Red Hot Chili Peppers - By The Way - Guitar Lesson

By the Way (Deluxe Edition)

2002 3:37

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About By The Way

Few RHCP tracks place the rhythm guitar work as centrally as "By the Way," and getting that part right takes more focus than the song's melodic surface suggests. John Frusciante's contribution here goes well beyond chords: layers of vocals and guitar interlock tightly, and the strumming patterns need to stay crisp and consistent throughout to hold the track together in F major. The chord movement is not particularly complex, but the right-hand rhythm has a bouncy, slightly syncopated feel that can trip you up if you rush it. Red Hot Chili Peppers built the track around a bright, clean-to-lightly-driven tone, so any sloppiness in the pick attack is very audible. If the strumming pattern keeps slipping, pull up the Practice Toolbar, isolate that section, and loop it slowed down until the rhythm is locked in your muscle memory before you bring it back up to tempo.

• The song sits in F major, which means some chord voicings benefit from open-position shapes shifted with a capo rather than all barre chords.
• The rhythmic strumming pattern is the main technical challenge: it has a syncopated bounce that requires a steady, relaxed picking hand to nail consistently.
• Frusciante layered multiple guitar and vocal parts in the studio, so live and practice versions typically focus on locking in the core rhythm part cleanly.