Punk Rock Track

Greg_L said:
You're not alone. I've been an unapologetic Ramones fanboy geek for 30 years.


Keep listening, you'll hear his barre chords everywhere. Blitzkrieg Bop is full of 100% barre chords. They're an integral part of his style and sound.

Listen to the Leave Home album. His tone is a little cleaner on that record and you can really hear the chime and major-ness of his barre chords.

And watch how he barres chords with the root on the A string. See if you can figure it out. It will open up new doors of awesomeness for your own rhythm playing if you're into that style..
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wow! this is gold - very informative (I'm sorry to the OP for keeping it off track).
One more Ramones die hard here. I just watched Blitzkrieg Bop from It's Alive.
When Johnny changes chords from A to D - is that what you mean?

Btw, it's funny that what drew me to punk rock then was my inability to play barre chords!
 
the kelvinator said:
wow! this is gold - very informative (I'm sorry to the OP for keeping it off track).
One more Ramones die hard here. I just watched Blitzkrieg Bop from It's Alive.
When Johnny changes chords from A to D - is that what you mean?

Btw, it's funny that what drew me to punk rock then was my inability to play barre chords!
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Yeah, Johnny's D and E barre chords on the A string are an example of how to make those chords sound huge. For example, Blitzkrieg Bop..
A chord
E-5
A-7
D-7
G-6
B-5
E-5

That's a standard A Major barre chord

D chord
E-5
A-5
D-7
G-7
B-7
E-X

You're playing 5 strings for the barre D from the A string. And then...

E chord
E-7
A-7
D-9
G-9
B-9
E-X

Same thing as the D, just moved up to an E chord.

Play those in succession with really fast downstrokes, and fret the chords cleanly, and you'll hear Blitzkrieg Bop the way it's supposed to be. Those aint no dumb ol powerchords.

Watch this, you can see his hands in detail in some of the shots. And you can really hear how his chords sound. You can hear the chime and ringing that you don't get from regular powerchords.


This has been Ramones Guitar, Lesson 1.
 
Greg_L said:
Who do you think taught you limeys? Americans! :D
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LOL. But using power chords seems to be a later development. I mean the Kinks, the Who, the Stones, Thin Lizzy, yada yada yada were all using full chords in proper rock music before punk came out. I'm not even sure that power chords were a thing until after punk. They certainly weren't part of any rock music I can remember before 1977. Everybody played full chords with thirds in, almost exclusively. They even used sevenths sometimes. :D
 
Bubba po said:
LOL. But using power chords seems to be a later development. I mean the Kinks, the Who, the Stones, Thin Lizzy, yada yada yada were all using full chords in proper rock music before punk came out. I'm not even sure that power chords were a thing until after punk. They certainly weren't part of any rock music I can remember before 1977. Everybody played full chords with thirds in, almost exclusively. They even used sevenths sometimes. :D
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I blame metal. They really dumbed it down. :( :D
 
That clip is probably the best part of the movie. A true piece of exploitation cinema - 10 years earlier it would've been straight to Drive In but when released was straight to video. I have a copy because i love junk movies - it certainly is pretty junked.
Iommi has "extensions" that make up for the missing bits - initially home made prosthetics to compensate for the foundry accident.
I can't play Barre chords I've been unable to press flat with my finger since as far back as I can remember so I can't do any of that fun & powerful stuff so it's been a total of 10 full, mainly open, chords since about 76. I "found" power chords on the fret board when, as a bassist, I was mucking about on an acoustic and trying to follow someone playing songs. I didn't know they were something legit until I'd been on HR for about 4 years or so, (so went through life not knowing for about 30 years), always ashamed that I couldn't play real stuff.
I only found out power chords could be played in an arrangement over/under minor or major chords a couple of years ago.These days I'm pleased it has a sense of OKness about it and still only find new chords by accident as I a very, very poor student.
 
Greg_L said:
I'm sure the power chord goes back before Tony Iommi. Rockabilly and blues guys used to use it as part of their plucky sound.
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You're probably right. I never learned to use power chords - I've always barred and fretted the whole chord. Sometimes I only hit the bottom three strings, so I am in effect playing a power chord, but the third and other higher notes are always there and available, possibly adding to the sound of the chord without directly being strummed.
 
rayc said:
That clip is probably the best part of the movie. A true piece of exploitation cinema - 10 years earlier it would've been straight to Drive In but when released was straight to video. I have a copy because i love junk movies - it certainly is pretty junked.
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Are you talking about Rock and Roll High School? It did play in real theaters, but not many. And it did debut at a drive-in in San Antonio or Austin or some place like that. Why not LA or NYC I have no idea, but it scored big in cow towns so they released it on the coasts. My bias aside, I do actually think it's a fun movie. It's silly and campy and has all of the elements of a goofy 70's/80s teenage rebellion movie...and it has a big chunk of actual Ramones stuff. The Riff Randall bedroom stoner scene is awesome! Can you imagine a less attractive group of guys to dream about?

Johnny playing (miming) real chords on an acoustic!
 
Bubba po said:
You're probably right. I never learned to use power chords - I've always barred and fretted the whole chord. Sometimes I only hit the bottom three strings, so I am in effect playing a power chord, but the third and other higher notes are always there and available, possibly adding to the sound of the chord without directly being strummed.
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Agreed. I pretty much do the same thing. I stumbled on to barre chords as soon as I learned a powerchord. I was like "where can I put these other fingers?" I was already familiar enough with roots and octaves to know that the E strings were the same, jamming my pinky under the ring finger would give me an octave of the root, and I just happened to drop my middle finger on the third and bam, it sounded good. Then I realized an F chord can be played anywhere and it's just the high half of a barre chord, so there's that. All those extra harmonics and nuances of "real" chords just sound better to me.

My drummer always marvels at how I can get so much sound from powerchords. I keep telling him they're not powerchords. Dumb drummers. :D
 
Oooh watch that video at 1:59. Big close up of a barred D and E on the A string. Notice he barres the low E as well to get a low octave of the fifth. That makes a huge difference in the bigness of the sound on those barre chords rooted on the A string.
 
Greg_L said:
Oooh watch that video at 1:59. Big close up of a barred D and E on the A string. Notice he barres the low E as well to get a low octave of the fifth. That makes a huge difference in the bigness of the sound on those barre chords rooted on the A string.
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So I guess you should change your lyrics then to "I heard there was a barre chords, that David played and it pleased the Lord"? (not sure if I remembered them correctly)

Will watch this video, and probably the movie as well. Thanks.
 
Greg_L said:
Ha, yeah maybe, but "powerchord" is a good term. It rolls off the tongue. It's just not a good chord. :D
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I know. I like that song and the lyrics parody. I'll put your version probably behind John Cale's. But the best version of that song would always be the one found on the movie "Watchmen" :D (if you know what I mean).
 
My version is unquestionably the best version there ever was.

But anyway, my version of that stupid song is rife with majors and minors. I don't pretend to be some theory guru, but I know how the very basics just by accident.

Another "technique" I like is how AC/DC does their rhythm stuff. They use real chords, open chords, barre chords, whatever, but they sometimes deliberately only pick at pieces of them. I think they're called "broken chords" maybe? Kiss does this a lot too. Or they'll mute the middle section of a chord and only let the bass and treble parts ring out. Sounds awesome.

These are all things that don't really work well though with a lot of gain. These things can get ugly fast when you're using metal levels of distortion, which I never do anyway.
 
Adding to the discussion of chords here.

The reason why power chords are so popular is because when you don't have a major or minor 3rd you have many more options for what chord to go to next, also with heavy distortion too many notes is no good.
 
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