How to Play Reggae Guitar and Get That Laid-Back Groove
by Simon Candy
As guitar players, we tend to get used to filling space. We strum the beat, keep things moving and often feel that if we're not playing something, we're somehow not doing our job.
Reggae guitar turns that idea on its head.
With reggae, playing less can actually make you sound better.
Instead of constantly filling the space, you learn to leave gaps.
Instead of sitting right on top of the beat, you can sit a little further back.
And instead of long, ringing chords, you use short bursts of sound that appear and disappear almost as quickly as they arrive.
The result is that wonderfully relaxed groove you immediately associate with reggae. And even if reggae isn't a style you plan on playing regularly, it's a great way to develop your rhythm guitar playing because it teaches you something that applies to all kinds of music:
Groove isn't just about what you play. It's also about what you leave out.
Watch the video below to learn more:
Reggae Guitar Rhythm Starts With the Upbeats
At its simplest, one of the most important things you can do to create a reggae feel is shift your accents away from the main beats.
If you're counting:
1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +
the reggae feel often comes from emphasising the “+” rather than the numbers.
This offbeat guitar strumming can feel quite different if you're used to placing most of your attention on beats 1, 2, 3 and 4.
A simple way to experience it is to keep your strumming hand moving down and up while muting the downstrokes and allowing the upstrokes to sound:
Down – UP – Down – UP – Down – UP – Down – UP
The downstrokes are muted, and the upstrokes give you the chord.
You don't necessarily have to play every upbeat. There are all sorts of variations you can create. The important thing is that your accents are happening in those spaces between the main beats.
Even with a very simple chord progression, this one change immediately starts to give you that reggae character.
Keep Your Chords Short
Where you place the chords is only part of the sound.
How long you allow them to ring matters just as much.
If you strum an upbeat and let the chord continue ringing, you'll lose much of that distinctive reggae guitar rhythm.
Instead, you want the chords to be short and sharp.
This is where silence becomes part of the rhythm.
You're popping into the space with a chord and then getting out again. The chord makes its statement and disappears, leaving room for everything else happening in the music.
Listen to a good reggae guitar part, and you'll often notice that the guitar isn't doing very much.
But what it is doing is sitting in exactly the right place.
A rhythm part doesn't have to be busy to be effective. In fact, adding more can sometimes make it less effective.
Try taking a simple chord progression you already know and play it using nothing but short chords on the upbeats. Resist the temptation to fill the gaps.
Listen to what happens to the groove when you allow the silence to remain.
Let Your Reggae Groove Breathe
This idea of space is one of the most useful things you can take from a reggae guitar lesson and apply elsewhere in your playing.
Imagine having a conversation with somebody who never stops talking.
No pauses.
No gaps.
Every bit of silence immediately filled with more words.
It would get exhausting pretty quickly.
Rhythm guitar can suffer from the same problem.
It's easy to become so focused on strumming that you feel you need to keep producing sound. But rhythm isn't created by sound alone. The gaps between the sounds are every bit as important.
Reggae makes this particularly obvious because the space is such a noticeable part of the groove.
You're filling a space and then ducking out.
Filling a space and ducking out again.
Once you start hearing rhythm this way, it can change how you approach other styles too.
Rather than automatically asking, "What else could I play here?" you might start asking:
"What could I leave out?"
Sometimes that's the thing that makes a rhythm part sound more musical.
Don't Rush the Reggae Feel
There's another important part of reggae guitar rhythm that can be harder to put into words.
It's the feeling of sitting slightly behind the beat.
This doesn't mean you're playing out of time. You're still connected to the pulse of the music.
But rather than pushing everything forward, you allow the rhythm to sit back a little.
That's a big part of what creates that laid back guitar feel.
If you try too hard to attack every upbeat perfectly and aggressively, you might technically be putting the chords in the correct places but still miss the feel.
You don't want the groove to sound anxious.
Let it breathe.
A great song to listen to for this is "Walking on the Moon" by The Police. The guitar has a strong reggae influence, and you can really hear that spacious, behind-the-beat quality.
Bob Marley's "Is This Love" is another excellent example of the laid-back feel.
Don't worry about analysing these songs in great detail. Simply listen to where the guitar sits and notice how much space surrounds what it plays.
Then try to recreate that sensation on your own guitar.
Listen for Reggae Rhythm in Other Styles
Once you recognise this feel, you'll start noticing reggae influences in music you may not have previously associated with the style.
The verses of "Hotel California" by the Eagles, for example, have a reggae influence in the rhythm. The song even had the working title "Mexican Reggae" while it was being developed.
You can also hear reggae influence in songs by The Police, including "Walking on the Moon" and, to an extent, "Message in a Bottle."
This is worth listening for because learning a style isn't necessarily about becoming a specialist in that style.
You can take one element of reggae — the upbeat accents, short chords, space or laid-back placement — and bring some of that character into completely different music.
You're adding new colours to your playing rather than simply learning another reggae strumming pattern.
Play Less and Listen More
The basic ingredients of a reggae guitar groove aren't particularly complicated:
- Emphasise the upbeats.
- Keep your chords short.
- Leave plenty of space.
- Allow the rhythm to sit back rather than constantly pushing forward.
But don't mistake simple for easy.
The challenge is resisting the urge to fill every gap and learning to trust the groove.
Start with one or two chords and keep things as simple as possible. Concentrate less on how much you're playing and more on how what you play feels.
Then listen.
Notice the spaces between the chords.
Notice how the rhythm changes when you shorten them.
Notice what happens when you relax rather than trying to force the groove.
Because reggae gives you a great reminder of something that's easy to forget on guitar:
Sometimes the thing that makes your playing sound better isn't adding something else.
It's knowing when to get out of the way.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the basic reggae strumming pattern on guitar?
A simple place to start is by counting 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + and emphasising the “+.”
Keep your strumming hand moving and try muting the downstrokes while allowing the upstrokes to sound.
Why are reggae guitar chords played so short?
Short chords create the space that is such an important part of reggae guitar rhythm. Rather than letting each chord ring, you play it and quickly cut it off so the silence becomes part of the groove.
Do you have to play every upbeat in reggae?
No. The accents generally happen on the upbeats, but you don't have to play every one. Once you have the basic feel, you can leave some out and create different rhythmic variations.
How do you get a laid-back reggae feel on guitar?
Avoid rushing or attacking every chord too aggressively. Stay connected to the beat, but allow your playing to sit back slightly. Listening closely to songs such as "Is This Love" and "Walking on the Moon" can help you hear this feel.
Can learning reggae improve my rhythm guitar playing?
Yes. Reggae teaches you to pay attention to space, accents and where your playing sits against the beat. These ideas can make your rhythm playing more musical even when you're playing other styles.
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