Pretty Fly For a White Guy Guitar Lesson – The Offspring

Genre:

Difficulty:
Length: 13:36

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Wikipedia page
Artist website
Music video

• Guitar notes
• Multiple string slides
• Power chords

Pretty Fly (For a White Guy) was a huge hit back when it was released, mostly due to the comedic, satiric nature and well-made music video. Lots of people know the song, which makes it an awesome song to learn since your audience will recognize it instantly.

It is a relatively straightforward song, not that difficult if you're familiar with power chords already. But even if you're not, don't worry, our guitar lesson on Pretty Fly for a White Guy will teach you all about power chords, including a bit of power chord theory.

At the beginning of the tutorial, you'll learn why power chords aren't real chords, which might be surprising to lots of you. Afterward, you'll learn all of the parts to this great Offspring song, including the intro, verse, chorus, as well as the bridge. Now there are lots of parts to it, so you might want to go ahead and download the tabs to Pretty Fly for a White Guy right now from the link above (after logging in of course).

As I mentioned, there are lots of sections to this song. First, you'll learn the intro (what a shocker :-)), then the verse, then the chorus. The chorus consists of 4 distinctly separate parts, which we'll learn one by one. After the chorus, we'll learn the bridge, which will mean the end of the lesson.

This song uses purely power chords, which means your hands WILL get tired! I know mine were after recording the lesson 🙂

But it's all good because it'll really strengthen your hands, your wrist, and your underarm. Believe me, once you get to the point where you can play along with the full song, it'll mean you are proficient at power chords and ready to take on the world.

This lesson is also beneficial if you are having trouble remembering the notes on the guitar since I refer to every power chord by its name, not by where it is. Of course, we go through every chord at the beginning of the lesson, but afterward, you'll need to know where the A power chord is rooting on the low E string automatically (if you said fret 5, you're right!).

Pretty Fly For a White Guy song details

Pretty Fly (For a White Guy) was released by The Offspring on their 1998 album, Americana. It quickly became one of the band's most successful songs and was released as a single as well, which went 4x Platinum. The song is also included on their Greatest Hits album.

The lyrics of the song mock the middle-class suburban youths who listen to rap music and "wannabe cool"  because it's trendy, and they can meet more "girlies". The music video of the song became very popular as well, portraying the "wangsta" (white gangster wannabe) very well.

Pretty Fly For a White Guy awards and rankings

The number of awards and acclaims Pretty Fly For a White Guy received is amazing, and actually too long to list. Here are the most important awards it received and rankings it achieved:

• US Billboard 100: #53
• US Billboard Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks: #5
• US Billboard Hot Modern Rock Tracks: #3
• Australian Singles Chart: #1
• UK Singles Chart: #1
• Multiple platinum in the USA, Norway, Sweden, UK

If you want to refine the skills you learned in Pretty Fly For a White Guy, check out these lessons on songs by clicking these links:
Guitar notes / Multiple string slides / Power chords

Please log in and revisit this page to download this song's tabs and backing track (along with hundreds more on the site).