[ProtectOurFreedom]

Elvis Presley’s ‘Jailhouse Rock’, The Kinks’ ‘You Really Got Me’, and The Who’s ‘My Generation’.

I’ll have to go back and give a re-listen.

[Red Badger]

Tesla......

[Chode]

three chord rock&roll...

[dfwgator]

That chord that started “A Hard Day’s Night”

[linMcHlp]

Hoover vacuum cleaner

maybe

[Publius]

Ping.

As I pointed out to you, Mozart used the power chord to end the Kyrie in his Requiem in 1791.

[brianr10]

The basic blues shuffle is a power chord.

[MV=PY]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt2zubHcER4

[Jim Robinson]

Michael

[Honest Nigerian]

Jimi Hendrix is the inventor. Don’t gaslight us!!

[Flatus I. Maximus]

The Who. “I Can See For Miles.” It was nothing *but* power chords, and the song that introduced the sound to an entire generation of aspiring rock guitarists.

[ComputerGuy]

I just move around until it sounds right.

Mississippi John Hurt

[Yardstick]

“...power chords are played by placing one finger across two or three adjacent strings on the fretboard.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Okay I gotta crank my nitpicker up to 11 for a second...

What he’s describing isn’t a power chord. A textbook power chord uses two fingers on adjacent strings spaced a fret apart. This gives you the root note plus the fifth on top.

When you do the one finger trick across two strings like he describes, you’re playing the fifth plus the root on top. So the notes are sort of flipped. The sound is similar but isn’t technically a power chord IMO.

The riff in Smoke On The Water uses this kind of flipped, quasi power chord. The classic mistake is to play it with true power chords — an easy mistake to make because it’ll sound similar, but it won’t be quite right. Rick Beato actually has an episode about it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mX0IInspcgg

And if you put one finger across three strings then you’ve got the major third involved which is definitely not a power chord. It’s a major triad. An example of this would be the A chord in Rumble by Link Wray.

[Songcraft]

Thomas Alva Edison invented the power cord...


        


...oh...never mind.

---

On a side note, when Thomas Alva Edison inserted the first power cord into the socket, he got a big shock, and let out a yowling howl, inventing the rock howl, later used by many rock bands in the future, like this one:


      "Werewolves Of London" - Warren Zevon

[minnesota_bound]

Maybe this is a power chord?

Eric Clapton - Layla
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fX5USg8_1gA

[KevinB]

Of course, it’s not a chord at all since it’s only two notes. It’s an interval.

[.44 Special]

I don’t know who invented the power chord but George Thorogood exemplifies it.

[sauropod]

I did. Next question. :-)