[TrueTom]

"In this video, I describe a common problem with the way guitarists cover popular songs by using open chords far too regularly. The trouble with open chords is that they often ignore important melodic and harmonic features. Hence, zombie chords. So dull they sound dead. It's spooooooooky!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEWQNKbXHQk

[re]

> While it's almost always I, IV, V, and vi, we have both II or ii, and III or iii, differing on whether the third is major or minor. One way to handle this is just to drop the third from all the chords and play them open

Note that what jefftk calls "open chords" are more commonly called "power chords" (or "indeterminate" or "no3" or "5" chords). This is a distinct concept from the open/"zombie" chords that that youtube video is about. (But if you did use only power chords when covering songs, they would also usually sound quite dull!)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_chord

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_chord

[jefftk]

I've now edited the post to say "chords without thirds" instead of "open chords", which should reduce this confusion

[ARandumGuy]

I was going to link that exact video. That video does a good job of explaining the problem with simplifying more complicated chords. Yes, you can get rid of the "extra" bits and the song is still recognizable. But those extra elements are what give a song character, and simplifying it down to just a handful of chords causes a song to sound bland and generic.

[tchock23]

It explains the problem, but doesn’t really offer any solutions for those of us stuck on ‘campfire chords.’ Any suggestions for videos that do offer solutions?

[eatonphil]

I started playing guitar in middle school and I hated learning complex chords so I'd do what this video suggested and just play the stripped down/simplified version of the chord.

But it's not just about open chords. If you strip down a Bm7b5 to a Bm and play the Bm on the second fret it still has half of the character of the Bm7b5 chord.

Only recently did I start gaining the patience to learn every suggested chord and it makes a tremendous difference.

That said, I prefer piano for accompanying because the piano's tone is somehow more forgiving with basic chords than guitar is.

[BizarroLand]

Yeah, for instance, it's much easier to melodically space out or articulate the notes in a chord on a piano so they don't clunk all together like the strum of a guitar without ever crossing into arpeggio. That can make for beautiful open melodic chord playing when you're jamming out or noodling around without ever breaking the rhythm.

[usrn]

IMO: It's much better to understand how to construct chords and then play music and memorize them by trying to play both the melody and some kind of accompaniment. You end up getting stuck in situations where you need to rearrange the chord or learn a new one and you can build them up that way without drilling.

[eatonphil]

I do know the basics of chord construction but it's still way easier to think through it on a piano because keys are all linear whereas with guitar strings you have to translate across strings with varying relationships. Not saying it's impossible it just takes more work to internalize that on guitar than piano. And I'm not there on guitar.

[QuercusMax]

I'm right there with you - I have lots of experience playing songs on piano with just lyrics + chords, and I use all kinds of inverted chords without even thinking about it. "Reading" the keyboard is much easier than reading the fretboard.

One other thing that makes it harder on guitar is that the chords that are easy to play are often various inversions, so your "A" chord might actually be a first or second inversion. I'm still just learning movable shapes on the guitar, and getting the fingerings right is tricky as things grow and shrink moving up and down the fretboard, something that also isn't a problem with keyboards.

[imperistan]

Check out the chord Melody guitar course at improviseforreal.com It Will make these relations very clear and help your playing a lot. Source: happy customer myself