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Easy Fingerpicking Pattern – Everybody Hurts by REM

Today I’m gonna teach you a simplified guitar version of the song “Everybody Hurts” by REM. This fingering picking pattern is easier and more comfortable to play, which is great for beginners and it stills sounds great.

I’m gonna take you through it step by step, the chords, the pattern, the right fingering, finger placement, slow and in close up. The guitar lesson is divided up into 4 parts, all present in this video, to make sure the whole piece is easy to follow and understand.

Let’s dive in!

11 Ways To Skyrocket Your Guitar Playing!

By Klaus Crow 9 Comments

Somewhere down the road in your guitar learning journey there’s a chance your playing gets stuck in a rut. You might play the same things over and over and find it hard to get out of that vicious circle. You need a boost and get outside of that box. So how do you do that? How do you get passed that bridge and get to the next level?

Today we got 11 ways to get you out of that rut, juice up your skills and skyrocket your playing.

Let’s take off!

1 – Get the right tools for the job

First, make sure you’re playing the right guitar. Some musicians stick with a guitar just because…. But playing the right guitar is not to be underestimated. Your appreciation for a guitar is a personal thing. Your personality, your taste and style of playing needs to resonate with a guitar. That’s no bull. The way a guitar feels, sounds and fits is really important. The right guitar can motivate and boost your playing enormously.

We all have different preferences and specific needs for a particular guitar type (classical, acoustic or electric), body shape (Acoustic: Dreadnought, Grand Auditorium, Orchestra Model, Jumbo, etc. or Electric: Fender Stratocaster, Telecaster, Superstrat, Gibson Les Paul, Gibson SG, etc.), neck shape/width, string gauges, and so on. You need a guitar that feels right against your body, right in your arms, hands, fingers and one that fits your frame.

Adjusting the action of your guitar can also make a huge difference to your playing. “Action” is simply how close the strings are to the fretboard. A lower action can make your guitar a lot more comfortable and fun to play. Be careful, a very low action can cause fret buzz, so make sure it is done correctly.

If you’re playing electric guitar, your amp (with gain/distortion) is just as important as your guitar. Your sound and playability will fully depend on it. The sound of an amp is also very personal. The choice of your amp will depend of what style of music you’re playing, your preferences (distortion, effects, analog or digital) and whether it’s for practice, studio or stage use.

Top 20 Easy Guitar Fingerpicking Songs For Beginners

By Klaus Crow 17 Comments

Fingerpicking also referred to as fingerstyle, is one of the many guitar techniques that is part of the complete guitar skill set and incredibly fun to learn.

Fingerpicking is a technique where you pluck the strings directly with the fingertips, as apposed to strumming where you move your fingers in a sweeping action across the strings to play some nice and easy guitar songs in a more rhythmic fashion.

Fingerpicking Basics

There are some basic fingerpicking principles for how to place the fingerpicking hand. The traditional way to approach the strings is as follows:

Use the thumb for the Low E, A and D string (6th, 5th and 4th string)
Index finger for the G string (3rd string)
Middle finger for the B string (2nd string)
Ring finger for the high E string (1st string)

See image below:

how and where to place the fingerpicking hand

Make sure your fingers are curved when you place your fingers onto the strings. When you pluck the strings your thumb goes downwards and the fingers are going in an upwards movement. Now you are ready to practice some fingerpicking patterns.

Top 30 Easy Guitar Rock Songs For Beginners

By Klaus Crow 3 Comments

There’s nothing like strumming a good rock song. It’s that thrill when you play the songs you’ve always been listening to. You feel it when your fingers are blazin’ across the strings through the gain of the amp. Total bliss!

But what songs do you pick when you’re in the beginning stage? There are plenty rock songs out there, but most of them are pretty challenging to play to say the least.

To tackle this problem I selected 30 easy rock songs for beginners so you can start practicing. Don’t forget to turn the amp up and play that electric guitar loud and dirty.

To be fair, it is recommendable that you own some beginner skills and try out some easy acoustic guitar songs first. You need to know a few basic chords and easy strumming patterns. Having said that, I know you are here for rock ‘n roll so some easy guitar riffs might excite you as well. I don’t want to overload you with material but I just want you to know it’s here if you need it.

Now let’s get rocking!

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