How to Play “Life is a Highway” on Guitar?

The song “Life is a Highway” is by Canadian artist Tom Cochrane and appears on his second studio album, Mad Mad World (1991). In late 1991, the song reached number one in Cochrane’s home Canada. “Life is a Highway” peaked at number six on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the United States in August 1992. It also hit the top three in New Zealand and Australia that year. Chris LeDoux performed the song for his 1998 album One Road Man, and Rascal Flatts covered it for the Cars soundtrack.

Rascal Flatts, an American country band, recorded a rendition of this song in 2005 for the Pixar animated feature Cars, which was released on June 9, 2006. The song sold a lot of digital downloads, propelling it to the number seven spot on the Billboard Hot 100. Furthermore, the song was added as a bonus track on subsequent versions of “Me and My Gang” and their first greatest hits album. At the 33rd People’s Choice Awards, this rendition was named “Favorite Song from a Movie.”

In this article, you’ll learn how to play Life is a Highway, as recorded by the Rascal Flats on guitar. It is a great rock song. We’ve got a lot of different parts we’re going to dive into, from double stops high up the neck to using power cords and playing riffs in between. It’s all jam-packed into this lesson. So, when you’re done with this article, you’ll have everything you need to play right along with the recording. Moreover, you can do all those things in one app, Deplike. With your digital studio, you can play that song. But first, let’s learn how to play Life is a Highway as recorded by Rascal Flatts on guitar.

How to Play Life is a Highway on Guitar – Intro

Our guitar is in standard tuning, and we’ve got quite a lot to get through the first line. We’ll start with holding down the E and the B strings at the 13th fret. Let’s use your little finger across those two notes and then your first finger on the 10th fret of the G string so, the bottom three strings you’ve got hitting that. We will hit a down up – down up – down up – down up. Thus, the first bar goes down – up – down – up, down, up, down, up. It doesn’t start on beat one; there’s a quaver rest, so half beat rest, and then we start. It does that four times, so the second bar is the same as the first bar, and you do the whole line twice ago. Just repeat that four times, then the sort of rocky distorted guitar bit comes in, which slowly goes.

How to Play Life is a Highway on Guitar

We’re going to play A5 and D7 chords. You could use your first and third fingers or first and fourth either way for this. So, you’re playing the power chord and then going down two frets. Now, you’re on the 3rd fret of the A string and the 5th fret of the D string. Then, another two frets, you’re on 1st fret of the A string and 3rd fret of the D string, and it goes to rest. Afterward, another hit on that 1st fret goes the first bar of that line, and number three goes rest. 

Bar #4

Bar number four, we’re going to do another hit on that, which is a B flat chord. But one and three, and then take your first finger off and leave the other finger on the 3rd fret of the D string. It sounds weird on its own, but it works in the song. Then, it’s going to go to 1st fret of the E string and 3rd fret of the A string, and then two hits on that. 

Bar #5

Bar number five back to the B flat chord, which is 1st fret of the A string and 3rd fret of the D string, then the upper string to 1st fret of the E string, and then the 3rd fret of the A string. Then, 3rd fret of the A string and 5th fret of the D string twice, so bar five goes to rest.

The Last Bar

The last bar goes, which is the B flat chord again, so the 1st fret of the A string is the 3rd fret of the D string. You play it, but then you pull your first finger off, so to the open string, leave the other finger down, and it does that twice. Then, it goes to the 1st fret of the E string and the 3rd fret of the A string for an F power chord and then two C power chords, the 3rd fret of the A string, and the 5th fret of the D string. So, bar slick six slowly goes to rest.

In the following line, the lead guitar part comes in over the last bar, so let’s go to the following line. We’ve got this little lead line that starts with a slide from five to seven on the G string. Then, the 6th fret of the B string, the 8th fret of the B string, and then a bend on the 8th fret of the B string, which you’re holding into the next bar, then drop down to the 6th fret of the B string. The 13th fret of the B string bending up a full tone, drop it back down, pull off to the 10th fret. Finally, another 13th fret of the B string and then the 13th fret bend on the same string, then just holding that bend up.

How to Play Life is a Highway on Guitar – Verse

We get to the verse, which is just doing some power chords starting with B flat power chord, which is 1st fret of the A string and 3rd fret of the D string. You’re going to hit it eight times, palm muted. Then go up a string, so you’re on the F power chord, which is 1st fret of the E string and 3rd fret of the A string, again eight times. And then to a C power chord which is the 3rd fret of the A string and 5th fret of the D string, and you’ve got two bars of that. You can accent different beats on that if you want, and that repeats.

