Monday, September 08, 2008

A music book I won't be buying

Looking in the window of Banks's Music Shop today I spotted a book of guitar tab. It wasn't Travis or the Foo Fighters. It was something else, something wronger. It was a book of music from Guitar Hero. It lets you play all the songs you've learnt to play on your fake plastic guitar on a real guitar instead of a fake plastic guitar.

Now, maybe I'm missing the point, but isn't the whole f***ing point of guitar hero that you do it on a fake plastic guitar rather than a real guitar? It helps you avoid the world of broken strings and lost plectri. Computer games are not an introduction to the real world. When I was a kid I spent hours (minutes) playing Advanced Lawnmower Simulator on my Spectrum. It was great because it let me have all the excitement of mowing an actual lawn with an actual petrol lawnmower but without having to leave my bedroom. It didn't in any way inspire me to go out and get my own petrol lawnmower. And I never saw garden centers selling ALS branded lawnmower instruction books in them. And believe me, I visited a lot of garden centers when I was a kid. Apologies if it's garden centre by the way.

So my point broadly is that the Guitar Hero tab book is daft and stupid and you should boycott it lest this stupidity escalate.

And I'm not planning to buy "The Yie Ar Kung Fu Guide to Martial Arts" or "Leisure Suit Larry Teaches Humping" either.

2 comments:

Wayne said...

I couldn't help but quench my curiosity. This is brilliant!

http://www.antom.co.uk/games/als/

Lint said...

I played it for hours when I was a kid. I've probably still got the tape with it on, somewhere in the flat!