Transcribing Notes From John Neil (Head Transcriber)
Come Together – The Beatles – Song Breakdown
A great John Lennon song with a great bassy production for their Abbey Road album.
Melody
John Lennon with his signature slap-back vocal tape delay, which is timed to a 16th note triplet. In addition to what I wrote out, he also claps twice and says “shoot me” through this delay in the intro and re-intros (I’m not going to go into the irony of that!). The note range is A3-D5, the higher notes being in the outro when Paul’s doing the falsetto “yeahhhh”s.
Download the Melody Sheet Music Here
Keyboard
This is Paul McCartney’s Fender Rhodes part, added in the overdubbing session. I always thought this was Billy Preston playing, as he was all over the “Let it Be” sessions, but I stand corrected. The only difference from that is at bar 47, I had the keyboards do one of the notes of the guitar solo.
Download the Keyboard Sheet Music Here
Lead/Rhythm Guitar
Both of these parts are the same except for the solo section, beginning of verse 4, the last re-intro, and the outro. Basically, they are doubled except for when the lead guitar does solos or veers from the 5 chord rhythm part. This was done so the lead guitar has something to do while there are no solos etc.
Download the Lead Guitar Tab Here
Download the Rhythm Guitar Tab Here
Strum Guitar
This recording doesn’t have a strum guitar part, so a part was done so anyone can strum the song out.
Download the Strum Tab Here
Ukulele
Download the Ukulele Tab Here
Bass Guitar
Another great Paul McCartney bass part with lots of slides. Played with a pick. Lots of chromatic hammer-ons in the outro!
Download the Bass Tab Here
Drums
Ringo Starr’s part with very LOW tuned drums. He also placed tea towels on his toms to dampen them. It is a pretty minimal part, considering how ‘rock’ they end up sounding, probably because of all the compression and the tape machines and mixing console they were using at the time.
Download the Drum Music Here
Download the Lead Sheet Here
