Chords for Born Under A Bad Sign Style Blues Guitar Lesson

_ Hey there, Griff Hamlin here.
I want to do a lesson today on basically Born Under a Bad Sign by Albert King.
This is one of those sort of jam staples, people play it all the time.
So I want to kind of give you an idea of how this works because this is the kind of thing
where the key gets changed all the time.
And so I really want to show you where riffs like this come from.
So I may not specifically do Born Under a Bad Sign, although it's going to be awfully
close to it, but I want to show you how you would play this like in D or in C or whatever
if you needed to change the key.
_ So let's start off [E] with taking a look at good old box three of the minor pentatonic scale
because this is sort of the redheaded stepchild of boxes.
Nobody talks [C#] about this one. _
If I were in the key of C sharp minor, which is what this is recorded in, and box one would
be way up here at the ninth [C#m] fret. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[C#] _ If you're not already familiar with the pentatonic boxes, I have other lessons that I've done on these.
_ You can find them easily with a Google search.
They're pretty common things, so _ try and make sure you have the first two down first.
I'm just kind of doing this for review.
The second one would be [E] _ here at the twelfth fret. _ _
_ [G#m] _ [E] _ _ _ _ _ _
[G#] _ [E] _ _ _ [F#] _ And the third one _ [E] would be up at the fourteenth fret.
Well, [F#] that starts to get a little bit silly.
It's just hard to play up there.
So what I'm going to do is I'm going to take that fourteen and subtract twelve and end
up here at the second fret.
So in C sharp minor, I can play the same [G#m] notes, _ [C#m] _ [F#] _ [G#m] _ [C#m] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [G#] _ [F#] _
and you might [G#m] notice [C#m] _ _ [C#] _ _
just those first few
notes right out of box three. _
That's exactly what we're doing.
That's exactly the riff, [Am] and this is not [C#] uncommon at all.
And notice, there's your root.
There's the C sharp.
[G#m] _ _ _ [C#] _ _ And that little [G#m] bit right [C#m] there, _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [C#] _ starting with that root, that's one of those little
four-note [E] solo patterns I talk [B] about a lot.
[C#] _ Okay, so this should be stuff that you've definitely seen before, or if you're seeing
it for the first time, it's not that complicated.
_ _ [F#] [G#m] So box three, _ _ [F#] if I started here, it's [G#] second, fourth, [B]
[C#] second, [E] fourth, second, [F#] [G#] fourth, [B] first,
[C#m] fourth, second, [F#] fifth, first, second, [B] sorry, [G#m] _
fourth.
_ [D#] Four, [A] two, five, [G#m] two, four, [F#] one, [C#m] four, [F] two, four, [F#] two, four, two.
That's if I'm calling out frets.
If you're doing it by [G#] fingering, [B] one, three, [A] one, [F#m] three, one, three, [G#] [B] one, four, with a
shift, [C#m] shift back [E] up, one, four again, [G#m] one, three, three, [C#m] one, four, [B] one, [Fm] four, [F#] one, [E] [B] three,
[F#] one, three, one.
Whatever works better for you.
All right, so notice, [G#m] _ [E] _ [C#] _
_ [G#] there's the [F#] riff [G#m] _ [C#m] _ [C#] _
right out of the [F#] scale, [G#] _ [B] _ [E] _ and we have the open E there.
Well, all that is is an [D] octave [E] change, because there is that same E up an octave.
So he just took it and moved it down an octave.
It's not like it's a [C] new note that wasn't in the scale before.
[F#] It's just being grabbed from a different place, [G#] _ [C#m] _ _ or [F#] _ [B] _
_ [E] _ _ _ _ there.
So for example, let's say you had to play it in the key of C.
Let's say you've got a
singer that has a hard time with it in the key of C sharp, and they say, hey, let's do
it in C.
[C#] And you get down here, and you just go from C [C] sharp down to C.
It's only a half
[F] step down, [Gm] _ _ [Cm] _ [C] _ _
[F] _ [Gm] _ [E] _ _ but you don't have an E flat.
You don't have a low enough note.
So you've got to go [F] up.
[Gm] _ [Cm] _
_ [C] _ [F] _ [G] _ [D#] _ _ [C] _ [F] _
It doesn't sound exactly the same, I realize, but that's one of the sacrifices you make
when you run out of the range of the instrument.
So that's one way we could [Gm] do it.
[Cm] _ [C] _ _ [F] _ [Gm] _
[D#] [C] Okay, _ [F] _ [A#] _ [Cm] _ [C] _ _
[G] let's say you've got somebody who does it in D.
That's pretty common, actually.
[Am] _ [Dm] _ _ _ [G] _ [Am] _ [F] _
Now you're going to have to actually grab that note.
The open won't be it.
It'll be the first fret, since we brought [Gm] everything up a [Am] fret.
_ [Dm] _ [D] _ _
[Am] _ _ [F] _ [D] _ [G] _ _ [Am] _ [Dm] _
_ _ [Am] _ _ [F] _ [D] _ [G#] Or maybe it's E [A#m] flat.
[D#m] _ [G#] [A#] Or [F#] _ _
[A] [G] E.
[A] _ [G] _ _ _ Notice how it's all the same, no matter [F#] where you put it.
You can change keys easily, and it's really no big deal.
_ Okay?
So _ in that tune, it's not exactly a standard 12-bar blues, in that it doesn't go four bars
of one, two bars of four, two bars of one, five, four, one.
It doesn't do our standard 12-bar blues form.
What happens is we do that riff for a while, [G#m] _ [E] _ [C#] and [G#] I'm back [E] to C sharp now.
[C#] _ _ [F] Then we walk up [F#] _
_ [G] _ [G#] _ to the five chord.
[C#]
Now we were in C sharp, which is here at the fourth fret.
I was playing with my third finger.
_ For any note on the fifth string, okay?
This is here, is at the fourth fret of [G#] the fifth string.
For any note, any root note on the fifth string, the five is right below it.
So that's easy.
[C#] Okay?
So if [G#] I'm in C sharp, right down below it on G sharp, that's the five.
So I just walk up to it.
Since it's at the [F] fourth fret.
[F#] One, [G] two, [G#] three, four.
_ [F] _ [F#] _
_ [G#] _ _ I just walk up to it, and I put a chord there.
A seventh chord, because that's usually what we use in blues.
_ _ And then it goes down to the four chord.
Four chord is always two frets [F#] below the five chord. _ _
_ And that's it.
There's your five and your four.
[C#] _ _
[F#] _ [G#] _ [C#] _ _ _ [F#] _ [G#m] _ [E] _
_ [C#] _ [F] _ [F#] _ [G] _ [G#] _ _ _
_ [F#] _ _ _ _ _ _ [C#] _
_ [G#m] _ _ [C#m] _ [C#] _ And that's really, that's pretty much the whole tune.
There's nothing fancy about it.
It's just that one riff, and as soon as you see that that just comes right out of the
pentatonic box, really kind of takes away a lot of the mystery out of it.
So I hope you're able to take that with what I've shown you.
I really encourage you to listen [N] to any _ recording of that song.
There's a bazillion of them, so just pick one.
Listen to their recording and see if you can't follow along with it.
Because really, I want to give you the tools, not just show you how the song goes, but give
you the tools to take it and learn whichever version of it it is that you want to learn. _
So hopefully with what I've showed you, you can go and learn that tune however you want
to do so.
And I hope you've got something out of it, and I will see you in