NINE-TIME M.V.P.

NINE TIMES NUNO BETTENCOURT PROVED TO BE GUITAR'S M.V.P.

- Andrew Daly

DID YOU KNOW the January 1992 issue of GW called Nuno Bettencourt the M.V.P.? If you’ve been following along for a while, you probably did. But if you’ve just joined the party, let us catch you up.

If we dial back to ’92, all things considered, being called the M.V.P. was major praise. Yes, Eddie Van Halen, Slash and Steve Vai were doing their thing, but old-guard types like Joe Perry, Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page were scurrying about, too (as they are now). So what made Nuno the M.V.P.? It’s simple: Nuno, in so many ways, propped up the world of rock guitar. In the early Nineties, most young guitar players had chosen to mosey down the path of the Seattle sound, but not Nuno. When Nirvana and Pearl Jam released Nevermind (1991) and Ten (1991) respectively, Nuno answered with 1992’s III Sides to Every Story. It takes a special player to do that, and — make no mistake — Nuno is special.

That’s why more than 30 years later, he’s still blowing our minds with songs like “Rise,” “Banshee” and “#Rebel.” So, yeah, the reasons that Nuno is the M.V.P. are numerous, but let’s boil them down.

“MUTHA (DON’T WANNA GO TO SCHOOL TODAY)”

Extreme (1989)
Before he ventured out to sonic pastures unknown, Bettencourt’s pastures leaned more toward hair metal than anything else. The entirety of Extreme’s first record proved to be a