Power chords

Your riff is a line of single notes. To make a section hit harder, Earth guitarists reach for the power chord: two notes, a root and the note five steps up, played together. It’s the sound of basically every heavy guitar record, and it’s one movable shape.

The shape

Index finger on the root, ring finger two frets up on the next string. Strum just those strings and let nothing else ring. Add your pinky one string higher at the same fret as the ring finger for a thicker, three-note version when you’re comfortable.

A5 — root on the low E string, 5th fret:

e|-----          e|-----
B|-----          B|-----
G|-----          G|-----
D|-----          D|--7--  <- octave (pinky, optional)
A|--7--  <- 5th  A|--7--
E|--5--  <- root E|--5--

Same grip, root on the A string: D5 is frets 5 and 7
on the A and D strings.

Two things make it clean: the thumb flat against the back of the neck for squeeze, and the underside of your index finger resting lightly against the thinner strings so a sloppy strum hits silence instead of noise.

One shape, every chord

The shape has no open strings, so it slides anywhere and the grip never changes: the fret your index lands on names the chord. Root at fret 5 on the low string is A5, fret 8 is C5, fret 10 is D5. Walk those three back and forth a few times and feel how the frets get closer together as you go up, your hand compresses a little, the grip stays the same.

This is why power chords show up in every garage on the planet: learn one grip and you can play in any key by moving your arm.

Palm muting

Power chords get their punch from palm muting. Rest the edge of your strumming hand (the karate-chop edge) on the strings right where they meet the bridge, and keep it there while you pick. Now play steady eighth notes on A5, counting “1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &”.

You’re hunting a tight, percussive chunk:

• Dead thud, no pitch? Your palm has crept forward, slide it back toward the bridge.
• Ringing like normal? Too far back on the bridge itself, nudge it onto the strings.

The sweet spot is narrow. Once you find it, lifting the palm off for one chord makes that chord explode out of the mix, that contrast is the oldest trick in heavy music, and it still works every time.

Give your riff an answer

Now bolt the two ideas together into a call and response:

1. Take 2 or 3 of the main notes from your riff, the ones on the strong beats.
2. Find those same roots on the low strings and play them as palm-muted power chords, in the riff’s rhythm or something simpler.
3. Loop the pair: one bar of riff, single notes, then one bar of power-chord answer. The riff asks, the chords answer, louder.

Keep the answer phrase dumber than the riff, its job is weight, not cleverness. When the two-bar loop goes around without a stumble, tab it out and send it to your tutor: that’s the piece you’ll record next.