How To Play Billie Eilish’s Everything I Wanted Chords

Billie Eilish is an amazing songwriter with a catalogue of hits – let’s learn to play the chords for Everything I Wanted!

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In this free lesson you will learn…

• How to use power chords with open strings
• How to play barre chords effectively
• Tips for making your chords sound amazing
• How to play this song in full

Ready To Learn Billie Eilish’s Everything I Wanted Chords?

It’s no secret that Billie Eilish has made massive waves in the last few years with her music.

From songs like “Bad Guy,” “ilomilo” and “Everything I Wanted” to her more recently-released “Therefore I Am,” this young lady is packed to the brim with hits.

Billie has also broken out of the typical “big studio songwriting” stereotype of the pop music industry and instead opts to songwrite and produce her music from home, with her equally-talented brother Finneas at the mixing board and piano/guitar to accompany her.

Billie and Finneas make a wonderful duo, and at such a young age they truly have the whole world ahead of them.

Our hats go off to these two for the incredible music they write, and today we’re going to help foster some more appreciation for that music.

We’re going to teach you the ins and outs of the Everything I Wanted chords.

Content Warning: This song is a rather emotional ballad that deals with heavy subject matter including mental health and contemplation of death.

 

If you find yourself moved in a negative way by this song due to personal circumstances, we have plenty of other lessons that you can find here.

 

Music is a personal journey, and we all express what we go through in unique ways as artists.

Remember to play the music that resonates with you.

Everything I Wanted Chords I – What We Need To Know

This song is extremely easy to play on guitar, as we only need four chords in total.

The thing that may throw off many beginner guitarists is that there isn’t actually any guitar in the original track.

Click here to listen.

Even though the Everything I Wanted chords weren’t recorded with guitar, we can still play along using the same chords that are being played on the piano.

There are a few other cool things that we’ll learn to take away from this lesson:

• How to play power chords with accompanying open strings
• How 8th note counting works

We’re going to start by reviewing the chords needed to play this song one-by-one.

Let’s have at it.

Everything I Wanted Chords II – D Major 7

Our first chord serves as a great introduction to barre chords if we want it to be.

We’re going to show you two ways of playing this chord to make it easy – the barre chord method and the power chord method with open strings.

Our first method is the power chord – we can keep it easy by playing a power chord at the fifth fret on the A string with our index, ring and pinky fingers.

Keep the B and E strings open for a nice bit of resonance.

Note: This version is meant to be an ‘easy’ way of playing this chord in place of the D major 7 chord. These are not the same notes specifically, but they contain enough of the same notes to pass for the chord.

D POWER CHORD

The second way to play this chord is considered the more proper method of the two, and that is to play a full D major 7 chord on the second fret of the G, B and E strings.

We leave the D string open for this one and mute the low E and A strings.

To achieve this, we’re going to place our index finger flat across the second fret of our top 3 strings.

Give this one a shot and use arpeggios to check that all of your strings are ringing out properly.

Pro Tip: Arpeggios don’t just help us check the sound of our Everything I Wanted chords, they also serve as a technique of their own.

Try using them in any progression, and click here for a full lesson on how to use them.

D MAJ7

Everything I Wanted Chords III – E Major

The E major chord serves as our second chord, and it’s another one that uses open strings to get its point across.

The second of our Everything I Wanted chords is easy to play, and we can play it in the open position like many of us are already used to.

Leave your low E string open and place your middle finger at the second fret on the A string.

Build on top with your ring finger at the second fret of the D string, and your index at the first fret on the G string.

Practice rotating your wrist to find the position that allows all six strings to ring out clearly.

E MAJOR

Now that we’ve gotten two of our Everything I Wanted chords down, it’s a good time to practice playing between them.

Take this opportunity to play back and forth between your D major 7 chord and your E major chord.

Pro Tip: If you opt to play the barre chord version of D major 7, you won’t have to slide down the fretboard to get to the E major chord. Barring might be a bit of a stretch for some, but it’s worth giving it a shot.

Look on the bright side: You’re only barring three strings!

D MAJOR 7

E MAJOR

Everything I Wanted Chords IV – C# Minor

This next chord is similar to the D major 7 we already learned in that it can be played two ways.

We’re going to learn both of them so you can pick for yourself.

The first way to play this chord is to once again make a power chord shape at the 4th fret of the A string this time. We let the E and B strings ring out the same way we did with the D major 7.

Pro Tip: If you opt to play your Everything I Wanted chords this way, you can slide the C# minor power chord up one fret to play the D major power chord as it comes back around.

This means less movement, which no one ever complains about.

C# POWER CHORD

The second, more full way to play the third instalment of our Everything I Wanted chords is to play it as a barre chord.

Although this one might be substantially more difficult for some, it’s worth trying to pick up early on in your guitar journey.

