The last few tabs have been at the trickier end of the scale. So for this one I’ve gone super-simple. The melody for this song is so great it benefits from having very minimal backing.
The whole arrangement is played with just the thumb on the picking hand. And most of the chord shapes used will be very familiar to you. The only time it ventures up the neck is the high variation on, “nothing compares,” right at the end. It’s a bit of stretch. So if you’re struggling you can stick with the way it’s played in previous bars. Or you can replace the 55 at the start of bar 32 with an open C-string.
As promised when I tabbed bury a friend, here’s a version of the slightly less creepy and more Bon Iver-y when the party’s over.
The song is mainly made up of vocal harmonies which means it works well with ukulele chords. There is a lot of space in the tune. So make sure you let it breathe and don’t take it too fast.
I first stumbled across Billie Eilish with her ukulele song party favor. I enjoyed it enough to stick it on my Ukulele 2017 Spotify playlist but wasn’t entirely blown away. Something must have happened since then because she’s released four outstandingly good songs in a row.
The song is split between melodic sections like the People are Strange-like intro and the “Debt I owe…” section and the more mood-based sections. To emphasise that I’m playing the melodic sections using fingerpicking and the moody sections with strums (including plenty of muting for strings that aren’t being played).
Happy Thanksgiving to all the Americans. And happy No-Americans-on-the-Internet Day to everyone else. Today I’m thankful for baritone ukuleles. They may be inferior to real ukuleles but sometimes they’re the best tool for the job. Such as for this latest tune from Lana Del Rey.
The picking pattern in the verse and chorus is based around Travis picking (i.e. thumb and two finger picking with the thumb alternating between the D and G strings). But because the G-string is needed for some of the melody notes there are a few exceptions. The trickiest is pair of notes on the G-string, 7th fret in bar 10. Here the first is plucked with the thumb and the second with the index finger.
I decided to write up this song after it cropped up in my post on augmented chords. And it quickly became obvious it would have to be a group arrangement. It’s impressively constructed. For most arrangements I can remove a few bits without losing too much. But all the parts here seem essential to the song.
Nothing too challenging in the vocal part (top left of the video). I’m using fingerpicking but you could easily use a pick for the same arrangement. And a pick would help this part stand out if you’re playing in a group.
This is the most challenging part (top right of the video) and uses both fingerpicking and strumming. You fingerpick in the quieter sections and switch to strumming in the loud bits. Tip: if all four strings are played at once it’s strummed, if it’s three or less it’s picked.
My favourite part to play (bottom left of the video). As well as the great lick in the intro, it gives you a chance to rock out on the big chords in bridge section. To fill out the sound, I’ve used different inversions of the chords.
This part (bottom right of the video) starts and ends harmonizing the opening guitar riff. Between that it’s based on the marimba part in the song. Playing the piano riff an octave higher in the bridge and partially following the vocals in the chorus. There’s a lot of empty space in this part. So if you’re playing as part of a group this part could join in with the chords in the bridge section.
For this arrangement I’ve threaded the melody together with fingerpicked, arpeggiated chords. With this style of playing it’s really easy for the melody notes to get lost amongst the backing notes. So it’s really important to more forcefully pluck the melody notes (indicated with arrowheads above them in this tab) so it doesn’t end up just sounding like picking practice.
I considered posting this song back when Amy Winehouse died but it seemed like exceptionally bad taste at the time. But it’s far too great a song to ignore for long and I’m not going to hold her questionable uke skills against her.
To keep the tab a manageable length I’ve notated straight repeats for the second verse. But there are a couple of differences between the verses. So I’ve added those at the end of the tab.
I’m using my thumb, index finger and middle finger for all the picking. But I’m am switching which strings those cover. As a general rule, if there’s no g-string in the bar my thumb is on C, index on E and middle on A. If there is some g-string, my thumb will be on g, index on C and middle on E.
I don’t cover a lot of pop music on here but Charli XCX’s contribution to the long tradition of lusty songs about handsome boys was the song of last summer and one of my favourite songs of the year.
The arrangement is a bit tricky with a few leaps up and down the fretboard. Probably the trickiest parts are the Mario coin noises. These are created by playing a note on the E-string 10th fret quickly followed by natural harmonic on the A-string, 12th fret. If you’re still getting the hang of natural harmonics you can fret the string at the 12th fret as you usually would. It won’t have the same ringing sound but it will sound right.
There’s loads of room to add your own spin onto this song. You can play around with dynamics and pacing, change the phrasing, throw in chord extensions or add in a few jazzy runs. Check out Louis Armstrong’s version for inspiration.
It seems like every cover version ditches the intro section of the original. And I’ve done likewise. I’ve replaced it with a chord section that establishes the harmony of the tune by borrowing chords from elsewhere in the song. This is a good place to start adding your own ideas.
Rounding off Valentine’s week with one of the few lovey-dovey songs I actually like. Make You Feel My Love first cropped up on Bob Dylan’s Out of Time (a record that was seen as Dylan’s “I’m nearly dead” album when it came out twenty years ago). But it became much more widely known when Adele covered it on 19. My arrangement leans towards the Adele version. But there’s not a lot to choose between the two anyway.
I’ve kept the arrangement very simple. I’m mostly using thumb and two finger picking. The only exception is when I strum all the strings with my thumb in bars 7, 24 and 26. But it is arranged in such a way that you could play the whole thing with your thumb.
The one part that might be a challenge is the jump down the neck between bars 10 and 11.