Mark Wright’s Blog

In the past, I have ripped on video games.  I don’t get them and probably never will.  However, I do have to give big ups to a particular game, Guitar Hero.  I am not giving Guitar Hero props because I think it is a great game.  I actually think it is pretty stupid.  However, what I do like about it is that it is turning young kids on to some really good music. 

I was at my sister’s house a while back and both of my nephews were playing the game.  I watched them for a little while and they were actually pretty good at it.  They asked me if I wanted them to play and I politely declined.  An uncle has to maintain a certain mystique of invincibility so I didn’t want them to see that I would be horrible at it and didn’t have the 500 hours to invest in it.  The problem is that I have a job which unfortunately cuts into my Guitar Hero practice time. 

Now wait where was I?  Oh yeah, the part about Guitar Hero that I liked.  I was listening to my nephews give a post Guitar Hero breakdown of their session and I heard a wonderful thing.  They were talking about bands like Kansas, Heart, Black Sabbath and The Who.  These kids are 10 and 14.  Guitar Hero is actually turning kids on to some really good bands.  Kids will now know that they Rolling Stones are a really good band and not just a bunch of old guys in clothing that is way too tight.  It will show kids that Kid Rock is not the foundation of Rock and Roll, merely just another brick. 

I am not one of those people that believe that for music to be good, it can’t be made later than 1978.  There are a lot of current bands that I like and listen to.  There will always be good and bad music.  I am just glad that kids are getting turned on to some of the older stuff.  If they raid their parent’s LP collection, they probably couldn’t play it because nobody owns an actual record player.  While it is all out on CD, the epitome of cool is not raiding your mom and dad’s music collection.  I’ll be the first to admit that listening to my parents big band LPs as a child was not my idea of fun.  Now when I found their Red Foxx comedy albums, that was a different story.  Anyhow, I have to give mad love to GH for exposing the younger generation to music they should know about.