“That’s a spelling mistake, right? What the hell are barre chords?”
Barre is a french word that means, er, ‘bar’ or ‘rod’. In guitar terms it refers to the technique of placing one finger across several strings (like a bar). The great thing about them is that there are four basic shapes that can be moved around the fretboard - so you can learn loads of chords.
“Four shapes that can be played everywhere; I’m guessing everyone uses them, then?”
Thar’s right! These essential shapes are found pretty much everywhere. Rock, punk, metal, indie, blues, country are a few styles, but we can’t overstate how popular they are. The Ramones are a great place to start and Arctic Monkeys’ stuff is barre chord heavy too.
“Okay, you’ve made your point.…