She Looks So Perfect by 5 Seconds of Summer Tutorial/Lesson
She Looks So Perfect
C, Em, Am, F
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Video transcript
Hey everyone, my name is Ellen and today I'm going to be showing you guys how to play She Looks So Perfect by 5 Seconds of Summer. So stay tuned if this is something that you want to learn. So, this song is actually going to be really super simple. Um, you're going to need your capo on your fourth fret if you want to sing it in the same key as the original song, but like I always say, you can take it off and use the exact same chords and strumming and everything, and it should sound perfectly fine. It'll just be a little bit lower than the boy song. Let's go ahead and start into the chords. There's only four of them, and they're all pretty basic. So, let me show you how those look. And I know now that I'm so dead. So, like I said, there's only four chords in this whole song and they're all really simple. So, let's go ahead and start with the first one, which is C. And that looks like this. And sounds like this. And then from there, you're going to want to go to E minor, which looks like this. And sounds like this. And then after that, you want to know a minor, which looks like this. And sounds like this. And then the last chord you need to know is F. And this is a bar chord. But if you stay tuned, I will teach you an alternate fingering. But this is the normal fingering for F. And it looks like this. And it sounds like this. But if you find this barring action a little bit more difficult, then you can go ahead and take off your first finger. You just want to place it on the first fret of the top B string. So your new fingering will look like this. And it'll sound like this. And those are all the chords you need to know for the entire song. So once you have those chords memorized, go ahead and practice transitioning between them in order because this song has the same chord order for the whole thing. So it'll go from C to E minor to A minor to F. So go ahead and kind of practice going through those chords and being able to transition between them. And when you're ready, we'll go ahead and go into some strumming patterns. Hey, let's get out. Let's get out. So, before we jump into a first strumming pattern, let's go ahead and do a practice pattern. And this is where I like to just go through the entire song and I'll play each chord once on a down beat and just kind of sing along so that I know when those chord transitions are going to be. So, let's go ahead and do an example of the beginning. Simmer down. They say we're too young now to amount to anything else. But look around. We work too damn hard for this just to give it up now. So you're going to want to keep on going and do that for the entire song just so you're familiar with where all of the chords transitions are. And once you've done that, then we'll go ahead and move on to our first strumming pattern. So, because this song has kind of a punk rocky feel to it, um, a lot of the rhythm is going to come from a percussion type sound that you can mimic with your guitar. So, this strumming pattern is going to be really great for this song. It's just going to be all downstrokes and we're going to do eight of them for each chord. And you kind of want to make the emphasis on different beats just to create that kind of rhythm. So, the first one I wanted to show you is just emphasizing the first beat of each one. So, go ahead and put your C chord on. And we're going to play this C chord eight times with downstrokes. So, 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8. And now to make our first little percussion sound, what you want to do is emphasize the first downstroke. So, kind of um strumming a little bit harder or with more like force, I guess. and then kind of let the other seven kind of follow up. So, let me give you an example of what I mean. So, with my C chord, I'm going to go down 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8. So, why don't you guys go ahead and try that with me? We've got C, E minor, A minor, F. And you can use this through the entire song, but I think the place that it sounds the best is kind of when you're transitioning between a verse and a chorus. So let's go ahead and do an example of the last line of the first verse. So I would go and of course um because you want that kind of percussive sound, we're going to add a palm mute by laying the side of our playing hand right in between these strings. and we're just going to kind of gently lay them on there so that when we play our chords, they don't ring out as much. So, let's go ahead and practice that percussive rhythm one more time. And this time, we're going to add a palm mute. So, if you don't swim, you'll move. All right. And like I said, you can definitely use this strumming pattern for the entire song as well. So, let's go ahead and do an example of what the chorus would sound like. She looks so standar. And I know now that I'm so down. And the great thing about this strumming pattern is that you can really play a lot with dynamics. So, um, you want to kind of emphasize the first beat and then as you play the rest of the seven downstrokes, you can kind of start getting them louder because you're going to be leading into the next chord. So, we have C, louder, E minor, louder, A minor, louder, F. And I think that sounds great and it's very reminiscent of how they play it in their music video. So, just a little advice if you want to try that out. All right, so now for our second strumming pattern, it's actually the same general pattern. It's all downstrokes, eight of them again, but this time we want to emphasize different beats. So, we want to emphasize the first, the fourth, and the seventh beat in this pattern. So instead of 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8, we want to go 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8. And again, I think to make the kind of percussive sound, it's very important to remind