Группа extreme more than word

More than words

“More Than Words” is a single from Extreme’s 1990 album Extreme II: Pornograffiti. It was written by Nuno Bettencourt & Gary Cherone.

According to Nuno Bettencourt, the song is described as a warning that the phrase ‘I love you’ was becoming meaningless, stating:

People use it so easily and so lightly that they think you can say that and fix everything, or you can say that and everything’s OK. Sometimes you have to do more and you have to show it— there’s other ways to say ‘I love you.’

It began with Bettencourt strumming an acoustic guitar one day on Cherone’s porch in Malden, MA. He played it for Cherone who was then inspired to scribble down the phrase “More than words is all you have to do”. Bettencourt then insisted he finish the lyrics right then.

Originally their record label wanted them to turn the song into a power ballad, asking them to add drums and a guitar solo like Motley Crue’s “Home Sweet Home” and Ozzy Osbourne’s “Mama I’m Coming Home” but the band refused. While the band recorded it in the studio, Skid Row frontman Sebastian Bach heard the song and predicted it would be ‘huge’ and become ‘a number one’.

Initially the record company resisted Bettencourt’s request to release “More Than Words” as the album’s third single. Its first two singles had made little impact in the US, so their label wanted them to begin work on their next album. However, the band informed the label that their audiences drowned them out by singing along to the song whenever they played it in concert. The band kept insisting that it be sent to radio, so to pacify them the label tested the song in one radio market – where it quickly became the most-requested song on the station. A test was done in another market and the same thing happened, so the label relented and officially released it as single.

The song became a number-one hit, topping the Billboard Hot 100 for a week in June of 1991 and was certified Gold by the RIAA. It also topped the charts in Canada, the Netherlands & New Zealand, and reached #2 in the UK. As soon as “More Than Words” was an international hit, the record company released the other acoustic track from the album “Hole Hearted” as the fourth single to cash in on their recent success – and it reached the top 5 in the US.

Being a hard rock band that scored two top 5 acoustic hits was both a blessing and curse for the band, the downside being Bettencourt felt it made the record company want to make them into something they were not:

Everybody got really greedy — the same people who thought an acoustic song would never work in the first place. And then on the next album, they were like, ‘Where’s an acoustic song?’ But we weren’t an acoustic band. I wrote a song on a porch and it became a hit. I wasn’t gonna try to write ‘More Than Words Part Two.’ It just doesn’t work that way.

Extreme is sometimes labelled as a one-hit wonder despite the fact their next single “Hole Hearted” reached #4 in the US and #12 in the UK.

In 2014, Bettencourt shared with the Straits Times how “More Than Words” created two distinct types of fans of the band:

People who just like that song are not Extreme fans, they just like ‘More Than Words’. That’s cool, that’s nice, but the actual truth fans know is we’re more than that song.

Можно ли считать, что слова «я тебя люблю» потеряли смысл из-за чрезмерно частого использования? Наверное, это слишком резкое утверждение, но вряд ли кто-то будет спорить с тем, что данная фраза не особо ценна, если она не подкрепляется поступками, доказывающими ее искренность. Подобным рассуждениям посвящена акустическая баллада More Than Words американской рок-группы Extreme.

История создания и смысл песни More Than Words

Она исполняется от лица парня, которому недостаточно слов о любви. Он хочет, чтобы в проявлении чувств его девушка не ограничивалась банальными выражениями. Вот как объяснил основную идею песни More Than Words гитарист Нуно Беттанкур, сочинивший ее в соавторстве с вокалистом коллектива Гэри Чероне:

Люди просто думают, раз вы встречаетесь, вы должны влюбиться друг в друга, но зачастую это не так. Люди используют ее [фразу «я тебя люблю»] так легко и так несерьезно, что им кажется, будто ты можешь произнести это, и все уладится, или ты можешь произнести это, и все будет в порядке. Иногда тебе приходится сделать нечто большее, и ты должен показать это – есть другие способы сказать: «Я тебя люблю».

Albany Herald, 1991

Релиз и достижения

More Than Words стала одним из треков альбома Extreme II: Pornograffitti (A Funked Up Fairy Tale). В марте 1991 года она была издана синглом, который поднялся на первое место Billboard Hot 100. Песня также возглавила чарты в Голландии, Канаде и Новой Зеландии. В британском хит-параде композиция добралась до второй строчки.

