PRESENCE - Volume 78
Inspiration For Guitarists
What do "Country Roads" by John Denver and "Crazy Train" by Ozzy Osbourne have in common?
Or "Time" by Pink Floyd and "Stand By Me" by Ben E. King?
More than you'd think. All four are built from the same major scale — A Major — using the same handful of chords.
That's the thing about music: there are only a few core ingredients, and nearly every song you love is some combination of them. John Denver and Ozzy Osbourne used the same raw materials to build completely different houses. Different vibe, different genre, same foundation.
This is exactly why I keep coming back to the three essential skills — the Number System, the CAGED System, and the Landmark Pentatonic System. Learn the shape of one key, and you've got a head start on every song written in it.
As you learn songs in the same key, listen for the overlap — shared chords, shared scale, riffs that borrow from the same handful of notes. You'll start noticing that songs that sound worlds apart are, underneath, built the same way.
Below are a handful of songs in each of the most guitar-friendly keys. As you learn them, listen for the overlap — shared chords, shared scale, riffs that borrow from the same handful of notes. You'll start noticing that songs that sound worlds apart are, underneath, built the same way.
Key of C / A minor
Let It Be — The Beatles
No Woman No Cry — Bob Marley
Breakdown — Tom Petty
Californication / Otherside — Red Hot Chili Peppers
Ain't No Sunshine — Bill Withers
Stairway to Heaven — Led Zeppelin
Miss You / You Can't Always Get What You Want — The Rolling Stones
Imagine — John Lennon
Dust in the Wind — Kansas
The Long Run — The Eagles
Have You Ever Seen the Rain / Down on the Corner — Creedence Clearwater Revival
You Got Lucky — Tom Petty
Old Love — Eric Clapton
Still Got the Blues for You — Gary Moore
Bertha — The Grateful Dead
Key of A / F# minor
Wagon Wheel — Old Crow Medicine Show
Time — Pink Floyd
Tuesday's Gone — Lynyrd Skynyrd
Stand By Me — Ben E. King
Refugee — Tom Petty
The Weight — The Band
Jack and Diane — John Cougar Mellencamp
Country Roads — John Denver
Peggy-O — The Grateful Dead
Key of G / E minor
Brown Eyed Girl — Van Morrison
Nothing Else Matters — Metallica
Heart of Gold — Neil Young
Paranoid — Black Sabbath
Take It Easy / Already Gone / Lying Eyes — The Eagles
Wish You Were Here — Pink Floyd
Knockin' on Heaven's Door — Bob Dylan
Turn the Page — Bob Seger
Runaround — Blues Traveler
Wonderful Tonight — Eric Clapton
The Pretender — Jackson Browne
The Joker — Steve Miller Band
Pink Houses — John Cougar Mellencamp
Friend of the Devil — The Grateful Dead
Key of E / C# minor
Blue Sky / Melissa — The Allman Brothers
Slow Dancing in a Burning Room — John Mayer
Your Love — The Outfield
Don't Stop Believin' — Journey
Just What I Needed — The Cars
Photograph — Def Leppard
High and Dry — Radiohead
Peaceful Easy Feeling — The Eagles
Limelight — Rush
Born to Run — Bruce Springsteen
Rock and Roll Band — Boston
Jack Straw — The Grateful Dead
You'll Accompany Me — Bob Seger
Piece of My Heart — Janis Joplin
All Along the Watchtower — Jimi Hendrix
Crash — Dave Matthews Band
Best of You — Foo Fighters
Message in a Bottle — The Police
Listen to the Music — The Doobie Brothers
Echoes — Pink Floyd
Beast of Burden — The Rolling Stones
Key of D / B minor
Bad Moon Rising — Creedence Clearwater Revival
Comfortably Numb — Pink Floyd
With or Without You — U2
Harvest Moon — Neil Young
I Can't Tell You Why — The Eagles
American Girl / The Waiting — Tom Petty
End of the Line — Traveling Wilburys
Mr. Tambourine Man — The Byrds
Dead Flowers — The Rolling Stones
Margaritaville — Jimmy Buffett
P.S. Learning songs in the same key isn't a party trick — it's the fastest way to internalize the Number System. Inside the Essential Skills Course, this is exactly how we build it out, key by key.