Good beginner band songs

Christian 71

I've started playing with other people in the last few months, but one thing we have struggled with is choosing good pieces to play that are easy to pick up and sound good. We don't have a singer at the moment which doesn't help and sometimes there are two guitarists and sometimes one.

Anyone any good suggestions of nice easy to pick up pieces to play, really something we can learn in a week or two and see if we like?

Nothing too heavy so, really looking for your standard Karaoke type songs that we all know.

Toasty

A good piece you can improv on instrumental:

                               
As for others, what era / genre songs are you looking for?

reevesy

first cover we did back in the day....was a bit of kinks.....you really got me.

depends upon what sort of era you want to pick.....since learning a bit of guitar i've found theres lots of classic stuff out there thats pretty easy to play....and you add more complicated stuff to it.

Christian 71

Just looking for ideas really, no particular preference just stuff we are all likely to recognise and pick up quickly.

Tried a few songs already some have worked better than expected, some I would have expected to work were actually harder than they sounded. What can be easy to pick up on guitar to a backing track, can be a real mare when everyone is doing their own thing.

I'd not considered the Peter Gunn theme, we tried Everybody Needs Somebody but mixed results. Dakota and Tainted love were songs I wouldn't have considered but both worked really well.

hyperfish

Maybe you already have, but just jam for a couple of sessions. Get to know each others style, limitations and strengths.

Find a mutually agreeable song go home and learn your part and then see how it goes in the rehearsal. When I was in a band we usually chose chart covers of the time, a bit of R n R and a couple the lead/singer wrote. I was on bass then so my bits were not as challenging.

Two guitars, I always think 'question and answer' like Thin Lizzy. But I'm a bit old school.

Toasty

C'mon everybody, Eddie Cochrane
Brown eyed girl, Van Morrison
Pretty Woman, Roy Orbison
Mrs Robinson, S&G / Lemonheads
Born to be Wild, Steppen Wolf
Hungry like a wolf, Duran Duran
Song 2, blur
Champagne super nova Oasis
Teenage Dirtbag, wheatus
Tubthumping, chumbawumba
I'll shut up now..