yourself to keep that little palm mute in there. So we have 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8. So, let's add in those chord transitions and see how that sounds. We've got C, E minor, A minor, F. I think that this strumming pattern in particular sounds really great with the verses, but you can also use it for the choruses. So, let's go ahead and see what the verse would sound like. Simmer down. They say we're too young now to amount to anything else, but look around. We work too damn hard for this to give it up now. And of course, you can use it for the chorus as well. She looks so perfect in my American. And I know now that I'm so down. All right. And the third strumming pattern I want to show you is also very simple. Here it is. It's just down up So what you want to realize for this strumming pattern is that the rest is just as important as the actual strumming. So we have C chord. We're going to go down up down up. And then we're going to want to kind of mute all these strings immediately afterwards. So again, I'm using the side of my right playing hand. And after I strum the C chord, down, up, down, up. I'm just going to come back and kind of tap on those strings to mute them all simultaneously. So we've got C C mute C mute C mute. So now let's go ahead and practice that strumming pattern through with the chord transitions. We've got C, E minor, A minor, F, and I think that this strumming pattern sounds the most like the chorus. So, let me give you an example of what that sounds like. She looks so perfect still there in my American barrel. And I know now that I'm so down. If you really wanted to, you could use this strumming pattern for the verses as well. Simmer down. Simmer down. They say we're too young now to amount to anything else. But look around. We work too damn hard for this just to give it up. Now, I almost forgot to teach you guys. There is a fourth strumming pattern. I would use this mostly for the parts where they're going, "Hey, hey, But um you can use it anywhere as well. It's just going to be similar to our first two patterns with all of the downstrokes, except this time we're just going to cut it in half and we're just going to have four downstrokes. So, instead of going twice as fast, 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8, we're going to kind of slow it down and do it at half tempo. So, we've got 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 C E minor A minor F. And you can probably tell that again I'm doing a little bit of a palm mute with my right playing hand for this part. So, let's go ahead and see what that sounds like with the beginning. Hey, And the reason why I'm showing you this strumming pattern is because that's kind of the beat that you hear at the beginning. Although, of course, you might have realized there's also a little bit of a picking pattern going on. Um, since we're playing this on acoustic guitar and not electric, it's going to sound a little bit different, but I did come up with a somewhat easy way to mimic that beginning portion. So, that'll be our picking pattern. And I know that. So, keep in mind for this picking pattern, if it's easier for you to put your fingers as the chord, so like C, E minor, A minor, and F. If that's easier for you to remember and play when you're picking, then that's great. But I'm going to teach you guys just the minimal amount of fingers that you need to use to play these chords. So, um, yeah, let's go ahead and start into this picking pattern. So, like I said, I'm going to show you the way to play it with the minimal amount of fingers with your left hand, but then I'll go back and show you what it would look like if you want to use those chord positions. So, let's go ahead and start off. What you're going to want to do with your right picking hand is you just want to use your thumb and your pointer finger. And you're going to want to use your thumb to pick the third G string. And you're going to want to use your pointer finger to play the second B string. And how you want to play is just do an alternating set between G and B. So with my thumb, I'm playing G. And with my pointer, I'm playing B. So, you're just kind of taking turns and picking these two strings. And now, to make it sound like the song, what you want to do with your playing hand is you're going to take your pointer finger and go ahead and put it on the first fret of your B string. All right. So, now you're going to alternate between the open G and the first fret of the B. So, you're going to want to play this through four times. So, 1 2 3 4. All right. From here, what you want to do is go ahead and take off that first finger. So, now you have no fingers on, and you're just going to pick both open strings. And again, you're going to do that four times. 1 2 3 4. So, going from the first one to the second one, we're going to go 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4. All right. From here, you're going to want to put your pointer finger back on the first fret of the B string, just like we had it earlier. But this time, you also want to add your middle finger to the second fret of the G string. All right? So, it'll sound like this G B. And again, you're going to want to go back and forth between these two for four counts. 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 All right. So, now let's go back to the beginning and play all three of those. We've got first one open, two fingers. And now for this very last section, your thumb is going to change a little bit. So now instead of playing the G string, you're going to use your thumb to play the D string or the fourth string. Okay? So now instead of going from G to B, you're going to be going from D to B. And with your left hand, you're going to want to put your ring finger on the third fret of your D string. And you want to keep your pointer finger on the first fret of the B string. And so now instead of alternating between G and B, you're going to alternate between D and B. And again, you're going to do this for four counts. 