Homegrown Talent Pt. 2!

Hey guys, it’s Tuesday which means here’s the next featured song review along with a video cover. This week I will continue to stick with the theme ‘homegrown talent’ by looking at actually another band hailing from Mississauga, Ontario. This band goes by the name of Billy Talent and they have achieved tremendous amounts of international acclaim. These guys, to those that have been following their career from somewhat early on, might seem that they have really exploded onto the international circuit in a very short period of time. In 2003, Billy Talent released the album that first drew the attention of the masses. Personally, I did not think much of the band when I first heard their song ‘Cut the Curtains’. In fact, I actually thought the song was pretty annoying. After being encouraged by many of my friends to give many of their other songs a listen, I was pretty blown away by the range of styles that appeared on the album. There are songs such as ‘The Ex’ and ‘This Is How It Goes’, which is actually the song I have covered. These songs have such aggression driven by the rawness of the guitars along with Ben’s powerful vocals. I have never been a fan of ‘screamo’ type music and angered a friend so much when I first referred to Billy Talent as a screamo band. Then there are songs such as ‘Try Honesty’ and ‘Nothing to Lose’ where they still stick to their aggressive assault but incorporate somewhat of a ballad feel that makes the songs appealing to a wider range of listeners as well as their main fan base. The way Ben and Ian blended their vocal harmonies together at first kind of bugged me but I believe it just took somewhat of a while to appreciate. Ian has a bit of a ‘whiney’ feel to his singing, and I hate describing it like that but it is the way it sounds to me. Nevertheless, the way they harmonize is amazing; definitely one of my favourite singer combos. The band has since then gone to produce a second and third album that have too succeeded internationally while keeping true to their sound.

‘This Is How It Goes’ is the first song I have covered in this series that is in a different tuning other than standard. Billy Talent writes all their songs in a ‘Drop D Tuning’. Drop D means that the low E string is tuned one step lower to a ‘D’ note. This can be done by tuning the E string with your finger placed on the seventh fret along with the open A string until they match. The song starts off with what will be used as the verse in the coming sections of the song as well. It is all single notes played on the A string following a progression of D, C#, E and F. The chorus I am not completely sure on but the way I play it is to start off ringing the open D chord and then barring the G, B and high E strings along the tenth fret. The next part of the progression is an A# chord followed by the same barring. Then an F with the barring now along the fifth fret and then the progression ends with a short riff stemming from an A note. The only other different part to the song is the bridge. Since I don’t know the names of the chords being used here I will break them down in a ‘fret(string)’ format, for example 5(b) means fifth fret on the b string. The chords for the progression are 7(g)6(b)5(e), 4(g)3(b)5(e), 3(g)3(b)5(e) and 2(g)1(b)3(e). This is by far probably the worst breakdown I have given of one of the songs in writing form so I am hoping the video might clear up some confusion and yes, I am aware I slipped up a couple times. Well that’s that for this week so check back for next week’s review! 


PS. I forgot to include that if you have been checking my 'Planned Covers' page, you would have noticed I was supposed to do 'Viking Death March' by Billy Talent instead. I liked this song more so I changed my mind, enjoy!