Was showing a part from Big Trummors to a student and this made me think about the power of 5 chords once again. There’s something very clever with the main part / main riff and how lines and melodies are added on top of it.

Big Trummors-powerchords-clip

1. THE POWER CHORDS

Here’s the simple foundation. The power chords which were the initial start for the whole composition. All the chords actually go perfectly in G minor scale. So with these powerchords only you would easily hear it as minor.

2. THE MELODY

But let’s put the melody line on top. This came as the second thing when I was composing this track. Huuuh, The B note makes the G5 chord turn into major chord. But it works, and makes everything sound suddenly much more interesting.

3. ARPEGGIATOR

Later I added this Alice Cooper “poisonish” guitar arpeggiationg line on top of it all. It gives some of the chords more color. This arpeggiatior can be heard after the solos.

4. THE HARMONY

If you stack up all the harmony of all these parts together you could come up with such chords as these. For something like a single acoustic guitar arrangement these chords could come up handy. Go fo it!

There’s actually more stuff happening on top with all the synths and strings but I let you analyse it as your homework.
Big Trummors is a proof of how strong and clever power chords actually can be. Powerchord leave a lot of room for the melodies and other instruments to play on. With a little extra harmony stuff on top of these chords you can do amazing sh*tuff!

If  you wish to practice some of these parts individually here’s the Guitar Pro 6 file for you: Big Trummors-stack.zip And here’s Guitar Pro 5 version.