Wednesday, December 22, 2010

My gal

I was watching the "To tulsa and back" DVD and realized he played this little tune acoustically.

Looking visually at what he plays, it was basically:
open E chord all the way except
B, A as a quick turnaround.

Don't even have the original here to listen, nor my guitar in my hands to check, so I'll just accept it is like that and the same on record too. :D

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Super blue

Super blue... another Grrrrrrrreat mood setter here!

Here's cover with a cello! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oeph019rpoI

The chords are:
G , C, G, C... for the main part
and then Eb, D, G for the "got yourself another man" part

The intro lick is approximately like this:
-----------------------10---------------------
-10^12-10----10^-------10^12-10----10^--------
----------12-----9--------------12-----9------
----------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------



-13^15-12-10----------------------------------
----------------------------------------------
-------------14-12----12---14^16~-14-15-16--17
-------------------14-------------------------
----------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------

If You're Ever In Oklahoma

This fun little country blues number goes like this for the main part:
A, C, D, A

To mimic the country V-I feel of the bass, you can play it like this for example (playing bass strings with thumb while muting them palm of the picking hand):
A...........C........D........A...........
----------------------------2-------------
--------2----------1--------3---------2---
--------2----------0------------------2---
---------------------0---0----------------
-0---0------3---3------0---0---0---0------
---0---0------3---3--------------0---0----

...and then D, A for this part:

And they don't [D]care about Dallas, [A]Texas
And they don't [D]care about Wichi[A]ta

Here's a great youtube cover of this song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L_HA9-1MJE

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Youtube JJ covers, part 2

Yeah, haven't been active with the blog. Just too busy with family to do any playing, really.

I did visit Paris over the weekend, and saw this ad on TV:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vo5xM24YkRU

I thoroughly dig it, though not getting a Citroen anytime soon. 

Anyway, I was checking Youtube for some new JJ covers. There's plenty of them, favorites a long bunch. Here's some of the top ones I found this time around.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jd2JhHUwgk (Dewey Paul is planning to release a Cale cover album!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chuf10X4fKQ (creat JJ style guitar on this)

...and gotta love a John Cale getting pissed off as being mistaken for another: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2t4K2sUI34



Sunday, October 17, 2010

"End of the line"

This is an approximation, again, and none of the bluesy licks tabbed now...


[A]Trains don't run forever[C#m7]
[D]Fire goes out sometime [A][F#m][A]
[A]Gotta tell you, baby
[B7]We've come to the [E]end of the [A]line .... [A][E]


10s:
------------------------------
-----0-1-0--------------------
---2-------2------------------
-------------4-2-4------------
-0----------------------------
------------------------------

15.7s:

-8-8-5---5---------------------
-------8---5---5--------------
-----------------5------------
-------------------7~---------
------------------------------
-------------5----------------

-------------------------------
------5~-----5-----------------
-7-8-----7-8---5H6----9-7-5----
-------------------7--------7--
-------------------------------
-------------------------------

24.5s
-8-10-8-5--s8-7-5-3-0--3-0----
------------------------------
------------------------------
------------------------------
------------------------------
------------------------------
etc.

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Friday

One of these elusive simple tiddies again...

This is and stays in Dm. The groove is a bit difficult get into (or out of! :D ), maybe. But it's all fretting hand muting and loose strumming hand stuff.

The bass line is: D D D A C. It can be played all on the 5th string, for example: 5th fret D note, open string for A, and 3rd fret for C.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

City girls

This is one true classic, only just realized I hadn't covered it in my blog...


...must be because I was too lazy or scared to pick the wonderful guitar solo. Sounds like Reggie Young on a stratocaster, to me. Could be that I am wrong. It might be a telecaster. :P


This a simple country number in E. Basically the chords are A A E E B B E E*. Where the last bar of E is cut after the first beat.



