- Hi, it's Trixie Mattel, and this is my Artist Check-In.
(guitar strumming)
Now, you might know me as a little bit of a country diva,
a little bit of somebody who has some yeehaw in their step,
a little bit backwoods,
a little bit up a tree playing a guitar barefoot
at the age 11, and you're right.
But once in a while, I do like to plug in
and get a little gross.
I mean, drag and rock music,
it's very relatable to each other.
It's aggressive, it's sexy, it's dirty.
It's sex, drugs, rock and roll.
And wigs and makeup, there's a lot of makeup
in rock and roll.
And I love girl bands.
I mean, I love The Donnas.
I love The Runaways.
I mean, I just love girl rock music.
And so when I wrote this song, "Hello Hello,"
I wanted to write something simple.
That was basically four chords.
That was a little bit, like, "What I Like About You."
A little bit, "Take it Off."
A little bit, just simple and chewy and crunchy,
but like the lyrics would have a wink to them,
that makes it kind of flirty and feminine and sexy.
I've never had sex in drag,
and I haven't even thought about it,
but I have thought, what if a day comes where I want to,
and I'll be mad that I didn't do it
when I was like, young and hot.
I mean, look at me, I mean, I could have any man I wanted.
So this song, "Hello Hello," is sort of about
what I think it would be like to go out somewhere
and put the heat on someone and take them home in drag.
If you wanna learn a little bit of guitar, this is it.
So, this song is basically four chords,
and it's basically all bar chords.
So, the first bar chord we're gonna use is
you know, it's a B major.
(guitar strumming)
And I have a little bit of crunch turned up
on the monitor over there.
We have a little fender twin plugged in.
You can hear the tubes buzzing
and it's better to just put a little crunch on
because it makes very simple guitar playing sound cool.
And I would say I'm an above average acoustic guitar player,
but I would say I'm a below average electric player,
but that's okay.
That's what I love about the Telecaster is,
it has some movability and some speed to it.
The action is so low.
You would think I really know what I'm doing.
This guitar's gone all around the world with me.
I just love this thing.
Look at it.
Custom pink glitter finish with gold hardware.
Come on, just obsessed with it.
So this song is a B.
(guitar strumming)
Second chord is an A.
(guitar strumming)
The third chord, this is when it gets wacky.
We're doing a D.
(guitar strumming)
And then an E.
(guitar strumming)
So it's a, B, A,
and then D, E.
And there's a little bit of magic there,
'cause it goes,
(guitar strumming)
easy, fancy.
It's one little pinky move and people are like,
wow, are you good at what you're doing?
It's, listen, showmanship, drag, music,
it's all about fooling people.
Okay, put a little razzle dazzle on, put a wig on,
put an earring on.
They don't know what they're seeing
and they don't know what they're hearing.
They're drunk.
So... (guitar strumming)
That's the first part.
So, E,
A,
D, E, E.
And you do that fancy little...
(guitar strumming)
Just for a little sparkle.
On the recording, I believe it's,
(guitar strumming)
I didn't write that.
I wrote it at home to be,
(guitar strumming)
And then I guess when we recorded it, I got fancy.
I drink.
(guitar strumming)
See, I mean, this is like truly high school level guitar.
I grew up in the country.
I was self-taught, I don't have the mad skills.
I mean, I actually thought I was good at guitar
until I started working with professional guitar players.
And I was like,
okay, I'm nothing, but I have enthusiasm, I have creativity.
And the great thing about songwriting on the guitar is,
give me three chords and the truth.
You don't have to be virtuosic.
You don't have to know everything.
You don't even have to know music theory.
I mean, some of the most prolific guitar songwriters
of our lifetimes were completely blind and deaf.
That's not true.
So it'll be,
♪B, B, A ♪
That's the first half.
And then
♪ D, E, E, B, B, A, D, E, E ♪
And now, this is when it gets spunky.
The verses we're gonna do,
(guitar strumming)
It's the same chords but it's just power chords.
