What are "tells" that someone is playing with a capo? Song examples?

kokorodoko wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 2:47 pm What are "tells" that someone is playing with a capo? Song examples?

Open sounding chords that are too high to be in standard position? Like the voicing of a 1st position C major but its a D#. I think it is silly when people get hung up on people using a Capo. Not that you are, just brings the conversation to mind. It's just a tool to change the voicing. It's not "cheating" in any way. People that think that probably have it on vinyl and think the first record was better... all the time.

kokorodoko wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 2:47 pm What are "tells" that someone is playing with a capo? Song examples?

It can be really hard to hear, especially if you're not playing along. A lot of the chords they'd be playing capo'd you could make with some effort, until you'd realize there's a voicing that's difficult or impossible without it (like a C shape, or a D shape).

As a listener, there's not really an obvious tell. It just puts a songs key somewhere in particular and makes it physically easier to play more chords in that key.

I know more folky stuff with a capo: Uncle Tupelo- Black Eye, Bob Dylan- It's All Over Now Baby Blue.

Thanks for your answers. I just remembered someone saying they heard it on a song and I got curious.

On training your ear to pick up on that something involves a capo -

(Most of this stuff dawned on me back in the "You've got cassette/ghetto blaster/your ears..." days.)

Kooky as it will sound? The Van Halen tune "Summer Nights" was a pretty legit "Buddy gets a clue..." moment when I finally read about exactly how Eddie had recorded the guitars. Way back in the dark ages, a company named Steinberger made this floating bridge assembly called the Transtrem. In addition the that it could raise/lower strings at the same rate(as opposed to a Stratocaster...), it could raise or lower all of the strings then "Lock..." everything at the new lower or higher pitch.

If you raised all of the strings? It essentially worked like a capo with the advantage of your open strings still actually being open.

Eddie played the intro with the bridge locked up three frets(minor third...) sounding in F Major while playing everything in open position D Major Shapes. After the intro? Drops back down to standard tuning with the whole thing actually being in D Major.

Here's a "Cover..." video that replicates it with a capo. Pretty good way to get your ears acclimated to hearing when things are higher up the neck.

Now, you are armed with that "Ear..." learning.

Some time goes by, and you see the video for the Sugar number "If I Can't Change Your Mind"



Bob has the capo at the third fret, and is playing something not unlike that part that Eddie had played years before.

That happens enough times, and you start to get an ear for that a capo is in play.

Around that same time?

Dino on Letterman playing "Feel The Pain"...



Third fret capo position turns up again.

Then, you gotta develop ears for when somebody is making a play along the capo line but a capo isn't actually involved.

(Forgive the example here. It's just the most obvious one that I can thing of...)



Nuno is obviously just sliding the same shape up to E Major while letting to open A and D strings ring out underneath said E Major.

(Just about sure that the Wilco number "Sunken Treasure" does the exact same thing - maybe minus the high E string? - before shifting up another whole step past that E Major.

Moral of the story?

If the open strings are still in play, it would have to be a mighty sneaky application of the capo.

Another example of this is shifting that D Major/E major shape way up to a G Major shape when you are playing the Dinosaur Jr. number "Not You Again"



Since everything else clearly does not involve a capo? It's J. trying to pull a fast one.

Like so...

After all of that?

It's just kinda sifting through where a capo is and is not.

Take this tune. Jeff's guitar part that starts the song?(and I would guess Max's dobro?) Capo. Second fret. The second guitar part Brian is playing? No capo. You can tell from the parts that are clearly against a standard tuning high "E" string.

That Sugar Video is some of the most 90's shit I've seen in a long time. Guy brooding in an attic with a cardigan ... CHECK! camera spinning on a lazy susan... CHECK! Cut time chigachigachiga strumming... CHECK! It has it all. I always though that Sugar record sounded like what happens when Husker Du has a sleepover at Mathew Sweets house, which isn't at all a bad thing. I bet his mom bought OK Cola for the boys.