[E, no chord]City girls they're all right[A]
They just want you for the [E]night
But when the morning comes at [B]dawn
City girls they all [E]gone
This is an approximation of the 1s intro kick off (that's also used in place of the [no chord] part):
-----------------
---------------2-
---------------2-
---------------2-
---2-4p2p0-2-4-0-
-3---------------

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Passion

This one's to honor the greatest JJ Cale cover band I know of: TALK TO THE CAT!  Please go their site and check their music (Oh, man the the stone JJ groove they have for Right down here!):  http://talktothecat.nl/Intro.php ...And book them for gig!

If Talk to the cat had not recorded this small gem, I would never have realized how good a song it is. And I still think of their version first, not the original. Although Number 10 is the first JJ album I bought the day it hit the shelves, I never liked it, it's also the most disappointing record of his, due to the sound. I wish he re-recorded all of it!

Anyway, I copped this off the Talk to the cat version:

The chords are:
Verse:
Gm D
Gm C

Chorus ("Now she's gone... the passion ... still lies in me")
Gm Bb
C D
Gm D

For their CD, the singer and main guitarist of this band played a Gibson Standard USA 1990 and through a Rivera Jake Studio and the other guitarist played a (rosewood fingerboard) Telecaster. Not that anybody cares, but I asked about it once, as I was interested about the tone they got. You can see their gear listing on the site, too.

...and while all you guys are at it, do check the Dutch JJ fan site too: http://www.jjcale.nl/index.html

...and go listen sneak preview's of new Eric Clapton album, with two JJ songs and JJ himself on it: 'Eric Clapton' Sounds good, almost as good as Talk to the cat! :)

Thursday, August 19, 2010

The Old Man And Me

Haven't got much on this, but just to mark a celebration here:
If I have my stats right, I started of with a list of 69 * 2 = 138 JJ songs to tab... and now have tabbed (to some extent) exactly half of them!

Anyway: Old man and me.

This just stays on Bb chord with alternating bass (Bb and F alternating). You can take a Bb barre chord at first or sixth fret and alternate between the 6th and fifth strings (with strums in between)

The solo bit at around 1min into the song is Bb major pentatonic, I think, and starts approximately like this:
---1~----------
-3-------------
------5-3-0-3--
---------------
---------------
---------------

Former Me

This is a great track! He just keeps putting out great stuff, I say!


The chords:


The main part is: 
Bm F# ...6 times, then the ending:
Bm A Bm


the "Those days..." bridge is:
G A Bm.... 3 times, then the ending:
A G F#


And don't forget the great youtube cover by Harry de Visser.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Roll on mama

Number 10 is the record I never listen to... just don't like the sound of it at all. So I'll skip the screechy solos...


The chords are:
Fm Bb Ab again again and again...
except for the "chorus" bit that goes:

I gotta [Ab]roll on, Mama
[G]Things been movin' too [F]slow

Starbound

This is in C, and I don't hear any changes, just C all the way through.  (SEE COMMENTS FOR SUGGESTION THAT IT'S MORE LIKELY FMAJ7 CMAJ7)


This is the intro (C major pentatonic):
-8p5---5~--8p5-8-10--10-12-12---8p5---5~-8-5--5-----
-----8-----------------------------8------------8-8--
-----------------------------------------------------


-8p5---5~---12p10p8-10'-12-12----10-12-12-
-----8------------------------------------
------------------------------------------

Hard Times

The chords for this minor masterpiece are:
F Ab Bb for ever in a loop. One bar of F, half a bar of Ab and half a bar of Bb. Repeat.

So it's like:
[F]Hard times[Ab][Bb]

The intro is something like (without the more quiet scratching in between):
---1-4-1--1--4-4-6--1---4-4-4-4-6--1---
-1--------1--4-4-6--1---4-4-4-4-6--1---
----------2--5-5-7--2---5-5-5-5-7--2---
----------3--6-6-8--3---6-6-6-6-8--3---

-----
-----

So that's just the 4 note lick from Fm pentatonic, plus strumming the same chords as the whole song is revolving around. 

Monday, August 16, 2010

"Who knew"

So another quick one here...