How to Play Life is a Highway on Guitar – Bridge

For the bridge part, we’ve got a D minor chord in which we’re playing the 5th fret of the A string, 6th fret of the B string with the second finger, 7th fret of the D string with the third finger, and 7th fret of the G string with the little finger. If you want to, you could play just a regular D minor, not the barre one. Then we’ve got a C chord again; you could play a standard C, but we’re playing the 3rd fret of the A string, then the 5th fret of the D string, the 5th fret of the G string, and the 5th fret of the B string.

The same rhythm goes to rest. Then, a B flat chord, same rhythm, so it’s just the same thing down two frets, 1st fret of the A string, 3rd fret of the D string, 3rd fret of the G string, and 3rd fret of the B string. Again, you could play the power chords on it, just the A string and the D string on those if you wanted to go. And then in bar 19, we’ve got a G5 chord which is just 3rd fret of the E string with a little finger, 3rd fret of the B string with his third finger, and 3rd fret of the E string use your face with your second finger and get that to touch the A string.

How to Play Life is a Highway on Guitar – Chorus

The first line of the chorus is the same as the second line that we played. The second line of the chorus is almost the same, but it just starts with a little lick. It’s a slightly different beginning first bar, so the 5th fret of the A string, then the 3rd fret of the D string, back to the 5th fret of the A string, the 3rd fret of the A string, and then two B flat power chords. Then, the rest of that line is the same.

Afterward, it will go back to the verse, repeat the verse, play the bridge, and then it does the two lines of the chorus, but this time it plays the whole two lines twice. And then there’s a little middle eight, which has just got some chords. And it repeats, so that’s Gm7 which is your second finger on the 3rd fret of the E and your third finger across the D, G, and B strings at the 3rd fret. 

BB7 CHORD

The next chord is a Bb7 chord which is your first finger on the 1st fret of the A string, second finger on the 2nd fret of the G string, third finger on the 3rd fret of the D string, and little finger on the 3rd fret of the B string and only plays the middle four strings. Then, we’ve got the Dm7 chord which is your first finger across 1st fret of the E and B strings, and then the second finger on the 2nd fret of the G string, and you play the open D string as well.

Then, we’ve got a C chord in bar 31, which is just your first finger on the 1st fret of the B string, second finger 2nd fret of the D string, and third finger on the 3rd fret of the A string. It plays those first four bars, so bars 28, 29, 30, and 31. It repeats those, and in the next bar, we’ve got another bar of C.

How to Play Life is a Highway on Guitar – Solo First Part

It starts on the 13th fret of the B string, and we’re going to bend up a tone, and we can hit it five times. And then, while it’s up into the next bar, you don’t play any notes in the brackets; you’re going to play it and drop it down to and pull it off to the 10th fret of the B string, 13th fret of the G string, 10th fret of the B string, and then 13th fret of the G string pulling off to 12th and 10th fret of the G string. 

On to the next line, we’re playing the 7th fret of the G string; we’re going to bend it upper tone, and then the 5th fret of the G string hammer on to the 7th and back to the 5th fret. Into the next bar, we’ve got a lick which is the 10th to 12th frets of the D string and 10th to 12th frets of the G string sliding straight up to the 14th fret of the G string. And then the 13th fret of the B, the 15th fret of the B, the 13th fret of the E, and the 15th fret of the E bend straighten up to the upper tone. All those notes are staccatos apart from the last note you’re holding on to. 

Second Part

In the next line, you keep holding it on, and then you’re going to do another one, two, three, four, like drops down from the 15th fret of the high E. Then into the next bar, we’ve got a 13th fret of the E, 15th of B, two 13’s of E, 15th B, 13th B, and 15th B pulling off to 13th fret, and then the 15th fret of the G. Afterwards, we’ve got 13th fret of the E to 14th fret of the G, then 13th fret of the B, then a slide quickly from 14 to 12 on the G string, and finally 10th fret of the G string.

In the next line, we’ve got the 12th fret of the G twice and then the 10th fret of the G, and then the last line, which is the 13th fret of the B string, 10th of E, 13th of E, 10th of E, 13th of B pulling off to b10th fret of the B. Then 13th fret of the G pulling off to 12th and 10th, and then 12th fret of the G pulling off to 10th again, 12th fret of the D string pulling off to 10th, 12th fret of the A string and then a quick hammer on in the next bar from 10th fret of the D to 12th fret.

Conclusion

Well, you’ve picked up a guitar and hesitantly played your way through Life is a Highway. What comes next? You can continue looking for guitar tabs for all your favorite songs, but if you want to advance as a guitarist, you’ll need some help.

In this regard, the Deplike Learning App looks to be valuable. Using the 3D interactive learning technique, you may learn the chords, choose a song in the app, figure out how to play it, and discover the musician. You may learn various additional songs with the Deplike Learning App, including Life is a Highway, which you learned in this post. With instant feedback which you will receive, you can improve yourself quickly.