Guitar Noise

Among the other things that fascinate me no end are covers. A “cover” is the term we use when what we mean is “We’re going to do a song that someone else wrote. It’s a song you know so you can dance or sing or do whatever you don’t do when you’re listening to one of our original songs. Which you don’t know anyway so it’s not a big deal. Really.”

Bands (and solo performers) approach covers in many ways. Some strive to render a perfect, straight from the album clone (around here there are many bands that make a living this way; they are called “tribute” bands and we really won’t get into this now…). Some may change the instrumentation a bit… put in a guitar solo instead of a keyboard solo or something along that line. And still others will come up with wild interpretations of old familiar tunes. I vividly remember one group with whom we shared a bill in 1980. I think they called themselves “Plan 9″ and they did all out punk version of Leaving On A Jet Plane. Another local band at the time called the Peer Group also had a memorable cover. They would start playing Just What I Needed by the Cars. The instrumentation was perfect. Everybody in the audience would get excited because they all knew and liked the song. But then the lead singer would step up to the microphone and belt out in his best Ric Ocasek voice:

Oh I
I’ll tell you something
I hope you’ll understand
When I
Say that something
I want to hold your hand…

The first time I heard this I was spellbound. It was so unexpected and so well done.

And so funny…

Covers chosen by solo guitarists can be even more interesting. Again there are people who are much more concerned about reproducing picture perfect carbon copy riffs and solos. And then there are guitarists who play songs you would never dreamed possible for a single acoustic guitar to cover. It’s all in one’s imagination. Some people just hear a song and say, “Hey, I could do a version of that!” Or, “Wouldn’t it be cool to do this song that way?”

There is an art to arranging songs, whether taking a simple folk song and playing it as a full band or coming up with a way to perform a big scale production number on a single acoustic guitar. Today we’re going to look at how to use alternate tuning as a tool for you to use in song arrangement. And since that means using someone else’s songs, let’s get the formalities out of the way, shall we?

These files are the author’s own work and represents his interpretation of the song. They are intended solely for private study, scholarship or research.

As usual, let’s start out with something simple (as well as something that we all hopefully know). Here’s the first verse of Rain by the Beatles:

Okay, a quick note… according to a friend of mine who owns the The Beatles… Complete Scores, which is a book of (surprise) the complete scores (musical transcriptions for every instrument used in a particular piece) of every song the Beatles ever recorded. The rhythm guitar used on the record is tuned to a variation of open G. We’re still going to use something different since we don’t have a band to back us up (this time anyway…).

Last time out (On The Tuning Awry)I showed you with a number of “Drop D” tunings. We’re going to give one of them a real workout today. Specifically, we’ll use this tuning:

(And, to avoid confusion, it’s really not called “rain tuning.” We’re simply using this tuning in a song called Rain.) To get this tuning you simply tune your first string from E to D. You can do this either by using the open D string as an octave or by tuning first string to the third fret of the B string (instead of the fifth fret).

We’re going to work a bit backwards here, so bear with me. I want to first show you how it works and then we’ll backtrack and go over the why. Okay? First, as always, we’ll need to figure out what our new chord fingers are. That’s not too hard. We have only three chords to play (all right, four if you count C9) and we’ve only changed one string so it’s not too difficult to figure out. Here’s our charts:

You see that I included a second version of the G as well as a second version of the D. Yes, there’s a reason for this. Yes, we’ll get to it soon. For now, though, let’s just play. Wherever you see a C or C9 in the song, use our C (add 9). You can use either D variation (here I use D (no3) first and then the Dsus). You can either strum this straight or use a picking pattern to make some cool arpeggios. Here’s a fairly simple pattern:

When we get to the “Raaaaaaaain……..I don’t mind” part, do a straight strum using the second G (G var1) followed by the C (add 9) and then return to the picking pattern when you get to the G (use the original one). Not too shabby, eh?

The reason why this works can be found in the song itself. The melody constantly hovers around the D note regardless of the chords being played. By stressing this note with the open first string of your guitar you create a lot of tension and resolution between your voice and the guitar’s voice. In other words, you’re carrying the harmonies with your accompaniment. This is especially true in the “Raaaaaaaain……..I don’t mind” part when you’re singing the E note in the melody while the guitar is holding the D and C notes at the top. When you finally bring it back to the G (”I don’t mind”), there is a real feeling of resolution to the chord progression. Another thing I particularly like about this is using the D (no 3rd) to increase the tension between the C (add 9) and the G.