Begin by barring across the fourth fret of the A string from the A to high E strings, leaving the low E muted.

From there, add your ring finger to the D string at the sixth fret. Stack your pinky finger on top at the same fret on the G string.

Finish this chord off with your middle finger at the fifth fret on the B string, and strum all five strings of the chord. Work with your wrist to get the articulation of this chord nice and clear.

Take some time now to practice all three of your main Everything I Wanted chords.

C# MINOR BARRE CHORD

Everything I Wanted Chords V – C#7

This chord only appears once in the song, but if we’re going to learn something we’re going to learn all of it!

C#7 is a relatively easy chord to work out. Unlike the other C# chord in this song, we only need to focus on one way to play this one.

This chord is a bit of a crunch, and it may take a bit of time to hit the cue for it properly amongst the other Everything I Wanted chords, but once again – it’s always worth it to learn.

We’ve included the chord diagram below for you to study, but we’re going to outline how to play this one either way. See below.

C#7

Begin with your middle finger on the 4th fret on the A string. Add your index finger at the 3rd fret on the D string.

Your ring finger takes the fourth fret on the G string, and the B string stays open. Get that pinky finger way up there at the 4th fret on the high E string, and let it all sing out.

Pro Tip: The hard part of this chord is the open B string. You’ll have to do a bit of wrist rotating in order to get this chord sitting right, but it’s all in the name of good practice and improvement. Right? Right. Moving on.

Let’s take this time now to practice all four of your Everything I Wanted chords before we look at song structure.

D MAJOR 7

E MAJOR

C# MINOR

C#7

Everything I Wanted Chords V – Song Structure

We’re happy to say that you’ve already gotten through all of the hardest parts of this song.

Playing the chords in sequence is the easy part – it’s learning them that’s difficult.

So, congrats! You made it. Now let’s put it all together.

The best part of this song is that you only need to worry about one progression for the most part.

Give each of the Everything I Wanted chords a count of 4 beats before moving on, and have a listen to how the chords move in the song itself.

Let’s have a look at the progression now:

D MAJOR 7

E MAJOR

C# MINOR

This is basically your main progression for the entire song, verses and choruses alike.

This makes this song super-easy to wrap our hands around once we’ve gotten the Everything I Wanted chords down pat.

We need to watch out for the C#7 chord, however!

Here’s the part of the lyrics where it pops up, for your reference:

Dmaj7        E

If I could change

 

C#7              Dmaj7

The way that you see yourself

 

Dmaj7                        E

You wouldn’t wonder why you hear

 

C#m             Dmaj7

“They don’t deserve you”

 

Everything I Wanted Chords VI – Strumming Pattern

Because there is no guitar in this song, we more or less have to infer our own strumming pattern from this song.

With this in mind, we can put our strumming pattern for the Everything I Wanted chords together as follows:

Strum your chords in two sections – the lower half, and the upper half.

Count as follows, with the bolded beats serving as accented beats:

1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &

Practice strumming down-up-down-up, with your downstrokes landing on 1, 2, 3, 4; and your upstrokes landing on the &.

You can also practice the Everything I Wanted chords using fingerpicking, where your thumb takes the bass note of every chord and your other fingers pick the rest of the notes at once.

Use the same counting technique as listed above to pull this off effectively.

Remember, all rhythms take practice – you’ve got to put the hours in if you want to master a song!

This is a great tune for practice because it uses no more than four chords at maximum, giving us plenty of room to loop the chord progression and practice our transitions.

The Everything I Wanted chords may look difficult at the outset, but it won’t take long for you to master them as well as the progression.

What’s The Best Way To Practice These Chords?

Altogether!

But seriously, practicing these Everything I Wanted chords in sequence helps us learn to transition between them more easily.

Listen for the tension and release of the C#7 moving up to the D major 7 chord – that’s one of the big sonic perks of this song.

Using the power chord versions of the Everything I Wanted chords that we learned gives us the opportunity to learn how to slide the C# power chord into the D position as well, so give that a good shot.

How To Improve On Your Everything I Wanted Chords

If you want to improve on your chords quickly and efficiently, the best way is through using arpeggios to check your chords.

Not only does this technique help us sound out more difficult chords, but it also helps us significantly improve our chord articulation.

Pro Tip: When playing arpeggios, make sure to use alternate picking to get the best economy of motion from your picking hand.

Arpeggios help us learn how to tighten up the screws in our playing in big ways, so don’t take this one lightly!

Happy practising, friends!

Recommended Resources

If you enjoyed this lesson on Billie Eilish’s Everything I Wanted chords, you’ll love the other lessons we’ve got for you here at the National Guitar Academy!

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• Our Top 8 Electric Guitar Songs
• Easy Guitar Picking Songs
• Easy Pop Songs On Guitar