Looking back, my early taste in music was mostly influenced by Guitar Hero World Tour, which I played vigorously and sometimes on the Wii as a child. My parents weren’t huge music people, which meant my dad introduced me to Queen, The Bee Gees, Guns N Roses, and that was the extent of my knowledge of rock music and all its adjoining genres. No less than, until I got my hands on a plastic guitar.
Note: Obviously, having free access to the web as a toddler also had some big influences, but I don’t actually need to discuss my teenage fixation on Marina and the Diamonds without delay.
Guitar Hero Is Back! Kind Of
As I’ve written before, World Tour was a continuing presence when my parents threw parties over the vacations – the adults would get sloshed on red wine, and the children would play Guitar Hero within the basement. That is where I first heard rap rock in the shape of the Beastie Boys, fell in love with Foo Fighters, and discovered Interpol, Tool, and No Doubt. I used to be already a Paramore fan and had heard Tokio Hotel’s Monsoon on MTV, but World Tour expanded my horizons, introducing me to songs far heavier and more alternative than Bohemian Rhapsody or November Rain.
RedOctane was accountable for birthing the Guitar Hero series, however the studio was bought by Activision in 2006 and subsequently shut down in 2010. Now, it’s been brought back to life as a division of Embracer Group by several former staff. It intends to bring back rhythm gaming, but higher, with “more power, more precision, and a deeper connection than ever before”. I don’t know what any of meaning, but I do know I need it.
It’s been ten years since we’ve gotten a dedicated rhythm game of this ilk, which implies a Guitar Hero or a Rock Band. There’s Fortnite Festival, but I don’t love the live-service approach to it, and there was Fuser in 2020, which was more DJ-based than instrumental. Neither have really managed to capture the spirit of Guitar Hero, where you possibly can get a gaggle of friends in your lounge to infuriate your neighbours with their screeching and banging.
What Artists Would A Recent Kind Of Guitar Hero Include?
This got me wondering: what would a contemporary Guitar Hero have? Music, and rock, has modified rather a lot within the ten years since we saw the last game. A number of rock bands have gone pop, pop artists have leaned into rock, and we’re seeing genre fusions like never before. Punk and pop punk, mainstays of the Guitar Hero oeuvre, are alive and well, but with different artists and bands on the forefront.
Guitar Hero, and games prefer it, shaped the music tastes of children like me as much as they reflected it. So who’re our modern classics? Immediately – and this will be controversial – Olivia Rodrigo sprung to mind. I absolutely think that Rodrigo is pop punk, despite her initial claim to fame as a squeaky-clean Disney child actor. It’s unimaginable to take heed to her albums Sour and Guts and never hear their rock influences, partially delivered to life by Dan Nigro of indie rock band As Tall As Lions, which I loved once I was a young person.
One other controversial take: Mitski. Specifically, Cop Automotive. Don’t yell at me till you’ve heard it.
This may also just be my experience due to music I grew up listening to and the people I hang around with, but post-hardcore and emo were huge parts of the 2010s. The critically acclaimed and Grammy-nominated Turnstile needs to be on there, and if it’s not, I’m boycotting. Emo legends Title Fight have one song on Guitar Hero Live, and it was from their last album Hyperview. How dare you. Turnover, Modern Baseball and Citizen deserve mentions. Amyl and the Sniffers are glorious.
Sure, I could discuss Machine Gun Kelly, or Enter Shikari, or Fontaines DC, Idles, or any of the opposite obvious bands, but that’s no fun. As an alternative I need to indicate other artists that defy genre – King Krule, Steve Lacy, and Yves Tumor. And there’s the maths rock stuff that will be super fun to play on a pretend guitar, like Covet, Delta Sleep, even TikTok sensation Flawed Mangoes. Hell, throw in Asian Kung-Fu Generation, we could use some bangin’ anime soundtracks in there.
My point is that with the TikTokification of music, things are different than they were in 2015. Music looks different, sounds different, plays different. With a brand new generation of rhythm games must come an understanding of what people take heed to now. You almost certainly disagree with my selections, so you possibly can yell at me within the comments in the event you like. I’m gonna go take heed to some King Krule.