The main part chords are a basic blues progression (add sevenths according to your taste) in C:
C C C C
F F C C
G G C C

The bridge is basically just:
Eb Eb C C for most of it, like 4 times, I think...
...and then fret by fret down towards to C from Eb... Eb, D, C#... for the end part of it.

There might some else in there, but those two progressions are the core of things happening...

Losers

Oh well, one of the my least favorite JJ tunes ever ever.


The main part is a 8 bar blues in C:
CCFF
CGCC

And the bridge thingy ("Came in this morning" etc):
FCGC
FCGC

ever. Did I already say that?

If You Leave Her

This, to me, is just Gm all the way through, except this at the end parts of progression:



I can't [C] see her [Bb]walking with [Gm]you

Friday, August 13, 2010

It's Good To Be In Austin

I had to buy the Rewind album twice, to get this song. It's a good country number, though. :)

The basic part is:
E A E ...x 3
B E

The bridge is basically just 
C#m E ...x 3
F#m B7.

Or so I hear, what about you? :D

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Trouble In The City


This might be slightly fuzzy, 
as I am trying to cop this out very quietly in the dark of night on my acoustic...

[Bm]Heard the one about your woman
Lord, she's been messing 'round
[E]She's been stepping out on the street
Lord, she's been hanging out[Bm]
[E]Ain't nobody had her this week, 
[Bm]boy it [A]won't take [E]long
[Bm]Lord, lord, there's trouble in the city
Lord, lord, there's trouble in the city
Lord, lord, there's trouble in the city
And I [D]hope it won't [A]mess with [Bm]me
The guitar fills appear to be from B minor pentatonic scale.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Rose In The Garden

Lovely sweet song this is. Love the piano and the acoustic guitar solo.

The chords spell a simple country progression:

[D]I'll find my way back [G]to the rose in the [D]garden
[D]I'll find my way [A]back to her sweet [D]arms

The solo picks off something like:
-------------------
-----7h8p7---------
---7-------7-4-----
-7-------------7---
-----------------5-
-------------------
which is based around the D chord (A barre shaped one in my tab), or D major pentatonic, if you wish. 

It's hard to tell

This one goes like this for the main "It's hard to tell" part:
Am G Am
Am G Am
etc...

Then the other part that is played in between and for  "when you face the face" etc, is:
C D
C Bb.


Or so I hear it, any comments welcome. :)

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Mojo

Yeah it isn't his own song, so normally I'd shy away... plus it's a straight ahead 12 bar blues. So what's the point?  I dig it, and I want to cover all his songs in my blog... :D

so here's the main riff for this 12 bar blues in E:
---------------------
---------------------
---------------------
-2-------------------
---2--2-4-5--5-4-5-2-
---------------------

It's the same but one string up for the IV chord. For the last four bars there's just strumming for V and IV chords and then a basic E blues turnaround that starts with the open D7 chord picked two frets up, then moving that fret by fret down...

No time for solo now...

Love Has Been Gone

This one's in the key of Bb.

[Bb]Love has been gone, [Eb]gone so long there's nothing [Bb]new


I say our love has been gone, [Eb]gone so long there's nothing [Bb]new
How does it [Gm]feel
Not too [Bb]good
It ain't [Gm]real but it's [Bb]understood

intro begins like this:
E:-----------------------------------
B:-6-8-9~--8-9-8-9s11--9-8-9~--9-8-6-
G:-----------------------------------

x:-----------------------------------

x:-----------------------------------

x:-----------------------------------


E:-------------6----------------------

B:-------------6--9-8-6~--------------
G:-8p6--------------------------------
D:-----8--8---------------------------

A:----------8-------------------------

x:------------------------------------

So that looks like Bb minor pentatonic... plus the sixth...

Monday, August 9, 2010

Everything Will Be Alright

The progression for this beautiful small tune is:
F Bb F Bb F
Ab G F# F

So basically for the verse it's going back and forth between F and Bb (The I and IV chords in key of F), and then the chorus is going down from Ab a fret at time, until back to F chord.

Disadvantage

Yet another 12 bar blues here... in E. The only difference is that in bars 9 and 10 there's half a bar of B followed by half a bar of A.So, it's like this:
EEEE EEEE EEEE EEEE
AAAA AAAA EEEE EEEE
BBAA BBAA EEEE EEEE

In the intro there's some play around the 2nd fret G string and open G string. Then some other E minor pentatonic stuff...

Sunday, August 8, 2010

Lawdy mama

The heat is on, and I am as lazy as ever... so I'll just state this very quickly:

This song is 12 bar blues in E, with a quick change IV in the second bar.

Has a nice groove riff, which I am not able to get down pat, so I'll just let it be for now. Maybe later...

Saturday, August 7, 2010

Sho-Biz Blues

Well the chords for the verse are these in a loop for forever:
C Bb F C

and for the bridge the two back and forth:
Bb C

So that's that.

River runs deep

Just read that Eric Clapton's new album has this track, so I thought I'll have a look on the original...

It's just Am and D all the way through. Or so I hear it!

The licks he plays are A minor pentatonic... some beautiful pre-bends there on the 8th fret. Too lazy to write the licks down now, but I play the in the 1st and second minor pentatonic boxes, so at five through to 10th fret.

B:------------
G:---5-7-5--
D:-7-------7-
A:-----------

I wonder if that was any help to anybody now. :D

Lonesome train

This to me is just a 12 bar blues in E simplified... as I don't hear a IV chord...

E/E/E/E
E/E/E/E
B/B/E/E

So all E, except:

Is it headed [B]up, is it headed [E]down
Oh well, could be that there's more happening, 
but the "Number 10" just doesn't inspire me to do more than that...

Wish I Had Not Said That

Lovely sweet country tiddy! Oh well, I just love the Shades album...

...picking the C major chord for intro riff:
---------------
------------(1)-
---0-----------
-----2-0-------
-3-------3-----
---------------

[C]You don't come here too often
You make my day when you come around
You know I love you something awful
You're a diamond I have found ([(C][G])
[F]Wish I had not said that, [C]baby
[F]If I could only close you [C]out of my [G]mind

Of course imitating the riff while strumming works well as well...
I just seem to be hammering on to the second fret on the D string once every bar... and alternating between C and G in the bass of the C chord (to "emulate bass guitar").

For going from the verse to chorus, there's this move from C to F:
-----1-
-----1-
-----2-
-----3- 
-3---3-
---3-1-

So C, G, F... I guess you could play all of those as chords too, so I put that in round brackets above..

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Does Your Mama Like To Reggae

Not one of my faves, so I'll skim it with a quick note:

Basically stays on G, the reggae scratch guitar is G7.

The bass riff is:
G G G G Bb C
G G G G Bb Bb C

Here's a live cover version of it on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLLI0RGpipU
(there's also a studio version )

(Searching for those, saw this video somebody has recently made for Lakeland's Bad habits )

Everlovin' woman


This is a quick one, hope it's correct:
[B]I've got a woman, I love her, lordy lord
She cooks my breakfast on Sunday, just like my ma
[E]I hang my hat in her house, she don't charge a dime
[B]Love me, trust me, never cuss me, you know she's mine
[F#]I'm talking 'bout, I'm talking 'bout, I'm talking in rhyme
[B]I'm talking 'bout that everlovin' woman of mine
Oh, yeah, I hope I haven't "tabbed" it before... I forget!

