Me and The Devil Blues- Tutorial + Tab

 


This is my version of the classic blues tune Me and The Devil Blues by Robert Johnson. Like many of his songs, this one has been covered many times by different artists. I have tried to keep this as close to Johnson's original as possible. It is essentially a 12 bar blues tune, as many of Johnson's tunes are.

It is played on a guitar in standard tuning, is in 4/4 time, and is in the key of A.

Below are the lyrics, some tips to help you play this piece, and links to download the tab.

Me and The Devil Blues Downloadable Tab - Power Tab - PDF - TXT
 
Here are the lyrics to the song if you wish to sing along:
 
Lyrics 
 
Early this morningWhen you knocked upon my doorEarly this morningWhen you knocked upon my doorAnd I say, "Hello, Satan"I believe, it's time to go
 
Me and the devilWalking side by sideMe and the devilWalking side by sideAnd I'm gonna see my woman'Til I get satisfied
 
See see, you don't see whyLike you'a dog me 'roundSay, I don't see whyPeople dawging me aroundMust be that old evil spiritDrop me down in your ground
 
You may bury my bodyDown by the highway sideYou may bury my bodyDown by the highway sideSo my old evil spiritCan greyhound bus that ride
 Source: musixmatch
  • Palm Muting - In Johnson's original he uses a lot of heavy palm muting when playing the bass notes on the guitar. Palm muting involves resting the palm of your picking hand against the strings near the bridge. This allows some of the note to ring out but deadens it significantly. In this song you only mute the lowest three strings on the guitar with your palm, leaving the highest three to ring out as normal. This can be quite tricky to make sure only three strings are muted and pick the notes at the same time. If you are having trouble with this, just leave out the palm muting and let the bass notes ring out as normal.

  • Mixing up the Bass Line - As Johnson did in many of his songs, as did many other blues artists, is mix up the duration of the notes in the bass line. Instead of just playing 1/4 notes on every beat of the bar, he adds in 1/8 notes too, which are played with a triplet feel. Timing these bass notes can be tricky especially when trying to co-ordinate the melody line with it. If you are having difficulty, just initially play all the bass notes as 1/4 notes on every beat of the bar. Once you are confident with that, start gradually adding in the 1/8 notes in the bass line.

  • Playing all the Verses -The song has four verses which are all very similar in terms of the 
guitar parts. Instead of repeating it, I have included the intro (bars 1-3), verse 1
 and 3 (which has the short solo) and the outro (bars 27-29). If you want to add in 
other verses just repeat from bars 5-16. As with many blues pieces, this has a very impromtu feel about it in the verses. Thus, when playing the verses, you dont have to try to play all the notes verbatim. You can add in and miss out notes as you see fit and make this piece your own.
 
This
 is about all I need to say about this piece. It is quite a 
straightforward fingerstyle blues piece. If you are comfortable doing palm muting across the bass strings, then this shouldn't be too tricky to learn.


Thanks for Reading,

Neil



















































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