Quality Or Quantity: More About Rock Band And Guitar Hero

By now you've been inundated with articles all asking the question "Is Guitar Hero/Rock Band going to save rock and roll?" I was reading one of the latest of these in the March issue of the Atlantic this year, and it felt like most of the rest of the articles in this style, someone, who at one point in their lives, had liked rock and roll when rock and roll ruled the entertainment world, saw the steady decline of rock and roll in its own hedonism and now sees "the kids" are coming back to rock.

The answer, is of course, yes, but that's assuming rock and roll needs to be saved. I don't think it does. There will be rock bands on top of the world and living lavish lifestyles beyond my fascination or imagination, but it's not going to globally dominating. What I think a lot of these people want, secretly, is not for rock and roll to be saved, but to be returned to the cultural touchstone it once was among the youth, everywhere. Sadly (for them), hip-hop and electronic music crashed the party and not all the youth dream in distorted guitar solos these days.

The industry will be fine, but they're going to have to adjust to new expectations. Those new expectations are simple: Records are not going to be diamond certified any more, unless digital sales are taken into account and a record is really, really lucky. So, if rock and roll is Motley Crue or Van Halen, then yes, rock is dead and it's not coming back. There are too many avenues to hear bands that aren't controlled by labels or radio stations and this means that among other things, that there probably won't be those same kind of cultural touchstones.

Music, nay, performance, lives and dies, James Parker, notes (at the end of that same peice), in the heads of teenagers everywhere, which is good, because Guitar Hero and Rock Band enable that. These products, hopefully, he says are exciting a new generation of rockers. And I include myself in that and enjoy these products, because, frankly, I don't have the backbone or courage to start a band of my own and it feels real fucking good to scream along to any Rage Against the Machine song, putting the microphone to my friends who also know the song and might be playing.

And yes, I know it's not real guitars and real drums. Baudrillard would be hung up on that. I'm not. It's a reasonable approximation of rocking out for the purpose of having fun and blowing off steam. But, as Parker mentions, rock and roll was always based on some delusion, whether it was a band starting wanting to be like an earlier group, or doing covers or, just being silly.

I see Rock Band and Guitar Hero in that tradition and the idea of hyperreality doesn't enter my mind. I know it's not real. It's not supposed to be real. It is supposed to mimic. That's why all the crazy avatars are there. It's not a real band. It's just fucking around and having fun. If you know anything about bands, then I might have just come full circle. Most bands start out as not being serious and then snowballing from there.

So, in the sense that Rock Band and Guitar Hero is not trying to be real, the closer it comes to being authentic. Funny thing, that. I wonder Baudriallard would think, but I hope he'd have the prensence of mind to drop the pretense and pick up a plastic instrument.

Quality Or Quantity: Textiles

I saw pictures from high school, tonight when I was cleaning out my drawers, looking for underwear and a cross. See, I get up tomorrow (at 7 a.m.) to work a law school graduation and I ended up peering into a drawer that had developed pictures in it. (Imagine that. Physical pictures, with negatives!) Those pictures dragged me back, kindly, back to different times.

Apparently, I spent a lot of time in the computer lab, with older girls that I thought were attractive and if I remember correctly, treated me like their younger brother. There are worse fates, I suppose. There's pictures of spending time at Six Flags, which for the life of me, I don't remember except being on a bus to go there and get back to school on literally, the far other side of the city. This ignores the pictures of which I am embarrassed after concerts and being so young and being so incredibly excited to see a band (in some huge arena) who'se members I am beginning to become closer to five, six years later.

So there's change and, I'll probably mention the pictures to the drummer the next time I see him online, so that bodes well, right? But.

There was something about innocence in those photos, but something...else. I genuinely did not remember the cute girl who was the math professor's (or was it science?) daughter that I look back on and now realize that she may have been my first real crush when I was old enough to have an understanding of what it meant. I remember she liked to sing. She also liked the Grateful Dead.

I forgot about her existence. Completely, until I saw that picture again. This was all pre-Facebook and...well, I guess people are right. I will forget. You will forget. I will probably forget all about a couple of girls within 4 or 5 years. I am aware that's a long time.

The more frightening question this brings up is when I found the other piece of memorabilia, the Celtic cross purchased in Ireland when I was 19. There was a prolonged breakup that happened and began to unravel over that trip, which cast a pall over the time I spent there. (Strangely enough, my mother, who otherwise is a by the book kind of woman, offered to get me a Guiness while I was there, where it would be legal, despite having an allergic aversion to me imbing alcohol in the States.) The relationship was pretty much over, or I kept trying to force it and it wouldn't take and it spilled over the Atlantic and over the last semster of that year.

