Thursday, November 29, 2007

Rock Band Post #9,000

I won't have a Rock Band post every day, even though it seems like that now. Well, it seems like that now because I AM having a Rock Band post almost every day. So many of you guys are playing it, though, that it seems like a natural discussion topic.

Plus, I've been playing it a bit, as you know.

In solo mode, my guitarist is named Ron Obvious, and if that doesn't ring a bell, you should watch this Monty Python skit (starts at about 2:10 of the video). It's classic Python comedy, and the name has always stuck in my head.

As you progress in solo mode, you'll start seeing your character's name on buses and airplanes. There is no way that seeing "Ron Obvious" on the side of an airplane is EVER going to get old.

I've also finally thought of a name for the band I'm going to be in with John Harwood. Sonora 64 even sounds like a band name, but it's actually the name of a dwarf wheat variety developed by Norman Borlaug that enabled countries like Mexico, India, and Pakistan to become self-sufficient in wheat production. Borlaug is one of the most important (and least-known, at least to the general public) figures of the last half of the twentieth century, and I would never have known about him if DQ reader Devon Prescott hadn't brought him to my attention a few months ago.

I finished the guitar solo career on Hard last night, and finished drums on Medium today. There's no question that Hard in Rock Band is less difficult than Hard on Guitar Hero III, but I think the note charts and songs in Rock Band are far more fun to play. And drumming, even on Medium difficulty, is an amazing experience--it's an entirely new way for people to experience music, and it's already changed how I hear songs when I listen to them on the radio.

I think that's what people who dismiss games like this are missing--yes, they're games, but they're also a new way to experience music, and they add an entirely new dimension to our appreciation of songs we may have already heard for decades.

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