Where Is My Mind

Where Is My Mind is a song that’s very close to my heart because it was the first song I learned using barre chords! So if you’re just getting started with them, don’t be intimidated and let’s jump in!

The chord progression

The main chord progression of the song is built around four different chords: E, C# minor, G# and A.

E is played as an open chord, whereas the other three chords are played using an E and A shape barre chord.

Let’s talk about the structure. We’re going to play each of these four chords for two beats each. That means the structure looks like this:

In terms of strumming, the idea is to learn the “main” strumming pattern, but you should play around with it and experiment a bit. Feel free to add strums here and there, or remove some of them. As long as you’re following the right structure, you’ll be fine!

Here are the two main options I’d go for:

On A major, the chord shape and pattern change a bit. We “open” the shape by lifting all of the fingers off the strings while keeping the index finger barred. The goal is to have this “alternate” shape only on beats 3 and 4 of the strumming pattern. And as you can see below, the pattern is relatively simple as we strum every eighth note!

So the pattern on A major would be:

When you get to the end of the intro, just stop strumming on beat 4 of the A major (our last chord!).

The break

On the break, we have six different chords to play, but most of them we’ve seen before. We have E, G#, A, A minor, C# minor and B. Let’s focus on the two new chords we have to play: A minor and B.

To go from A to A minor, all you have to do is remove your middle finger. On B, I’d personally use the E shape barre chord, but feel free to use the A shape if you like!

The structure would look like this:

The strumming pattern for the break is mostly the same as the one we’ve seen in the verse, but we’re going to let C# minor ring. We’re just strumming it once on beat 1, which is a good way to breathe a little!

Also, on B major, the pattern changes to:

When we get to the solo, just stay on B with the same pattern we’ve just seen and play it for four bars instead of just one!

The main melody

The main melody of Where Is My Mind is played entirely on the B and high E strings. We start on the 5th fret of the B string and I’d suggest you play that note with your middle finger because we need to play fret 4 on the high E string with the index finger. We then alternate playing these two notes.

In the second part of the melody, we barre the 4th fret across the B and high E strings with our index finger. To finish, we have a little slide to play from fret 4 to fret 5 on the high E string, but remember to let the open E string ring as you slide. Just so you know, the key of Where Is My Mind is E major, so these notes come from the E major scale!

The solo

The solo is in the key of B minor and is played using shapes 1 and 2 of the B minor pentatonic scale.

We start with a really cool unison bend that we’re playing on shape 1, on the G and B strings. We’re going to play that unison bend quite a few times back to back, keeping in mind that we’ll need to slowly release the bend and bring the G string back to its original position, which can be a bit tricky at first! This type of unison bend is very common across Pixies lead parts, so if you’re into them, make sure you spend time on this!

In conclusion

This is one of those songs that can really motivate you to practice and finally master your barre chords, just like it did for me. If it’s just a bit too much, don’t feel bad about sticking to the lead part at first as there’s plenty to learn there as well!