Tabs
________________
/ Heather Nova / This is one of my favourite Heather Nova songs as it
/ Island / contains so much darkness and frustration in all its
/ Oyster / beauty. I think it's about a girl on the edge of leaving
/_______________/ her cheating and decieving boyfriend.
Intro:
First Heather's wonderful singing! Then her acoustic steel-stringed comes in.
This main riff is played with finger picking. It's actually a bit harder to play
than it seems at first. The tricky part is with the C/E-chord, when hammering on
the note on the 1st fret at the same time as picking the 2nd fret.
Asus2/E 
C/EC/E Em/B 4x
||------------------|------------------||
||o---0-----0-----0-|h1-1-------0-----o||
||------2-----2-----|-----0-------0----||
||--2-----2-----2---|-2-----0-------0--||
||o-----------------|---------2-------o||
||------------------|------------------||
There's also an electric guitar playing randomly around with the harmonics on
the 12th fret on the e- and B-string. There's no specific pattern to it; it's
just there to create some filling.
e:-------:
B:-------:
G:-----------:
D:-----------:
A:-----------:
E:-----------:
Verse (4x main riff)
Verse
Verse
Chorus:
There are several guitars playing in the chorus.
Heather's steel-stringed acoustic plays this finger picking pattern:
A minorAm 
G+G A minorAm G+G
|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|
|---1-----1-----1-|---0-----0-----1-|---1-----1-----1-|---0-----0-----1-|
|-----2-----2-----|-----0-----0-----|-----2-----2-----|-----0-----0-----|
|-------2-----2---|-------0-----0---|-------2-----2---|-------0-----0---|
|-0---------------|-----------------|-0---------------|-----------------|
|-----------------|-3---------------|-----------------|-3---------------|
A minorAm G+G 
FF G+G
|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|
|---1-----1-----1-|---0-----0-----1-|---1-----1-----1-|---0-----0-----1-|
|-----2-----2-----|-----0-----0-----|-----2-----2-----|-----0-----0-----|
|-------2-----2---|-------0-----0---|-------3-----3---|-------0-----0---|
|-0---------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|
|-----------------|-3---------------|-1---------------|-3---------------|
There's also a clean electric guitar strumming this Am-chord.
Sometimes a whammy bar is also used to bend the chord a little up and down.
It's strummed to support the A minorAm every four bars, which'll be the A minorAm first in
the lines above. It's very easy to hear, anyway.
||--5^--------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
||o-5^--------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------o||
||--5^--------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
||--7^--------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
||o-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------o||
||------------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
Finally there's a slide guitar basically doing this lick with a few variations.
||------------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
||o-----------------|-------------3---|\1---------------|-----------------o||
||------------------|-----------4-----|---------------2-|/4----------------||
||------------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
||o-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------o||
||------------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
Interlude (2x main riff)
Verse:
In the last bar the electric guitar plays this fill with harmonics:
C/EC/E Em/B
|-------------|
|-------------|
|-------------|
|-----------------|
|-----------------|
|-----------------|
Chorus 2x, and then add these two bars:
F(add9)
|-----------------|-3---------------|
|---1-----1-------|-----------------|
|-----2-----2-----|-----------------|
|-3-----3-----3---|-----------------|
|-----------------|-----------------|
|-----------------|-----------------|
Re-Intro:
A minorAm G+G FF G+G
|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|-3---------------|
|---------1-------|---0-----0-------|---------1-------|-----------------|
|-----2-----------|-----0-----------|-----2-----2-----|-----------------|
|-2-----2---------|-------0---------|-3-----3-----3---|-----------------|
|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|
|-----------------|-3---------------|-----------------|-----------------|
A minorAm G+G F(add9)
|-----------------|---------3-------|-----------------|-3---------------|
|---------1-------|-----0-----------|-----1-----1-----|-----------------|
|-----2-----------|-------0---------|-------2-----2---|-----------------|
|-------2---------|-----------------|-3-------3-------|-----------------|
|-0---------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|
|-----------------|-3---------------|-----------------|-----------------|
Bridge:
For the entire bridge it's just the same two bars played 15 times. But since
15 is an unnatural number to count, just think about moving on when she sings
"It's out of my hands again".
