You Too, Can Be A Carboard, Karaoke Guitar-God Cutout

While my days of guitar-oriented glory-seeking are far removed, I am nonetheless proud of the roads I’ve traveled musically to arrive at the abilities I now have. I remember copying Golden Earring’s “Twilight Zone” guitar solo as my first success at mimicry. I remember being able to hear blues-based playing in the fingers of Eddie Van Halen, yet thinking no mere mortal could ever really do that—at that rate of speed. Then I remember actually doing it, and realizing it could.

Then, a pompous young Swede named Yngwie J. Malmsteen changed my life again when I heard him scorching up and down the neck in what I would later learn were diminished runs and harmonic minor scales. I again, remember working backwards through time musically, as this tousled lunatic cited unexpected influences—like Nicolo Paganini and Johann Sebastian Bach. I then remember learning to play parts of the 24 Caprices note for note, and seeing the relationship between arpeggios and scales. It was at these crossroads that I purchased my first metronome.

I managed to undergo the usual, guitar-based baptisms by fire; Hendrix, Clapton, Angus Young, George Lynch, Stevie Ray Vaughan, along with a host of others whose playing has colored the way I approach the instrument. Nearly thirty years after I started playing as a kid, I’ve learned how to play, and have no apologies when noting that I happen to think I’m pretty good when I do play.

So what appalling specter am I confronted with at the guitar shops? The American infatuation with a high-profile video game that not only lauds one’s inability to play the guitar, but facilitates magazine covers, talk-show interviews, and thousand-dollar awards for the one who can effortlessly wield their non-ability to the consternation everyone else in the competition. I submit as evidence, the following abomination to all I hold on guitar strap:

Let me explain in oversimplified terms. That pile of plastic in the above picture is a toy—a toy that connects to a videogame interface. As the background music to a song plays, the implied guitar parts scroll down the screen in one of the five colors seen on the neck. One must coincide their “picking” to a perfectly timed push of the appropriate colored button—at the correct time. If one is successful, the song plays without incident, and you “appear” to be carrying the guitar in the song—in the same, delusional fog that has many controller-hoarding couch-potatoes convinced that their otherworldly ability to vanquish their enemies in World of WarCraft translates into verifiable tactical, battlefield skill.

It’s not that I want to rain on anybody’s fantasy parade. I, quite frankly, could care less if you sit around postulating protracted attacks on your co-worker’s existential guild of mutated manatees, or if you like playing air guitar with your own soundtrack. But when my little guitar world legitimizes such feckless pantomime as something legitimately artistic—and thus worthy of a championship cardboard cutout in my guitar shop—I just get a tad bit irritated. Next thing you know, they’ll be trying to convince me Paula Abdul can sing.

I’ve never been able to stomach mediocrity dressed up as excellence, and I can barely maintain my composure when it’s applauded. Whenever I’m standing outside with friends, and some automotive troglodyte decides to spin out his tires, I always say “wow, that guy can step on a gas pedal like nobody’s business.”

Guitar Hero, taken as a game, is a fun premise. But when I see pub fliers around town, equating Guitar Hero as a legitimate answer to a battle of the bands, I get tempted. Tempted to actually slip into the back, and wait until the sweaty, contorted fretboard Goliath finishes his crescendoed rendition of Smoke on the Water. As soon as the maniacal applause died down, I’d pipe in with the all-too-smarmy “slow clap,” waiting for all heads to turn. Then I’d exult:

“Hey, does that man know his primary colors, or am I just dreaming here? Somebody pinch me!!”

I’m sure begging for a pick and asking him to show me how to play “Eruption” would be enough to have me thrown out.

And quite frankly, I wouldn’t have it any other way.