Каверы на More Than Words исполняли Westlife, BBMak и многие другие музыканты. Ее также часто пародировали и включали в саундтреки к художественным фильмам и телесериалам.

Клип More Than Words Extreme

Черно-белый видеоклип сняли Джонатан Дэйтон и Валери Фэрис.

Интересные факты

• More Than Words и Hole Hearted стали самыми успешными треками из Extreme II: Pornograffitti. Обе песни являются акустическими балладами, выбивающимися из общей концепции альбома.

Текст песни More Than Words Extreme

Saying I love you
Is not the words I want to hear from you
It’s not that I want you
Not to say, but if you only knew
How easy it would be to show me how you feel
More than words is all you have to do to make it real
Then you wouldn’t have to say that you love me
‘Cause I’d already know
What would you do if my heart was torn in two
More than words to show you feel
That your love for me is real
What would you say if I took those words away
Then you couldn’t make things new
Just by saying I love you

More than words

Now that I’ve tried to talk to you and make you understand
All you have to do is close your eyes
And just reach out your hands and touch me
Hold me close don’t ever let me go
More than words is all I ever needed you to show
Then you wouldn’t have to say that you love me
‘Cause I’d already know
What would you do if my heart was torn in two
More than words to show you feel
That your love for me is real
What would you say if I took those words away
Then you couldn’t make things new
Just by saying I love you

More than words

Перевод песни More Than Words Extreme

Фраза «я тебя люблю» –
Это не те слова, что я хочу от тебя услышать
Я не хочу, чтобы ты
Этого не говорила, но если бы ты только знала,
Как легко ты могла бы показать мне свои чувства
Для этого тебе понадобится нечто большее, чем слова
Но тогда тебе не пришлось бы говорить, что ты любишь меня,
Ведь я бы уже и так это знал
Что бы ты сделала, если бы мое сердце разорвалось на части
Нужно больше, чем слова, чтобы показать, что ты считаешь
Свою любовь ко мне настоящей
Что бы ты сказала, если бы я убрал эти слова
Тогда бы ты не смогла все освежить,
Просто сказав: «Я тебя люблю»

Больше, чем слова

Теперь, когда я попытался поговорить с тобой и все тебе объяснить,
Тебе нужно лишь закрыть глаза,
Протянуть руки и коснуться меня
Держи меня крепко и никогда не отпускай
Мне нужно от тебя нечто большее, чем слова
Тогда тебе не пришлось бы говорить, что ты любишь меня,
Ведь я бы уже и так это знал
Что бы ты сделала, если бы мое сердце разорвалось на части
Нужно больше, чем слова, чтобы показать, что ты считаешь
Свою любовь ко мне настоящей
Что бы ты сказала, если бы я убрал эти слова
Тогда бы ты не смогла все освежить,
Просто сказав: «Я тебя люблю»

Больше, чем слова

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

«More Than Words»
Single by Extreme
from the album Pornograffitti
B-side	«Nice Place to Visit» «Kid Ego»
Released	March 12, 1991
Genre	Soft rock[1] acoustic rock[2]
Length	5:33 (album version) 4:09 (radio edit)
Label	A&M
Songwriter(s)	Gary Cherone Nuno Bettencourt
Producer(s)	Michael Wagener
Extreme singles chronology
«Get the Funk Out» (1991) «More Than Words» (1991) «Hole Hearted» (1991)
Music video
«More Than Words» on YouTube

«More Than Words» is a song by American rock band Extreme, released as the fifth track and third single from their second album, Pornograffitti (1990), in March 1991. It is a ballad built around acoustic guitar work by Nuno Bettencourt and the vocals of Gary Cherone (with harmony vocals from Bettencourt). The song is a detour from the funk metal style that permeates the band’s records. As such, it has often been described as «a blessing and a curse» due to its overwhelming success and recognition worldwide, but the band ultimately embraced it and plays it at every show.

Content[edit]

The song is a ballad in which the singer wants his lover to do more to prove her love other than saying the phrase «I love you.» Bettencourt described it as a warning that the phrase was becoming meaningless: «People use it so easily and so lightly that they think you can say that and fix everything, or you can say that and everything’s OK. Sometimes you have to do more and you have to show it—there’s other ways to say ‘I love you.'»^[3]

«That song gave us the freedom to make the record we really wanted to make when we started recording our third disc,» Cherone told KNAC. «It got us doing huge tours all over the states and around the world… As the nineties went on, however, we really started to resent the song. We were tagged ‘the More Than Words guys’. We didn’t like the perception the song created about the band. I remember being on tour with Aerosmith in Poland… it was on that tour we decided we would not play the song. We just didn’t do it. A couple nights into the tour, Steven Tyler writes in big letters on our dressing room door, ‘Play the fucking song!’ His attitude was almost father-like. He was like, ‘Look, this is your first time in Poland. When do you think you will be back? They want to hear it, so play it!'»^[5]

Critical reception[edit]

AllMusic editor William Ruhlmann noted that on the song, the band pursued «acoustic balladry».^[6] Kira L. Billik from Associated Press described it as a «sweet, pure acoustic ballad» «whose message is that the words «I love you» are becoming meaningless.»^[7] It was also labeled as a «nontraditional love song».^[8]

Billboard stated that this «tender, sparsely produced rock/love ballad proves that sometimes less really is more. The spotlight here is on the band’s striking vocal harmonies, as well as its shimmering acoustic guitar work.»^[9] The Daily Vault’s Sean McCarthy said that it is a «beautiful, minimal acoustic number [that] made the band huge» and added that «for the band, «More Than Words» is the song that will still get airplay.»^[10]

Diane Cardwell from Entertainment Weekly called it «a simple, almost folkie ballad using just two voices and a single acoustic guitar.»^[11] Kirsten Frickle from El Paisano described it as an «all-acoustic ballad that is so beautiful it will make your hair stand on end».^[12]

Pan-European magazine Music & Media labeled the song as «folky»^[13] and «a calming piece of music, aptly produced by Michael Wagener.» They added, «It shows the band from a totally different angle. And it must be said, they handle this ballad extremely well.»^[14]

Alan Jones from Music Week stated that it is «a subdued, lilting acoustic workout that suggests nothing more than Simon & Garfunkel in its more angelic passages.»^[15] Carrie Borzillo from Record-Journal called it an «Everly Brothers-style» song.^[16]

A reviewer from Sandwell Evening Mail wrote, «If ever a song could be unrepresentative of a band’s output, Extreme’s worldwide smash hit ballad More Than Words is it.»^[17] Marc Andrews from Smash Hits said it is «eye-moistening».^[18]

Tom Nordlie from Spin noted it as «a love ballad that sounds like the Everly Brothers or early Beatles.» He added, «Singer Gary Cherone harmonizes with himself as guitar-friend Nuno Bettencourt strums clean, jazzy chord accompaniment, and that’s it. No sudden escalation to bombast in the middle, no reneging on the song’s original promise.»^[19]

Chad Bowar writing for LiveAbout placed the song on his list of the «Best 20 Hair Metal Ballads of the ’80s and ’90s».^[20]

Chart performance[edit]

On March 23, 1991, «More Than Words» entered the US Billboard Hot 100 at number 81 and soon after reached number one. It also reached number two in the United Kingdom, where the group had success before its American breakthrough. Though they had made a few European charts before, this brought the band to their first mainstream success in the United States.

Music video[edit]

The song’s music video was filmed in black and white and was produced and directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris. It starts with Pat Badger turning off his amplifier and putting down his bass, and Paul Geary putting down his drumsticks. Nuno and Gary are then seen performing the song, while the other band members are shown in front of them, holding up their lighters.

In the video’s music rendition, the song ends abruptly before Nuno’s final solo and coda.

Track listings[edit]

CD maxi

1. «More Than Words» — 5:33
2. «Kid Ego» — 4:04
3. «Nice Place to Visit» — 3:16

7-inch single

1. «More Than Words» (Remix) — 3:43
2. «Nice Place to Visit» — 3:16

Charts[edit]

Certifications[edit]

Release history[edit]

References[edit]