I Feel Fine - Guitar Tutorial (4K) - Epiphone Ej160e - Gretsch Tennessean - Ft.

October 18, 1964 was a marathon recording day for The Beatles. They needed to complete a fair amount of songs for their upcoming album aswell as a single before Christmas. They met at EMI for a 2:30-11:30 pm session which resulted in the completion of eight songs; five of which were covers that the group was already fairly familiar with.

At about 4:30 in the afternoon of October 18, the group started recording I Feel Fine. Problems quickly arose, however. First off, the key was too high (in A. A whole step higher... 🥲) and secondly, Lennon could barely sing and play the distinctive riff at the same time. Take one quickly broke down. Between take one and two, the group brought the key down to G. Lennon found the drop in key helpful, but still had trouble singing and playing the riff simultaneously. Also, the solo hadn't been worked out yet so Harrison just played the riff in unison with Lennon. This take also broke down before the song could be performed in its entirety.

Take five was good, but not satisfactory. The problems that Lennon was having with singing and playing were resolved by take six as the group had decided to overdub vocals later and focus on recording a rhythm track. take six was complete but also not satisfactory.

Take nine was the best run through of the rhythm track. Onto this, Lennon recorded his vocals and then double tracked them. McCartney and Harrison overdubbed double tracked harmony vocals and Harrison recorded his double tracked guitar solo. After that the song was complete!

THE GUITAR PARTS:
The distinctive guitar riff was heavily influenced by a record called "Watch Your Step" by Bobby Parker. The Beatles were very familiar with the record as it was part of their live repertoire in 1961 and 1962. The record was also one of Lennon's favorites.

Lennon played Harrison's 1962 Gibson J160e through a Vox AC100. Take note of a couple of things here:
0:08. THE INFAMOUS TRILL. No, its not an overdub. No, its not any kind of delay or echo effect. And no, its not him doing hammer-ons and pull-offs. All it was was Lennon simply playing two strings at essentially the same time. These two strings were the D and G; both right next to each other. When playing the riff during that section, you're fretting the D string at the 14th fret and the G string at the 11th fret. These notes are E and F# respectively. Thats all it is; Lennon's picking technique.

At 0:21, Lennon plays a D7 and C7 at the 10th and 8th frets respectively. This is the only time it happens in the song. Every other time has him playing those chords in a "C" shape lower on the neck.

Lennon plays an open D chord in a couple spots during the bridges. I thought that was kind of interesting.


Harrison played his 1963 Gretsch Tennessean, also through a Vox Ac100.
Take note of a few things here;

At 0:40, he goes from a D to a C and quickly goes to a Bb power chord before going back to G. This only happens once in the song.

During the bridges, Harrison sticks mainly to the E, A and D strings. He picks within the chord shapes mainly using the I and the V. He quickly plays the mVII (G) in the Am barre chord during both of the bridges (as shown at 0:52 and 1:48)

Cool little riff at 2:06.

At the beginning of the fadeout (2:10), Lennon and Harrison both play the main riff in unison for one time. Harrison then breaks off into a completely different riff. Its a neat contrast.



GEAR USED:
Epiphone EJ160e
Gretsch Tennessean
Vox AD100

Big thanks to ‪@gioelmermusic325‬ for providing the low A hit on his Hofner 60th Anniversary 500/1!