Saturday, July 10, 2010

All mama's children

[E7#9]All mama's children got rythm
And all mama's children got [B7]soul
When they [E]get up in the morning
[A]Without no warning
They [E]all start to [B]rock 'n [E]roll
etc

Just give me some [A]more
Of that country [E]soul
One more [A]time
I'm crossing the [B7]line

Hey this isn't the same song,but still sounds like a bunch of fun:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_3zO3leTMY
(Carl Perkins tune of the same name)

Friday, July 9, 2010

"No time"

--------
in key of E

Going back and forth between E and A:
[E]No time[A] making my move [E] no time

Then the "clock it turns" bit is
[E]Summer comes and [G]summer gone
[A]When I sing the [E]very same song

intro:
-0-0------------------------0--
-0---3-0--------------------0--
---------2-0~--------0~--------
---------------0-2-5----0-2----
-------------------------------
-------------------------------


-0-----------------------------
-0---3-0-----------------------
---------2-0~------------------
---------------0-2-2--2P0-0H2--
-------------------------------
-------------------------------


-0---------------------0-3^-0-----------------
-0---3-0------0-----0-3--------0--------------
----------------0-1--------------2-2-0--------
---------------------------------------2-2-0-1
----------------------------------------------
----------*E*---------------------------------

where is *E* means playing the E chord (for a while).

The the rhythm extra notes:
it sounds like strumming the chords with  fretting some notes of the E minor pentatonic on top, like


-----0-3-0-3------
-0-3--------------

So you like playing chords E, E7, E7#9.

------------
-2-3--2-3-0-

so you like play chords A Asus4

etc.


Here's live vid from turn of 90s:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hemrseR4qtA

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Jailer

Jailer
------

The main part:
F#m (at 2nd fret, fingerpicked in a sort of a Merle Travis way)
A A B

...I do it approximately like this, I play it very loosely, so almost like strumming instead of fingerpicking:
-2----------2----------------
---2---(2)----2----x--2-2-4--
-------(2)---------x--2-2-4--
--------4--------4-x---------
------------4---------0-0-2--
-2---------------------------

(Travis picking = the three bass strings with thumb, the notes in brackets brushed with thumb)
the xxx means just a muted down strum as an accent.

...there is a move between F# and E notes there...
so I guess you could play it so that you first play the barre F#m, then lift off the barre, to play the open 1st string...
...or something...

break part:
A E G (for example open cowboy chords)
D A E (at fifth - seventh fret, so the E is higher one)
A E G
D A

Monday, June 28, 2010

JJ's Harmony

Yeah, haven't been been blogging for months now. Well, JJ isn't always that busy going public either, is he? I did hear some rumours of another JJ album in recording, but that's another story...

But anyway, this tima I am talking about the the mystical "that piece of shit" Harmony, that Eric Clapton so anxiously wanted to see when he showed up at JJ's recording session in the mid-70s.

He bought it in the late 60s, for $50, the story goes:
"My favorite guitar is this old fifty dollar Harmony, now backless for easier access to the electronics. Originally it was a round hole acoustic, but I've added five pickups for making records and playing concerts. Four of the pickups are Gibson, two of which are low impedance for recording direct. The other bar type pickup came from a Sears Silvertone guitar, it was manufactured by Dano Electro. The guitar has three high impedance outs and one low."
The shiny white humbucker on it being from a "Les Paul Signature" guitar (a short lived 70s model).

Most places they say it is a H-162 (spruce top, the H-165 had a mahogany top). Later on they had adjustable truss rod, but his is an earlier model with fixed rod, but here's the catalog bit on the later model from 1970 catalog:
"No. H162. Folk Guitar-Mahogany with Resonant Spruce Top. Grand Concert Size. Back and sides of selected quality mahogany; top of resonant spruce. Soundhole, top and back edges are celluloid bound, with inlay. Durable natural color eggshell lacquer finish. Ovalled rosewood fingerboard. Rosewood bridge, with bone saddle. Hardwood neck with Torque-Lok adjustable reinforcing rod. Shell celluloid pick guard. Excellent tone quality. A value stand-out.



No. H162 - Size 15 1/8 x 39 in"

It's also ladder braced, which is an older simpler bracing style, nowadays almost all guitars have x-style braces instead. Many fingerpicking blues players dig that, but most others don't like the ladder bracing. I remember reading Lightning Hopkins played a Harmony H-162 in 60s.  

