Acoustic Songs, Intermediate Acoustic, Song Book

Dreadlock Holiday chords

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Dreadlock Holiday | Chords + Lyrics (capo 3 and 4)

Intro (0:00)

||: Em Dsus2/A | C :||: Em | Am :||

Verse 1 (0:38)

||: Em (Bm) | Am (Bm) :||
I was walking down the street, concentrating on truckin’ right.
I heard a dark voice beside of me, and I looked round in a state of fright.
I saw four faces, one mad, a brother from the gutter.
They looked me up and down a bit, and turned to each other.

Instrumental 1 (1:12)

Chorus 1 (1:22)

| Em D | C (Bm7) | Am Bm7 | C D |
I say, I don’t like cricket, oh no, I love it.
| Em D | C (Bm7) | Am Bm7 | C D |
I don’t like cricket, oh no, I love it.

Chorus Tag (1:45)

| G | G |
Don’t you walk thru my words, you got to show some respect.
| G | G Bm7 |
Don’t you walk thru my words, ’cause you ain’t heard me out yet.

Instrumental 2 (1:55)

| Em Bm7/D | Am7 | Em Bm7 | Am7 |

Verse 2 (2:06)

||: Em | Am :||
Well he looked down at my silver chain, he said I’ll give you one dollar.
I said you’ve got to be joking man, it was a present from me Mother.
He said I like it, I want it, I’ll take it off your hands.
And you’ll be sorry, you crossed me, you’d better understand that you’re alone.
| Em Bm7/D | Am | Em Bm7/D | Am N.C |
A long way from home.

Chorus 2 (2:50)

| Em D | C (Bm7) | Am7 Bm7 | C D |
And I say, I don’t like reggae, oh no, I love it.
| Em D | C (Bm7) | Am7 Bm7 | C D |
I don’t like reggae, oh no, I love it.

Chorus Tag 2 (3:12)

| G | G |
Don’t you cramp me style, don’t you queer on me pitch.
| G | G Bm7 |
Don’t you walk thru my words, ’cause you ain’t heard me out yet.

Instrumental 3 (3:23)

Key change – move the capo up!

Verse 3 (3:34)

||: Em | Am :||
I hurried back to the swimming pool, sinkin’ Pina Coladas.
I heard a dark voice beside me say, would you like something harder.
She said I’ve got it, you want it, my harvest is the best.
And if you try it, you’ll like it, and wallow in a Dreadlock Holiday (Dreadlock Holiday).

Instrumental 4 (4:07)

Chorus 3 (4:17)

| Em D | C (Bm7) | Am7 Bm7 | C D |
And I say, don’t like Jamaica, oh no, I love her.
| Em D | C (Bm7) | Am7 Bm7 | C D |
Don’t like Jamaica oh no, I love her, oh yea.

Chorus Tag 3 (4:39)

| G | G |
Don’t you walk thru her words, you got to show some respect.
| G | G Bm7 |
Don’t you walk thru her words, ’cause you ain’t heard her out yet.

Instrumental 5 (4:50)

| Em Bm7/D | Am7 | Em Bm7/D | Am7 |

Outro Chorus (5:00)

||: Em (Bm7) | Am (Bm7) :||
||: I don’t like cricket, I love it (Dreadlock Holiday).
I don’t like reggae, I love it (Dreadlock Holiday).
Don’t like Jamaica, I love her (Dreadlock Holiday). :||

You can learn from my mistakes playing Dreadlock Holiday!

The intro is not played correctly in the video above. These would be the correct chord. VI – III – II. Em – Bm7 – Am7, should you have a capo.

Next, we move to what will also be played during the verse, chords VI – II. Em (Bm) – Am (Bm). The Bm acts as a passing chord. The same chords are played during the bridge.

The chorus uses passing chords on beat 4. Em (D) – C (Bm7) – Am7 (Bm7) – C (D). In roman numerals: VI – IV – II – IV, disregarding the passing chords.

