Wherever I May Roam

Let's be honest... It would be amazing to pick up an instrument and without any prior experience be able to play lick for lick, beat for beat the same configuration of notes, tone, and accentuation as world-famous musicians. Imagine, putting oneself in those god-like shoes, either alone or in front of one's peers, from the very comfort of a living room. Recent gaming technology grants such virtual power and unsurprisingly it is a runaway hit that originally began as simple guitar interaction but has evolved to include a full band. The game series even continues to expand its song library from The Beatles to The White Stripes so as to involve multiple generations of rock fans. Seemingly, the sky is the limit for music-loving gamers; unfortunately, however, the "sky" is really just glow-in-the-dark cutouts shaped like stars and quarter moons randomly glued to the ceiling of their bedrooms save for the constellation that happens to read, "Mom loves you."

Sure, it's fun to hang out with friends and rather than playing against each other play towards a common goal but doing so under the assumption that it somehow makes somebody a musician or musician-like is a farce. You don't become the world's greatest lover by masturbating ten times a day so why would you think that practicing on a piece of plastic with plastic buttons will prepare you for the real thing? Hell, it takes most guitarists a while to get accustomed to not only a five-button setup that resembles nothing to actual chords or notes but also having to strum in a style that is dumbed down, even on "expert" mode, at best. With that being the case they should just rename the series, "DDR: Hands and Fingers Edition!" It's really nothing but a distorted fantasy when the irony is that all the time and money spent drunkenly fooling around after-hours with friends could have been best used to learn how to play these songs with wood and steel instruments in the first place, maybe even opening the possibility of playing something... original.

But fine, it's a total blast to sit in front of a TV, press some buttons in time with pretty colors on the screen, and hear yourself "play" and judged in front of a virtual crowd. I bet at parties you have girls come up to you requesting you to do "Master of Puppets" just so they can whisper behind your back, "Wow, did you see him solo? OMG. He must masturbate like ten times a day!" Right. Well, while you're off in the den showing how it's done to "Freebird" I'll be tuning a guitar in time for your girlfriend to tell me how she picked a song to distract you long enough to show me her tits while I play her "Yellow Ledbetter."