The Real Rock Book Volume I, a great find!

The Real Rock Book, Volume I
Hal Leonard Publishing ISBN 978-1-4234-5388-8

What a Great Find!

During my Thanksgiving trip to visit family in Prescott Arizona, I found a terrific book that I just want to tell everyone about. The book is "The Real Rock Book Volume I" by Hal Leonard publishing.

I bought it because it is not like any other song book in my library. What makes it different is that it has EVERYTHING but the bass clef! There is just so much more detail than I have ever seen in a “Fake” book. So I thought well maybe all the “Real” series of books are done like this. Not So! I could not find another one like this.

No skimping on detail here! Whoever put this book together for Hal Leonard was a journeyman musician who got not one single credit for the work. I also like that the chords are in a nice big bold handwritten style that is easy for my old eyes to read.

The illustration below will give you an idea of how well each piece is treated. Each piece identifies each section as intro, outro, verse, bridge, interlude, chorus, whatever. It appears to me that every attempt has been made to make it match the recorded version of the song.

My son Robert, who plays bass guitar, has an extensive song library on his iPad. I watched as he picked songs from this book, played them from his iPad through his amp and accompanied them on his bass by following the chords in the book. It seemed that in most cases, the song in the book matched the key in which the song had been recorded and followed the original arrangement.  I gifted him the book before I left and ordered myself one from Amazon as soon as I got home.

There are 200 songs in the book , by my count and only one,  “Walk Don’t Run”, an instrumental by jazz guitarist Johnny Smith, has no lyrics. Every other song in the book, has the lyrics and multiple verses. You will also find things like "Guitar Solo" or "Harmonica Solo", even "w/ lead voc. ad lib", things that help you re-create the original recorded sound.
It gets even better. I did not find a single song that required a page flip!. To me, that shows an editor that cares about their readers. Most songs in this book occupy two pages and start on the left page.

I'm looking at "Hard Habit To Break" (HHTB) on page 126, and it is in the key of F#. On two side by side pages it shows Intro with "keys" in m1 and "flutes" in m2, good stuff to emulate with a keyboard. Also shows verse, chorus, Bridge, Trombone Solo, Outro-Chorus sections. All you need to try to re-create, if you want, or just dress up the piece or just pick up technique. This is not a simplistic Fake Book. It shows 7ths, 9ths, 11ths, and slash chords. Some measures show the written out comped chords. 

Page 2 of "Hard Habit To Break" on page 127
Check out the comping detail in the bridge.

For example, in the bridge of HHTB you will find: F/A F-/Ab Eb/g Eb-/Gb Bbmaj7 in one measure, The comped chords are fully written out below the chord symbols. Thats a lot of attention to detail, which I'm sure is intended to let the reader re-create the original sound.

There is a review ot this book on Amazon entitled “Mediocre Song Selections” which I felt compelled to refute, because this is an extremely well done book and it deserves a large audience. Furthermore, I have not found it’s equal in the Real/Fake book genre.

As far as the song selections go, almost all of the 200 songs in this book will be readily identified by anyone interested enough in a book entitled “The Real Rock Book” to read its reviews.

The book by itself is terrific, but to be able to play the original recording and use the book to add in your own stuff is a really fun bonus.

This is a five-star book, no doubt about it. Kudos to its Editor and Hal Leonard Publishing!