I Should Have Known Better by The Beatles

Overview

Key: G major · Chords used: 8 · Sections: 9

Form: Intro → Verse → Verse → Bridge → Verse → Solo → Verse → Bridge → Outro

Where these chords come from: an expert transcription of the original recording made for the Isophonics reference annotations (Centre for Digital Music, Queen Mary University of London). This page shows that transcription as-is: the analysis below is generated directly from it by code, not written by AI. Consecutive repeats of a chord are shown once, and the piano voicings are our playable arrangement of each chord symbol, not a note-for-note transcription.

Section by section

Intro

• G – D (×4)
  I – V

Verse 1

• G – D (×5)
  I – V
• Em/G – Em – C
  vi⁶ – vi – IV
• D – G (×2)
  V – I
• D
  V

Verse 2

• G – D (×5)
  I – V
• Em/G – Em – C – B
  vi⁶ – vi – IV – III

Bridge 1

• Em – C – G – B – Em – G – G7 – C – D – G – Em – C
  vi – IV – I – III – vi – I – I7 – IV – V – I – vi – IV
• D – G (×2)
  V – I
• D
  V

Verse 3

Same chords as Verse 1.

Solo

• G – D (×5)
  I – V
• Em/G – Em – C
  vi⁶ – vi – IV
• D – G (×2)
  V – I
• D
  V

Verse 4

• G – D (×5)
  I – V
• Em/G – Em – C – B7
  vi⁶ – vi – IV – III7

Bridge 2

Same chords as Bridge 1.

Outro

• G – D (×4)
  I – V
• G
  I

Chord vocabulary

Harmonic highlights

• B acts as V/vi: it resolves to Em.
• G7 acts as V/IV: it resolves to C.

Sources & accuracy

• Chords and sections: the Isophonics reference annotations (Centre for Digital Music, Queen Mary University of London). Expert chord and structure annotation of the original recording (CC BY 4.0 via ChoCo).
• Not verified: only one expert transcription of this song is available so far.
• Rhythm and chord durations aren't shown; each step is one chord change.