25.25" scale length says this bit on Harmony guitar info site:
http://harmony.demont.net/guitars/H162/87.htm

Here's a link to the harmony central reviews:
http://reviews.harmony-central.com/reviews/Acoustic+Guitar/product/Harmony/H162/50/1

Here's somebody's blog bit on one of these: http://thedeanfiles.blogspot.com/2008/01/h162-harmony-acoustic.html

It seems you can still quite easily get one for $300 or even less. Strings will be high, I bet. JJ had coin at the base of the neck for adjusting the action. The frets were small and the neck big, and JJ shaved the neck some.

It finally gave up in the '80s, I think. The airlines finally broke for good, he said. Maybe Travel-log has some of it still, but haven't heard it since. He took the wiring and pickups out and put the back on. It's stored somewhere in Southern California...

Friday, February 12, 2010

"I'd like to love you baby"

This one's mostly just the E chord (I play it on the 7th or the 12th fret). The bass line for this main part is E, E, B / E, E, B, D, E... (where the E is the highest note, seventh fret A string)...

At the end of a verse of lyrics (after I'd like to love you baby and keep my other baby too), there's always the instrumental bridge thingy. The chords go A - E, A - E for that. 

Great solo thingies, yes. No time for  that. The intro plays around with 12th (D) and 14th (E) fret on D-string. Solos from E minor pentatonic.

"One Step"

This one's in G....

In the intro it's bend on the F on the 13th fret on thin E string, followed by the G two frets higher. Then the same 5 frets higher.

I play it about like this:
[G]
One step forward and two steps back
...
[C]It's made out of wood, [G]made out of stone
[C]I'm building that man a [G]fancy home
[C]That's the way it is let me tell you jack
[G]It's a one step forward and [F]two steps [G]back
I hope it's about right! :)

Saturday, January 30, 2010

"Bring down the curtain"

This one goes about like this: 
 
[E]Bring down the curtain
It's all the show tonight
It's [A]dark outside
Sunday [E]light
[A]Enough is enough
Can't do it no [E]more
[G]Bring down the curtain
[A]Close the door
[E]

The intro (and I bet solo too) is in E minor pentatonic, 
starts off something like this:
-------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------
---------------14'-12---------12-14-12'--------12------------
----12-14'-14'--------14---14-----------14-14-----14-14------
-14----------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------


Saturday, January 9, 2010

"Soulin"

OK, this one is kinda elusive for me. A stone groove, it is.

I think the record is slightly above regular tuning. So tune slightly up to play with the record. Or tune the record slightly down. :D

I play this with just two chords, basically: regular E chord ( 022100 ) and a "long" A7 ( x02223 )... and well, an A in between like this x0222x (it's sort of muted as it's just a move towards the A7 from the E).

So it's a bit like:
E E A
A7 A7 A7
A7 E

Where the A7s emphasize the high strings and the E after them is just the open top three strings.
And the EEA in the beginning is just on the bottom string, and the A is quickly muted.
The A chord I play barring the second fret with my index, and the A7 is the same but ring finger on 3rd fret of E string.

Here's a slow and imperfect example of what I mean there:
http://www.box.net/shared/gigdeou87e

Friday, January 8, 2010

"Mama don't allow"

The old concert opener for JJ. I remember listening the Washboard Sam '30s version as a kid. Also a stable among some dixieland bands, I hear. I think Julie Lee did a rousing version. Just a good jam number, I guess. 

In my previous post with a set list from 1993-94 had this in Bbm (if I read the set list correctly).  But the record and some live versions I checked from 2004 tour had this in Bm.

[Bm]Yeah, Mama don't allow no guitar playing 'round here
Yeah, Mama don't allow no guitar playing 'round [F#]here
[Bm]I don't care what mama don't allow I'll [E]play my guitar anyhow
[Bm]Mama don't allow no [F#]guitar playing 'round [Bm]here

Solo you can play in B minor pentatonic. Didn't tab any of them this time, though.