptoe But the theme tune, called Old Ned, was by Ron Grainer. Most famous for the Doctor Who theme. I was prompted to put together this short version by the recent death of the Simpson half of Galton and Simpson who created the show.
Steptoe, of course, was transferred across the Atlantic and became Sanford and Son. You can find the tab for that theme here.
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