Below is the lesson for “Everlong” by the Foo Fighters

Helpful Tips

This arrangement for “Everlong” is broken into a few sections: Riff (intro/outro), Verse, Pre-Chorus, and Chorus. I mainly took inspiration from the acoustic version played by Dave Grohl, thus I would recommend giving it a listen before you begin learning this song. It features some interesting chords in the riff: Sus (suspended) chords. A Sus chord is achieved by altering a major triad’s third by either lowering it by a whole step (as used in this arrangement) or raising it by a half step. The formulas are illustrated below:

Major Triad: 1 3 5
Sus 2: 1 2 5
Sus 4: 1 4 5

What does all this mean? Sus chords create an open, unresolved type of sound… or simply said: they make for great rock riffs! If the above confuses you, jump into our music theory course to learn how chords are formed and altered. Getting back to the arrangement, the most difficult part is the pre-chorus. Work on the upward moving octave lick slowly, as to get used to keeping your fingers in the same shape while sliding up the neck.