The main chords you'll find him using in AC/DC's songs are the A power chord, E power chord, G power chord, D major chord, and B power chord. The first rhythm guitar part we'll learn uses single notes instead of chords. You want to make sure you're adding that rhythmic swing that Malcolm always talks about.
Power chords are key to the AC/DC sound. Particularly the most common power chords, the 'root and fifth' kind. These are famous for their heavy, low-end sound and their being technically neither major nor minor.
These three chords are a simple means of covering many melodies without the use of passing notes. There are tens of thousands of songs written with I, IV and V chords. Almost all country, blues, and early rock and roll songs are three-chord songs. A great many pop songs are also I, IV and V chord songs.
The most common chords we'll be using in country music are the I, IV and V chords, which are all major chords, which are all major chords. It's not uncommon to throw in a minor VI chord for some texture or even to change the dynamic of a section.
The first note is C, the fourth note is F, and the fifth is G. The I, IV, and V chords in the key of C are a C major triad, an F major triad, and a G major triad. We'd simply say, “The chords are C, F, and G.”
Play Thousands Of Songs With Just 3 Chords
One of the most common chord progressions used in music is known as the I-IV-V or 1-4-5, and with it you can play quite a variety of songs across many genres.
The famous four chords used in many pop song progressions are the I, V, vi and IV chords of a major key. The roman numerals represent the numbers of the major scale we begin a chord from (1, 5, 6, 4) so in C major this would be C, G, Amin, F or in G major it would be G, D, Emin, C.
Whereas the vi and ii chords use two of the three minor scales, the scale of the iii chord does not. So it doesn't function well in the circle of fifths cadence. Therefore it's mostly used as a sub for the I.
AC/DC are an Australian rock band formed in Sydney in 1973 by Scottish-born brothers Malcolm (rhythm guitar) and Angus Young (lead guitar). Their music has been variously described as hard rock, blues rock, and heavy metal, but the band calls it simply "rock and roll".
To build some riffs, you can try to work out different combinations of power chords and bass-heavy rhythmic chords. Most AC/DC riffs evolve out of blues, which means that they rely heavily on the minor pentatonic and blues scales.
These four chords are the magic I, IV, V and vi. But why are these four chords so universal?
1. C - G - Am - F (I - V -vi - IV) This just might be the most popular chord progression in Western popular music.
Therefore, a iii6-V progression probably means that the iii chord is not really a mediant chord – it's just a dominant chord with a non-chord tone, where the third scale degree resolves down to the second scale degree. This is also where you might see a III+ chord come up in minor key.
The major chord contains the 1st, 3rd, and 5th notes of a major scale. For example, below is a C major scale. The notes of a C major chord are the 1st (the root note), 3rd, and 5th notes, which are C (the root note), E and G. Notice that the octave (the 8th note) is also part of the chord.
The iii chord contains E-G-B, and the dominant V chord contains G-B-D; these share the root and third of the V chord, so the iii chord can function as a dominant chord.
G, C and D are some of the most commonly used chords in popular music and are used in literally thousands of songs (we'll list some of the most well-known later). Also, they're not too difficult to learn and they sound really good together (hence their popularity).
The C-sharp major triad, more commonly called the C-sharp major chord or simply the C-sharp chord for short, consists of the notes C-sharp, E-sharp and G-sharp.
Why is the C major scale important? Major scales are the most common scales used in music and C major is the only one without any flats or sharps (black keys). That makes it easiest, technically and visually for a beginner to learn this scale first, play music in the key of C or learn to read sheet music.