The steel-stringed acoustic strums these chords.
Asus2Asus2 
Cmaj7Cmaj7 15x
||--0-------0---0-0-|-x-0---0-0-0-0-0--||
||o-0-------0---0-0-|-x-0---0-0-0-0-0-o||
||--2-------2---2-2-|-x-0---0-0-0-0-0--||
||--2-------2---2-2-|-x-2---2-2-2-2-2--||
||o-0-------0---0-0-|-x-3---3-3-3-3-3-o||
||------------------|-x----------------||
An electric guitar with overdrive plays this riff.
15x
||--3-5---5-5-------|--0--0----0--0----0----||
||o-3-5---5-5-------|-12-13---13-13---13---o||
||--0-5---5-5-------|--0--0----0--0----0----||
||------------------|-----------------------||
||o-----------------|----------------------o||
||------------------|-----------------------||
After the first 4 rounds, another electric guitar with overdrive plays in.
It plays a lot of noisy things based around this Am-chord, but it's almost
impossible to hear and transcribe exactly. But it's not that important, this
guitar's function is basically to create some noise.
||--0~--------------|-------------x-x--||
||o-1~--------------|-------------x-x-o||
||--2~--------------|-------------x-x--||
||--2~--------------|-------------x-x--||
||o-0~--------------|-------------x-x-o||
||------------------|-------------x-x--||
Chorus 2x
Outro:
The outro is just the last 4 bars of the chorus reapeated until the song
fades out, so the steel-stringed acoustic repeats this:
A minorAm G+G FF G+G
||------------------|-----------------|-----------------|------------------||
||o---1-----1-----1-|---0-----0-----1-|---1-----1-----1-|---0-----0-----1-o||
||------2-----2-----|-----0-----0-----|-----2-----2-----|-----0-----0------||
||--------2-----2---|-------0-----0---|-------3-----3---|-------0-----0----||
||o-0---------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------o||
||------------------|-3---------------|-1---------------|-3----------------||
From here the electric guitar is out.
The slide guitar plays this fill 3 times the first 6 bars, and then moves back
to the fill from the chorus.
3x
||--5---------------|------------------||
||o-----------------|---------5-------o||
||------------------|------------------||
||------------------|------------------||
||o-----------------|-----------------o||
||------------------|------------------||
LYRICS
**********
Yeah, there are parts of me he'll never know
My wild horses and my river beds
And in my throat voices he'll never hear
He pulls at me like a cherry tree
And I can still move
But I don't speak about it
Pretend I'm crazy, pretend I'm dead
He's to scared to hit me now
He'll bring flowers instead
I need an island, somewhere to sink a stone
I need an island, somewhere to bury you, somewhere to go
And the dogwoods shimmer in October sun
"Oh, sweet thing" he sings to me
"You're the only one"
I need an island, somewhere to sink a stone
I need an island, somewhere to bury you, somewhere
I need an island, somewhere to sink a stone
I need an island, somewhere to bury you, somewhere to go
And I don't know why
I can't tell my sister
He spat in my face again
And I don't wanna die here
You know that dream when your feet won't move, move
You wanna come, but your body won't let you
He steals it from me
He steals it from me
It shines, shine like sweat, like jewels
Like something that has died to soon
He fucks with the beauty
A augmentedA kiss, a kick, a kiss, a kick, a kiss, kiss, kick, kick, kick
He steals it from me
It's out of my hands again
I need an island, somewhere to sink a stone
I need an island, somewhere to bury you, somewhere
I need an island, somewhere to sink a stone
I need an island, somewhere to bury you, somewhere to go, to go
********************************************************************************
I recall my original tab for this song as my first real tab. That was the first
time I transcribed everything from scratch. So even though it hurts a bit to
overwrite the old, original one, which to myself has its charm, I thought it
was time to update it as I've gotten a lot better at transcribing since then.
********************************************************************************
Jon Sebastian Frederiksen - 15th /June /09
Other versions of Island
Alternative guitar chords and tabs for Island by Heather Nova
