Weekly Basslines #195: Oh, Pretty Woman (Roy Orbison; Van Halen)

This song was requested by one of my students. Herbert requested the original Roy Orbison version, but I also transcribed the Van Halen version.

The # 224 in the Rolling Stone list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time" was originally released in 1964. Orbison co-wrote the song with Bill Dees on a Friday afternoon in July 1964 at his house. Orbison's wife Claudette came in and said she was going downtown for shopping and asked for money. Bill said, "Pretty woman never need any money". Orbison sang that line while Bill was banging his hand on the table to the beat of Mrs. Orbisons high heels clicking on the pavement when she was walking down the street.
At the time she returned the song was finished. On the following friday the song was recorded and the next friday it was released. Bill recalls: "It was the fastest thing I ever saw."

In the 90ies the song gained much fame, when it was made the title song of the movie "Pretty Woman" feat. Richard Gere & Julia Roberts.

To play along with the Van Halen version you got to tune down your bass a half step to Eb, Ab, Db, Gb:

Weekly Basslines #194: Isn't It You (Channel 5)

A very special request by Sandra from Cologne. "Channel 5" was a german pop band from Hamburg founded in 1982. I have to admit that I didn't know them prior to Sandra's request. "Isn't It You" was the hit single from their debut album, which sold 80.000 copies. All in all very nice pop music with some harmonic twists. I'm not sure about all the chords, but I think I'm pretty close :-)

Thanks to Sandra for the request and the donation!

Weekly Basslines #193: Drink New Blood (Iggy Pop)

Wow, it's been 7 weeks since my last transcription post here. I've been very busy this summer with playing lots of gigs with my band (14 shows in 7 weeks) and running summer intensive courses at my music school. And it's going on: ten more shows until the end of October and 2 Weekend Workshops besides the regular bass lessons. But anyway I want to try to catch up with my "Weekly Basslines" routine, especially because there's a bunch of requests piled up on my desk. That means I will be posting more than one transcription a week until I'm back in the schedule again.

I'm starting with a request by one of my students:
"Drink New Blood" is from the 2001 studio album "Beat 'em up".

To play this song you have to tune down your E-string a whole step to D. 

This is called "Drop-D-Tuning".

I've also recorded a video tutorial for this song: