Youtube How To Play Status Quo Songs On Guitar

The power of the latest reunion from Quo's 'Frantic Four' line-up makes you wonder why so many people still think of them as laughable

I went back in time on Saturday, to 30 years ago, which was the last time I saw Status Quo play live. I was a kid, and went to Milton Keynes Bowl on 21 July 1984 to see what was billed as the last ever Quo show. It turned out it wasn't; they were back together for Live Aid within a year, and recommenced a career that continues to this day. I always felt cheated by that; I wouldn't have gone had it not been the last ever show.

But on Saturday night – as part of my continuing to campaign for force Guardian music writer, pop historian, and Saint Etienne band member Bob Stanley to embrace heavy rock – I was down at Eventim Apollo (or the Hammersmith Odeon, as pretty much everyone there would have known it) for the return of the Frantic Four, the original Quo line-up. Or, rather, the second return of the Frantic Four, since they first reunited this time last year for the first time since 1981. Never let it be said Quo don't have a pretty good eye for an opportunity, because this line-up is alternating with the actual current line-up, the Frantic Four playing the deep cuts, the current line-up doing the end-of-the-pier hits set.

Stick To The Status Quo

Recent years have seen some extravagant claims made for Quo. A big Mojo feature posited their single-mindedness as a precursor to punk, and Bob suggested to me they had plenty in common with Krautrock, in their own peculiar way – making Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt the Norwood Neu! – and that the guitar pattern that introduces Caroline has rather more in common with the systems music of Steve Reich than with, say, Foghat.

I can't go that far. And I doubt Quo would be likely to make those claims for themselves. But, equally, to paint them as the world's most limited band is to do them a grave disservice. They are used a byword for predictability: I saw a review earlier of the Cure that took this usage, saying they had turned into a formulaic, Goth rock Status Quo. And that's simply unfair, probably on the Cure and certainly on the Quo.

For a start, it isn't all heads-down no-nonsense mindless boogie. Alan Lancaster's Is There a Better Way is a song that provides some justification for the proto-punk argument; the guitar intros to Oh Baby and Blue Eyed Lady venture into near baroque territory; and Rossi, as everyone who's seen him live knows, is a genuinely excellent blues guitarist, while Parfitt's frantic downstrokes on rhythm were the blurry twin of Johnny Ramone.

Status Quo Caroline Guitar Play Along Guitar Tab

But I can't deny it. Quo are at their most thrilling – and thrilling is the right word – when they bring on the boogie. Rain was astoundingly heavy, Down Down as fabulous as ever (and as lyrically puzzling: I want all the world to see/ To see you're laughing and you're laughing at me. Why? Who would want that?). Small wonder the Apollo/Odeon was as packed as I've ever seen it, with an audience as fiercely partisan as I've ever encountered. This was the first time I've ever entered that auditorium and been physically unable to make more than a couple of steps into the crowd.

So why are Quo so dramatically underrated by those outside their fanbase? It can't just be that people think they do one thing and one thing only – look at AC/DC, whose range is equally limited, but who are now regarded by anyone with half a brain as a treasure. I think it's more to do with their lack of any hint of rock star mystique. Now, you might say AC/DC lack that, too, but they do it by being more or less invisible when they're not touring, and by doing so few interviews. By staying silent, they make themselves more interesting than they actually are. Quo, by contrast, have no problems putting themselves out there – Rossi and Parfitt have told their war stories a thousand times – to the extent that they even starred in their own crime comedy last year, Bula Quo! There's no hint of mystique about them: Rossi and Parfitt are evidently a pair of genial south London fellas who do exactly what they want, which makes them appear a bit naff (though it surely contributes to the fierce loyalty they attract from their fans). Pair that with records like the execrable Margarita Time and it's not hard to argue that if a big part of rock'n'roll's appeal is about creating an image of excitement, then Quo fail dismally. On Saturday morning, I was telling a friend I was off to see Quo that night. For pleasure? he asked. Yes. He looked aghast. And I got that reaction time and time again from different people.

That's probably the way I'd feel – possibly wrongly – about the official, current Quo line-up, which groups the hit singles into medleys, and which I associate with the band's transition from rock group to family entertainers. But the Frantic Four? That's one of Britain's defining rock groups, and they deserve to be treated as such.I started working with Status Quo in 1968, when they were wearing frilly shirts and flared trousers and doing Pictures of Matchstick Men on Top of the Pops. They were never comfortable with all that silly Carnaby Street gear, though. I was a roadie for Amen Corner, and Quo were touring with Gene Pitney. Then Quo's manager told me their gear had been nicked, and they needed a new roadie. I'd been offered £10 a week by Jethro Tull, but Quo offered me £15. That extra fiver changed my life.

Safety Dance — Status Quo

The band and the gear fitted in one Transit van. After they gave me the job of playing harmonica on Down the Dustpipe, I ended up on stage every night. I was tour manager, harmonica-player and songwriter. It was a strange gig. By 1971, Francis Rossi [guitarist] and I were living in East Dulwich, London. We were both married with one kid, and he had the flat above mine. We started writing Caroline, and then we all went to Perranporth in Cornwall for our holidays. We stayed in a right grotty hotel because it was all we could afford and continued writing the song there – in the dining room on a rainy day, when we couldn't take the kids anywhere and everybody was miserable. The hotel manager wasn't impressed that there were two members of Status Quo staying at the hotel. He was even less impressed when I leant against the dining room window and fell through it. But I managed to finish the lyrics – on a napkin.

We demo-ed the song with Francis on guitar and bass and a drummer called Terry Williams who went on to be in Dire Straits. Caroline began as a slow, bluesy number, but we decided to try it at double speed, and that's how it sounded when the full band recorded it. I think it was the first thing Status Quo recorded on their own, without a producer, and it started the Quo sound. We used to set up all our gear in the studio – too much gear, really – and play like we were on stage: loud and rocky. Caroline went on to become a Quo classic, opening up pretty much every live show for the last 25 years.

There are various Carolines around the world who think the song's about them, but Caroline wasn't a real person. Usually, we'll discuss the relationship in a song we're writing – man, woman or whatever – and each of us will have someone in mind. When we performed [1975 No 1] Down Down, as far as I was concerned I was singing about the press and my ex-wife – but I'm sure Bob didn't have that in mind when he wrote his bits.

Status Quo Frontman Francis Rossi

We'd always start writing songs in each other's flats or on the road. Caroline began as a shuffle (do-dum, do-dum, do-dum), but I remember reworking it on the beach in Perranporth and in the car, too – this old Bentley we had. I remember singing: If you want to turn me on to … And we came up with that line: Together we can rock'n'roll. It was such a hackneyed expression that I thought: We can't use that! But we did.

The industry was in a period of transition at the time, and we were still trying to find our way. Most bands had gone into that stand still and be moody musicians thing. But we'd started playing these shuffling grooves. We did Roadhouse Blues by the Doors and Steamhammer's Junior's Wailing, and had played with Chicken Shack a lot, who were very bluesy. So we ended up developing this way of moving together on stage, in unison. My brother used to say to me: You're a fucking embarrassment.

The band and the gear fitted in one Transit van. After they gave me the job of playing harmonica on Down the Dustpipe, I ended up on stage every night. I was tour manager, harmonica-player and songwriter. It was a strange gig. By 1971, Francis Rossi [guitarist] and I were living in East Dulwich, London. We were both married with one kid, and he had the flat above mine. We started writing Caroline, and then we all went to Perranporth in Cornwall for our holidays. We stayed in a right grotty hotel because it was all we could afford and continued writing the song there – in the dining room on a rainy day, when we couldn't take the kids anywhere and everybody was miserable. The hotel manager wasn't impressed that there were two members of Status Quo staying at the hotel. He was even less impressed when I leant against the dining room window and fell through it. But I managed to finish the lyrics – on a napkin.

We demo-ed the song with Francis on guitar and bass and a drummer called Terry Williams who went on to be in Dire Straits. Caroline began as a slow, bluesy number, but we decided to try it at double speed, and that's how it sounded when the full band recorded it. I think it was the first thing Status Quo recorded on their own, without a producer, and it started the Quo sound. We used to set up all our gear in the studio – too much gear, really – and play like we were on stage: loud and rocky. Caroline went on to become a Quo classic, opening up pretty much every live show for the last 25 years.

There are various Carolines around the world who think the song's about them, but Caroline wasn't a real person. Usually, we'll discuss the relationship in a song we're writing – man, woman or whatever – and each of us will have someone in mind. When we performed [1975 No 1] Down Down, as far as I was concerned I was singing about the press and my ex-wife – but I'm sure Bob didn't have that in mind when he wrote his bits.

Status Quo Frontman Francis Rossi

We'd always start writing songs in each other's flats or on the road. Caroline began as a shuffle (do-dum, do-dum, do-dum), but I remember reworking it on the beach in Perranporth and in the car, too – this old Bentley we had. I remember singing: If you want to turn me on to … And we came up with that line: Together we can rock'n'roll. It was such a hackneyed expression that I thought: We can't use that! But we did.

The industry was in a period of transition at the time, and we were still trying to find our way. Most bands had gone into that stand still and be moody musicians thing. But we'd started playing these shuffling grooves. We did Roadhouse Blues by the Doors and Steamhammer's Junior's Wailing, and had played with Chicken Shack a lot, who were very bluesy. So we ended up developing this way of moving together on stage, in unison. My brother used to say to me: You're a fucking embarrassment.

Posted by zodaries14

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