How to play Holland, 1945 by Neutral Milk Hotel

Well, I'm back from a nice and baseball-y vacation across the east coast. Apologies for the lame weekly poll (it was about the best spots to sleep on vacation), but that was the big question on my mind when I got home. I had a great time, but it feels good to sleep in my own bed again---and to play some Neutral Milk Hotel on my uke again!

In that spirit, this video is on Holland, 1945, another great Neutral Milk Hotel song along with In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. It's a dang good album that was inspired by the diary of Anne Frank, and this song seems to be the only one directly talking about her (maybe? who knows).

In making this, I sought assistance from Woodshed at ukulelehunt.com to make sure the chords I had were all correct. His version, which--I have come to accept--is usually the correct version, is a bit more complicated than the one I originally found here. It adds in a few more chords in the last verse, and calls for some very quick chord changes.

Ukulele Hunt chords and lyrics can be found here.

I am not quite at that level yet, but I did incorporate the advanced techniques into my youtube tutorial video:

Video Breakdown
0:00 Intro and Tuning (GCEA)
0:13 Chords (Simple: G,C,D Advanced: G,C,D, G/B, D7, Am)
1:59 Strumming pattern (8 beat loop)
4:10 Part 1- Intro
4:33 Part 2- Verse 1
5:29 Example of Intro and Verse 1 w/lyrics
6:48 Part 3- Chorus
7:09 Part 4- Verse 2 (same chords/timing as verse 1)
7:25 Part 5- Chorus (same as first chorus)
7:36 Part 6- Verse 3 (has advanced version if you prefer)

The strumming pattern I describe in the video loops in eight beats, where each beat is a down or an up strum:
1) down
2) miss up
3) down
4) up
5) miss down
6) up
7) down
8) up
(repeat, switching chords if necessary)

I had enough trouble figuring out the timing for this song that I decided to chart it all out (credit for idea goes to E-dub). I divided the song into units of time (or beats), and turned that into a table. Each cell in the table represents one loop of the strumming pattern.

Intro

C	C	-	-
C	C	G	G
C	C	G	G

Verse 1

C the	C I've	G loved	G
C was	C roses	G her	G
C but	C buried	G -live	D nine
C five	D sister	G side	D weeks
C guns	D rained	G -one	D little
C spain	D pianos	G flames	D rings
C sun	D say	C come	C

Chorus

G	G now	C pick	C every
G piece	G	C life	C used
G love	G	C keep	C -selves
G least	G	D on	D7

Verse 2 (exact same chords and timing as verse 1)

C and	C ride	G -cus	G
C with	C brother	G in	G
C says	C good	G -live	D rides
C flame	D coming	G -gain	D better
C star	D -bove	G are	D mean
C cry	D ring	G fly	D rings
C heart	D screams	C part	C

Chorus (same as above)

Verse 3

G (G/B,Am) here's	C mother	G sleeps	G
G (G/B,Am) here	C room	G brother	D born
G (G/B,Am) indentions	C in	G sheets	G
G (G/B,Am) bodies	C moved	G move	D -more
D	C sad	G see	C world
G agree	C rather	G faces	D flies
G (G/B,Am) oh	C want	G keep	D roses
D in	G eyes	G	G