The chorus tag simply stays on a G chord, which is chord I, only a Bm7 is added as a passing chord at the end.

Next up, we have a key change, if you move the capo up a fret you simply play the same chords again.

The advantage of having a capo is that using the chords above, you can adjust the capo up or down the neck to find what key suits your singer.

Dealing with key changes a semitone up in the middle of a song is always going to be awkward for a guitarist. The Glider Capo might be the only real practical solution to this problem.

Without a capo, the chords are from the key of Gm. If you choose to play it like this, you will need to barre most chords.

Let’s take a look at what all this would be without a capo, including those new chords for the key change. I’ve now put in the correct chords, not what I play in the video above!

Dreadlock Holiday | Chords + Lyrics (no capo)

Intro

||: Gm Dm7 | Cm7 :||: Gm (Dm) | Cm (Dm) :||

Verse 1

||: Gm (Dm) | Cm (Dm) :||
I was walking down the street, concentrating on truckin’ right.
I heard a dark voice beside of me, and I looked round in a state of fright.
I saw four faces, one mad, a brother from the gutter.
They looked me up and down a bit, and turned to each other.

Instrumental 1

Chorus 1

Chorus Tag 1

| Bb | Bb |
Don’t you walk thru my words, you got to show some respect.
| Bb | Bb Dm7 |
Don’t you walk thru my words, ’cause you ain’t heard me out yet.

Instrumental 2

Verse 2

||: Gm (Dm) | Cm (Dm) :||
Well he looked down at my silver chain, he said I’ll give you one dollar.
I said you’ve got to be joking man, it was a present from me Mother.
He said I like it, I want it, I’ll take it off your hands.
And you’ll be sorry, you crossed me, you’d better understand that you’re alone.
| Gm (Dm) | Cm (Dm) | Gm (Dm) | Cm N.C |
A long way from home.

Chorus 2

Chorus Tag 2

| Bb | Bb |
Don’t you cramp me style, don’t you queer on me pitch.
| Bb | Bb Dm7 |
Don’t you walk thru my words, ’cause you ain’t heard me out yet.

Instrumental 3

Key change!

Verse 3

||: Abm (Ebm) | Dbm (Ebm) :||
I hurried back to the swimming pool, sinkin’ Pina Coladas.
I heard a dark voice beside me say, would you like something harder.
She said I’ve got it, you want it, my harvest is the best.
And if you try it, you’ll like it, and wallow in a Dreadlock Holiday (Dreadlock Holiday).

Instrumental 4

Chorus 3

Chorus Tag 3

| B | B |
Don’t you walk thru her words, you got to show some respect.
| B | B Ebm7 |
Don’t you walk thru her words, ’cause you ain’t heard her out yet.

Instrumental 5

Outro Chorus

||: Abm (Ebm) | Dbm (Ebm) :||
||: I don’t like cricket, I love it (Dreadlock Holiday).
I don’t like reggae, I love it (Dreadlock Holiday).
Don’t like Jamaica, I love her (Dreadlock Holiday). :||

Dreadlock Holiday chord progression as roman numerals

Capo or no capo, if you understand a chord progression as Roman numerals, you can create licks and build your own guitar parts using suitable scale and chord shapes.

As I was building the intermediate acoustic course, I discovered a few mistakes in my chords in the video above.

By taking a closer look at the song, and transcribing the original bass line, I ended up with a much better way to play this song on one acoustic guitar. All will be revealed in step 8!

Below, you find the first step of the course. Here I make excuses for why I made mistakes when playing Dreadlock Holiday’s intro, verse, and bridge chords. Enjoy laughing at my expense, hopefully, you’ll learn from it!

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Dreadlock Holiday guitar lesson | Intro, verse, and bridge chords

Let’s start working on how to play Dreadlock Holiday by 10cc.

I made a few mistakes on the original recording when it comes to the chords. Unfortunately, I got the V chord mixed up with the IIIm7, an easy mistake to make!

As if that wasn’t bad enough, I also got the IV chord confused with the IIm7.

