Extreme - More Than Words - Guitar Tab

Extreme II - Pornograffitti

1990 5:34

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About More Than Words

Stripped back to two acoustic guitars and close vocal harmonies, "More Than Words" sits in a different corner of the Hard Rock catalogue from what most people expect. The tuning is Eb Standard, dropping every string a half-step, so if you want to play along you will need to retune or use a capo and transpose your chord shapes accordingly. In G major at 97 BPM, the song lives and dies on fingerpicking: Nuno Bettencourt's right-hand pattern combines a plucked bass note with brushed upper strings in a way that feels deceptively simple until you try to keep it fluid under the chord changes. The thumb independence required on those alternating bass notes is what trips most players up. Use the Practice Toolbar to loop those transitions slowed down until the thumb and fingers stop fighting each other. Extreme recorded this as a ballad, but approaching it as a fingerpicking study reveals just how much technique is quietly packed into every bar.

• The song uses Eb Standard tuning, so retune all six strings down a half-step to play comfortably in the original key.
• Nuno Bettencourt's fingerpicking pattern requires strong thumb independence to keep the alternating bass notes steady under chord changes.
• Chord transitions between G, Cadd9, and Am7 happen quickly, making clean left-hand movement the main technical challenge to practise slowly.