1 2 3 4. And then when you put it all together, it'll sound really similar to the song, but it'll be a little bit easier to play. So, we've got the first one open, both fingers, D again. and the reason I'm showing you this is because it sounds really great at the beginning of the song just to kind of mimic the way that they play it with their electric guitar. So, we've got Hey, Of course, right now we're going a little bit below tempo. So once you understand which fingers to keep on and leave off and you get a the feeling of the alternating pattern between your right hand, then go ahead and practice speeding it up a little bit so we can play it at tempo with the rest of the song. Hey, All right. And so once you get this picking pattern down, then you can go ahead and play that every time they sing the hey portion. And I think that that sounds really great and really similar to how they play it in their original song. Now, like I said, if it's a little bit more difficult to understand this whole left hand portion, like putting which finger down on which fret, um, I will go ahead and give you some advice. It is the exact same chords that we've been playing. So, we've got C, E minor, A minor, and F. So, if you're one of those people where it's easier for you to remember which chord you're playing and actually put the chord position down, then that will also work because the right picking hand is going to be the same. So, no matter what, your right picking hand is still going to be do this alternating pattern. But instead of just remembering which finger you're putting, you can put the whole chord down. So, let me show you what I mean. I'm going to go ahead and put my entire C chord down with my left hand and it'll sound the same. Then I switch to E minor and it's still the same. Then A minor and then F. So you can hear either way you play it, it'll have the same sound. It's just uh one way you're making all the chord positions and the other way you're just using whatever fingers you need to to produce that sound. So, you can pretty much pick which one makes more sense to you. If it makes more sense to actually put the entire chord down and pick with your right hand, then go ahead and do that. And if it makes more sense for you just to use whatever fingers you need that are involved in those chords, then either way works. So, go ahead and pick which one you like better. Hey, like I always say, these strumming patterns, you can use just one through the entire song, or you can kind of mix and match them and just use whatever you feel the most comfortable with in any part of the song that you want. And of course, like I always say, if you have a strumming pattern in mind that you kind of just naturally start playing, I think the best bet is to go with that one because that'll be the easiest way for you to sing and play the song at the same time. Now, for my little cover I'm about to do, I'm going to try to mix up these strumming patterns uh throughout the song, just so you can get an idea of what it would sound like to vary your strumming patterns and give your guitar a little bit more interest. All right, so once you're comfortable with all the chords, the transitions, and all the strumming, then we'll put all of those elements together and play through the whole song. This is She Looks So Perfect by 5 Seconds of Summer. Hey, hey, Simmer down. Simmer down. They say we're too young now to amount to anything else. But look around. We work too damn hard for this. Just to give it up now. If you don't swim, you'll drown. Don't move. Honey, she looks so perfect standing there in my American apparel. And I know now that I slow down your state is a work of art. I've got your name tattooed in it. And I know now that I'm down. Hey, Let's get out. Let's get out. Cuz this dead beat town's only here just to keep us down. While I was out, I found myself alone just thinking if I showed up with a plane ticket and a shiny diamond ring with your name on it, would you want to run away too? Cuz all I really want is you. She looks so perfect standing there in my American barrel hair. And I know now that I go down. I made a mistake straight out of 94. I've got your energy for more and I know now. Hey. Hey. You look so perfect standing there in my American barrel underwear. And I know now that I'm so down. I've got your finger tuning in. I know now. Hey. My American barrel. I know. Slow down. This state is a world. I got you in know now. Hey. So, thank you guys so much for watching my tutorial. I really hope that this helped you learn how to play it. And um if you liked this tutorial and you want to see more, then definitely click on one of these playlists and it'll take you to um different levels of tutorials that I have for beginners or intermediate or just whatever level you're at. And like I always say, if you liked this tutorial and found it helpful, then please like it down below and also subscribe to my channel so you know every time I upload a new tutorial. And I just wanted to take a minute right here to point out that I got to do a brand new kids show called Homemade Harmonies where I partnered up with the awesome YouTube channel Cartoonium. And I'll leave all of their information down in the description box below. But anyway, I wanted to give you guys a sneak peek of some of the episodes that I got to work on where I teach you how to make homemade instruments and then also a little bit of a music theory lesson. So, if you have any little kids or you know any little kids or you yourself um just are just a kid at heart and you want to check this out, then I will leave an annotation all over the screen so you can click anywhere right now and it'll take you to the very first episode and I'm really super excited and proud to show this to you guys. So, I'll just leave it going a little longer. Go ahead, click on it. You know you want to. Okay, come on. Thanks again so much for watching and I will see you guys next time. Bye.