Heart Of Gold | Chords + Lyrics
Intro
||: Em7 | D5 Em (A B D E) :||
||: Em C | D5 G :|| x3
| Em7 | D5 Em (A B D E) |
Verse 1
||: Em C | D5 G :||
I want to live, I want to give.
I’ve been a miner for a heart of gold.
It’s these expressions, I never give.
Chorus 1
||: Em | G | C | (C B A) G :||
That keep me searching for a heart of gold and I’m getting old.
Keep me searching for a heart of gold and I’m getting old.
Instrumental 1
||: Em C | D5 G :|| x3
| Em7 | D5 Em (A B D E) |
Verse 2
I’ve been to Hollywood, I’ve been to Redwood.
I crossed the ocean for a heart of gold.
I’ve been in my mind, it’s such a fine line.
Chorus 2
That keeps me searching for a heart of gold and I’m getting old.
Keeps me searching for a heart of gold and I’m getting old.
Instrumental 2
||: Em C | D5 G :|| x3
Outro
||: Em | D5 Em :||
Keep me searching for a heart of gold.
You keep me searching and I’m growing old.
Keep me searching for a heart of gold.
| Em | G | C | (C B A) G |
I’ve been a miner for a heart of gold. Ah-ha mm.
Heart Of Gold Chords: Learn the progressions
Heart Of Gold by Neil Young has some great diatonic minimalism that most songwriters and guitar players could learn from.
The intro lays out the verse chord progression but mixes it up with a riff, here’s the riff seen as just chords with the bass line in brackets:
||: Em7 (VI) | D5 (V) Em (A B D E) :||
Using an open position Em, we simply add the b7, go to a D5, back to an Em, hammer-on the bass line, and loop it. So simple, so effective.
It is much easier to understand how this is played if we look at TAB, you can access this in the other part of this lesson: Heart Of Gold – Guitar Lesson with TAB.
The verse chords, which we already heard during the intro and will later hear during the instrumental section, move in the same way but aren’t played the same.
||: Em (VI) C (IV) | D5 (V) G (I) :||
The chorus is easy to learn and play, it uses the same chords we already heard, but changes the order, like this:
||: Em (VI) | G (I) | C (IV) | (C B A) G :||
That bass line taking us down to the G chord is clever, it’s so simple, yet it feels as if it belongs to Heart Of Gold’s chords, not like it was stolen, even though it’s been played a million times before.
This is the genius of a songwriter like Neil Young, he focuses on making the song great, and all the guitar parts support the song. There is no fluff, nothing feels “stolen” or as if he wants to show off.
If you think you’ve heard the intro’s hammer-on lick somewhere before and then realize it’s Wish You Were Here, you’ll soon find out that Heart Of Gold was released three years earlier.
Here’s a chord chart I made for you.
Heart Of Gold Chord Chart | PDF + iReal Pro
In this chor chart, I’ve used intervals to describe the bass line. For the chords and lyrics, I wrote them as letters.
The main reason for this is that if you use the iReal Pro app to change the key, the intervals will still make sense.
Should you want to download this chart, here’s a PDF: Heart Of Gold Chord Chart PDF.
This chart was created using iRealPro, here’s a link to that file: Heart Of Gold iReal Pro. Using this and the iRealPro app, you can change the key.
Heart Of Gold was Neil Young’s only U.S. #1!
Released as a single from the album Harvest (1972), Heart Of Gold is Neil Young’s best-performing and only #1 single in the U.S.
Still, with sales of just 1 million, it pales in comparison to the album which did the same in just Italy! Worldwide, Harvest sold over 8 million copies.
By most seen as Neil Young’s finest work, Harvest came with two other classics, Old Man and The Needle And The Damage Done.
Collectively, these three tunes made it the best-selling album of 1972 in the U.S. which is pretty remarkable as this is one of the best years in the history of popular music.
Three other ‘72 classics come to mind instantly, Nick Drake’s Pink Moon, Lou Reed’s Transformer, and Stevie Wonder’s Talking Book.
Guest vocals on Harvest came from James Taylor, Linda Ronstadt, and Neil’s band mates Crosby, Stills, and Nash with whom he’d just recorded the album Déjà Vu a year earlier.
The early ’70s was in my opinion not just Neil Young’s golden era, but the golden era of popular music!
Heart Of Gold Chords | Related Pages
Heart Of Gold | Guitar Lesson + TAB
With this guitar lesson, you can learn to play Heart Of Gold by Neil Young using TAB and chord analysis.
| Em C | D5 G |
I want to live, I want to give…
Five similar tunes | Chords + Lyrics
- A Horse With No Name chords by America
- Knocking On Heaven’s Door chords by Bob Dylan
- The One I Love chords by R.E.M.
- One More Cup Of Coffee chords by R.E.M.
- Wish You Were Here chords by Pink Floyd
Neil Young tunes
Neil Young started out with Buffalo Springfield, briefly joined Crosby, Stills & Nash, and collaborated with Pearl Jam but is best known for his solo career.
His best tunes include Harvest Moon, Heart Of Gold, Old Man, The Needle And The Damage Done, My My, Hey Hey, and Like A Hurricane.
Neil Young on the web
About me | Dan Lundholm
This was a guitar lesson about Heart Of Gold chords, by Dan Lundholm. Discover more about him and how you can learn guitar with Spytunes.
Most importantly, find out why you should learn guitar through playing tunes, not practising scales, and studying theory in isolation.