Taxonomy of Rhythm Guitar Parts (Strumming)

Community Hub General Questions (not lesson specific)
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One of the things I am working on right now is improving my strumming. I was trying to brainstorm a list of songs I wanted to learn to make sure I’m covering my bases and I started to come up with a bit of a taxonomy of rhythm parts. This doesn’t include more riffy type stuff—it’s mostly for my strumming practice.

This isn’t meant to be comprehensive or definitive but just for fun I thought I’d share and see what categories you all think I am missing, or other songs that might fit into the categories. (Current list is biased towards my taste…)

Driving: Strong, propulsive rhythm guitar that push the song forward, often with strong eighth- or sixteenth-note beats. Probably could include punk as well as Bo Diddley-like grooves?

  • Learning to Fly by Tom Petty
  • American Girl by Tom Petty
  • Last Nite by The Strokes
  • Should I Stay or Should I Go by The Clash

Laid-Back: Almost the opposite… The rhythm guitar’s trying to hold everything back.

  • Fade Into You by Mazzy Star
  • Wild Horses by The Rolling Stones
  • Bulletproof… I Wish I Was by Radiohead

Blues Shuffle: The original rock and roll shuffle

  • Johnny B. Goode by Chuck Berry
  • Get Back by The Beatles

Jangle Pop: More texture and some arpeggiation

  • Mr Tambourine Man by The Byrds
  • The One I Love by REM
  • Under the Milky Way by The Church

Off-beats, Reggae, and Ska

  • Three Little Birds by Bob Marley (and many others!)
  • Roxanne by The Police
  • Oxford Comma by Vampire Weekend

Funk Guitar

  • Le Freak by Chic
  • Get Up by James Brown
  • Don’t Stop by Red Hot Chili Peppers

Jimi-style Embellishments combining rhythm and lead playing with a lot of left-hand embellishments

  • The Wind Cries Mary by Jimi Hendrix (and a lot of Jimi songs)
  • Under the Bridge by Red Hot Chili Peppers
  • Slow Dancing in a Burning Room by John Mayer
  • Yellow Ledbetter by Pearl Jam
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Good song list.

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Nice list. Here are two ideas:

  1. Make sure you have some 3:4 or 6:8 songs in your list. (You may have already, I don’t know all the songs you listed.)
  2. You could (depending on your musical tastes) include a folk/country guitar category. Many country and folk songs feature a strum pattern where you just hit the bass note on some beats (often 1 and 3) and than strum the treble strings on the other beats. Johnny Cash’s boom-chicka is the classic example, but there are many others. Many pop songs (think Neil Young) also adopt this sort of bass-treble strumming.
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I might add a Zeppelin song in there some where. Maybe Folk Rock type. The acoustic songs are for sure doable and sound killer. Something like Hey Hey what can i do or Gallows Pole. I dont know.

I love you list like it is so. :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:, i was messing with 2 songs yesterday, zep was kne of them. :sign_of_the_horns:t2::smiling_face_with_sunglasses: anyway great mix of rad songs.

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Maybe a category of “Guitar as a background instrument”

I’m not sure background is the right word. I’m trying to say one where another instrument is the main focus. There’s some skill involved in staying out of the way to add emphasis or support when required.

Songs in the category:

  • Perfect by Fairground Attraction
  • You could pick loads of songs by the piano playing rocks stars: Elton John, Stevie Wonder, Meat Loaf
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Re the Blues Shuffle. I wouldn’t characterise these songs as Blues Shuffles, or Rock Blues shuffle. They are more straight eighths.

Songs like The Sweet Home Chicago and the much quicker Crossroads are good examples of the Blues Shuffle structure

Cheers, Shane

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