♪ B, A, D, E, E ♪
♪ They barely want to ♪
♪ You better ♪
So it's just,
♪ Play, play, play, play, play ♪
♪ Sing, sing, sing ♪
♪ Play, play, play, play, play ♪
♪ Sing, sing, sing ♪
Again, not coordinated, not a great musician.
I have to do one or the other.
So then it goes back to the intro.
♪ Meet me in the middle ♪
See, once you master intro, we use it like 10 times.
I'm telling you, this is a secret easy song.
Watch the music video.
Why do you think it's all dancing?
I had to do something.
Now, this is when it gets wild.
When I'm songwriting, I love to do sections
that are very easy for your ear to understand
into sections that are a little special.
And that way it keeps a song that's very repetitive
from being just over and over and over and over, you know?
So,
(guitar strumming)
This is when it gets wild.
(guitar strumming)
So it goes to G.
(guitar strumming)
And then to E.
(guitar strumming)
And then back to the riff.
(guitar strumming)
But if you're really wild, I mean,
this is if you're really wild,
this section ends on this.
(guitar strumming)
Instead of going all the way down to that G,
(guitar strumming)
you can do this G.
(guitar strumming)
And that's kind of fun.
If you wanna be real nasty,
then you could do like a,
(guitar strumming)
Slap it around.
(guitar strumming)
Woo!
(guitar strumming)
I do the lower one.
'Cause I like the way that sounds open.
I mean, most of the song is situated up here.
So I like doing this E open 'cause I can really do like a,
(guitar strumming)
It just makes you feel like you're good, when you're not.
Guitar is all trickery, all right.
My grandpa, musician his whole life,
who taught me how to play the guitar,
he said, music is 40% how good you are
and 60% how good you look doing it.
Obviously I took that to heart.
So,
(guitar strumming)
So then it's like this blues note.
You're like,
♪ I'm just the kinda papaboom ♪
(guitar strumming)
And the second time, G, E,
and then it's a C, then F sharp.
Can you believe that?
How did I think of that?
♪ G, E, ♪
Back to the riff.
♪ Papapa papapa ♪
♪ G, E ♪
Then C.
♪ Bababa ♪
♪ F sharp ♪
And then hello, hello.
(guitar strumming)
And then the second verse is this again.
(guitar strumming)
So easy, right?
So then, it's verse, chorus again and the pre chorus.
(guitar strumming)
Woo!
(guitar strumming)
There's some other stuff sprinkled in there
that admittedly, I didn't play.
(guitar fingering)
Stuff like that.
There's little stuff like that, that you can add,
but you need a friend
'cause you only got two hands.
So then the bridge is,
(guitar strumming)
♪ Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah ♪
It's long notes.
♪ Hey, hey ya, hello ♪
It's just the one kind of sustained and it's a slow build.
So this is when your drummer would be like,
(drummer beat)
You know and you was kind of, you just do like,
(guitar strumming)
And then there's a pause,
♪ Hello? ♪
♪ Hello ♪
And then it's back to the pre-chorus.
(guitar strumming)
Woo!
(guitar strumming)
♪ Hello, hello ♪
And then the whole outro is just,
♪ Wanna talk, talk, talk to talk ♪
♪ Tell me about it ♪
♪ You wanna talk, talk, talk to talk ♪
♪ Tell me about it ♪
♪ Hello ♪
(guitar strumming)
It's very easy.
You can do it.
When I wrote this song, I was so excited to play it
for my band and help them hear the demo.
'Cause I was like, they're gonna love this and they do.
I know what they like
and they like songs that are easy to learn.
So I'm not saying they're lazy.
I'm just saying they're slow.
Anyways, that's how you play "Hello Hello".
I hope it's a little brush up for you,
if you already play a little bit.
I hope it's a great intro, if you've never played before.
And if you're a superstar who plays way better than me,
tag me on Twitter, I wanna hear you shred it
and I'll feel all bad about myself, rightfully so.
So thank you for learning to play this with me.
I'm Trixie Mattel and this was my Artist Check-In.