It’s great to hear guitar music in the charts and James Bay is certainly proving popular with my students. Hold Back the River is a great tune and a good introduction to pinching with right hand rather than using a pick.

Like me James, seems to favour red guitars and plays a cherry Epiphone Century from 1966! Here’s the tab of the main riff. Try to add vibrato at the end of each phrase to sustain each note. A good amount of reverb helps too.

PDF:

James Bay Hold Back the river main riff

The final phrase of the song is most challenging. I prefer to use my thumb to play the note on the 8th fret low E string.