Instead of scrapping the song, I thought, you could learn from my mistakes here since these are easy mistakes to make.

This doesn’t happen all the way through the song, mainly, it’s in the opening section of the intro.

I play Em – Dsus2/A – C. Should you play this on your own, play Em – Bm7 – Am7.

Once the intro gets going, it’s all a combination of chord VI (Em) and chord II (Am/Am7).

There’s a TAB loop you can play along with, enabling you to practice all the rhythmical variations.

Dreadlock Holiday chords and strumming TAB, capo 3, intro.

Next up we have the verse. This is a much simpler affair, using no rhythmical variation whatsoever.

This is a good concept when there’s singing going on as you want the listener to focus on the vocal. Spend enough time playing along to this until it feels natural.

Dreadlock Holiday chords and strumming TAB, capo 3, verse.

Next, there are a couple of ways you could play the bridge.

The first bridge is played using plenty of 16th notes. This goes well with the floaty ohs that make up the backing vocals.

Dreadlock Holiday chords and strumming TAB, capo 3, bridge.

Should you not like this way of strumming, you could play it using longer, held chords, like in bridge example 2.

Perhaps you’ll end up, just like me, playing both!

Dreadlock Holiday chords and strumming TAB, capo 3, bridge 2.

In the course, we next dive into the chorus, the chorus tag, and the instrumental sections of Dreadlock Holiday.

This is followed by moving the capo up a fret (using an assistant) as we transpose all this up a semitone.

In the real world, this is obviously impossible so we discuss how this can be solved. Then we spend a few steps working on a second guitar part so you, me, and the singer can play Dreadlock Holiday together.

Finally, in step 8 I show you how you, without a capo, can construct a great acoustic guitar part when playing Dreadlock Holiday on your own.

This will be similar to how you’ll play I Shot The Sheriff in the advanced course.

Dreadlock Holiday is about the Moody Blues singer

Dreadlock Holiday was inspired by an experience that the singer of Moody Blues had as he went to Barbados.

Released on the album Bloody Tourists in 1978, Dreadlock Holiday started its life as a chart hit. Since then, it has been played on the radio and in nightclubs the world over, becoming especially famous for the line “I don’t like cricket, I love it!”

10cc wasn’t a reggae band, Dreadlock Holiday was an exception to their repertoire.

Still, the connection between the U.K. and the Caribbean, both musically (with British record shops importing reggae and ska music already in the 70s) and in sports such as cricket, was beautifully captured in the song.

The fact that the band isn’t too shabby at playing reggae helps too!

The lyrics that refer to how the singer shouldn’t be mugged since he likes Cricket, have more to them than one might first think.

The Brits are very proud of their influence on the world musically and also with regard to their sports. Cricket, tennis, and football, all of these games came from England.

Whether this helped the Moody Blues singer when he traveled to Barbados remains uncertain.

Dreadlock Holiday chords | Related pages

Dreadlock Holiday – 8 guitar lessons

Dreadlock Holiday by 10cc is a hilarious pop-reggae tune that is almost impossible to play on one acoustic guitar.

You’ll have to go all the way to step 8 to realize how this can be achieved without using an assistant.

Dreadlock Holiday – 8 guitar lessons.

Intermediate Acoustic Songs

The intermediate songs can not be played using just basic open-position chords. We have to move up the fretboard and play CAGED barre chords as well.

We incorporate bass lines, licks, extend chords, and even play vocal melodies. Most importantly, we invent 2nd guitar parts and play these songs together.

Intermediate Acoustic Songs.

Dreadlock Holiday – 5 similar tunes

When you can play Dreadlock Holiday's chords, try these five tunes from the song book.

10cc

With influences such as the late Beatles and Frank Zappa, 10cc was not your average middle-of-the-road band.

Similar to Supertramp, 10cc was prog/rock/pop with long instrumental sections and many styles mixed. Hits include Dreadlock Holiday and I’m Not In Love.

10cc tunes.

10cc on the web