I said a lot of things over that period of time I'm not proud of and have since sworn never to say again, which, so far, I've been keeping. I still hang my head in shame even obliquely mentioning that.

I have to go to bed now, but I'm left with the question: Would I remember that girlfriend (my first!) if it wasn't for the absolute douchebaggery that I pulled and the Fallout-esque aftermath? I hope not, but seeing those pictures makes me wonder now, all the same.

The internet is like amber for the things that embarass us (and occasionally make us proud) and looking at those pictures make me wonder how I ever stuck those dead bugs with pins...

Quality Or Quantity: War Games

Here's a surprise: A game based on an actual, ongoing war, is going to have an uphill battle to climb.

The response to a feature on Six Days in Fallujah on Kotaku has been interesting. Some people have come right out of the gate saying that there's a double standard here being placed on videogames about the battle, that other mediums of communication are allowed to get away with and game aren't. I know I went over this elsewhere, but I really just skimmed over it.

Nestled in the comments to the feature, a lot is put forward in short, sarcastic sentences. (Oooooh, alliteration!) One rewarding conversation path is the idea of the anti-war videogame. (Apparently, the Metal Gear Solid series does not count.) Can a videogame based on a war be realistic and enjoyable?

I don't think so. War, to me, is horrible, visceral and sickening. It's not terribly often going in guns blazing into the enemy's compound with the element of surprise and the fate of the universe in the balance. From my limited understanding (in the current Iraq quagmire), it's far more often about pounding the pavement, talking to people who may or may not be shooting at you with a mask the day before, or if you're not in combat, watching employees of KBR, Titan or another multinational with no clear chain of command do your job for six times more money. That's not entertaining or exciting. When it gets exciting, the soldier the imaginary player is following usually isn't on the good side of the gun (if such a side exists) and members of the platoon tend to die, in the heat of battle, with or without a medic screaming and crying for help.

The player is used to having precise control over the soldiers movements and the ability to distance themselves from what's going on. Ignoring the mechanical challenge of engrossing the player into avoiding the pause button, do players really want to see what happens to troops when they lose control over their emotions, tempers and selves and be forced to carry it out?

Take this possibility: Let's say you, the player is pinnned down and you are given orders: Lay down some covering fire over where you think the enemy is. It later turns out they're not in there, and you might have lit up an unrelated grocery store or pizza shop.

Even worse, having to enter a building without information about hostiles that might be waiting for you inside the door and standard operating procedure is throwing 3 or 4 frag grenades to soften up the inside for intrustion. These grenades buy you a crucial amount of time, if enemies are in there, because otherwise, they'll shoot you (and likely kill you) when you enter. What if the enemy is hiding in a school building or hospital? Or if it's in a building that's been abandoned, but you've heard reports of civillians running out of screaming?

Do players want that? That's more realistic, I think, but I doubt it would be enjoyable or entertaining. I doubt the experience would be one where the replay value would be discussed so much as shock and abject horror.

I suppose I am tipping my hand here, but would one call this game anti-war? Or, to actually use some of the education I've recieved, would it be a hyper-war game?

Perhaps I'll write on the questions it brings up for tomorrow: Would anyone care? Would it be boycotted? Would parents shelter their children from it? Is it better for children to be sheltered from it and grow up later to support it?

Quality Or Quantity: Returning

Today (well, tonight), it's about my own fear of the future and falling into comfortable traps or living patterns, using Crime In Stereo as the thread that ties the ideas together.



I can't listen to Crime In Stereo anymore. At least not until they release something new. It's not that I've gotten tired of them or that I've stopped thinking about what lyrics I want to get tattooed on me. I still haven't, but that the songs that aren't about girls are imbued with a sense of my time spent at Allegheny College. Listening to "Love" or "Takbir" not walking up the hill to the Campus Center on the mean streets of Meadville feels wrong.

I haven't learned to come back yet. Whether it's seeing a particular ex-girlfriend or an ex-city I'm living in again. It takes a lot of pain to see the same people/places/songs/ideas with different lenses. I haven't listened to "For Exes" in months. I've been force-feeding myself "...But You Are Vast" because that's one of the songs they play live and well, I want to be able to scream along without showing any other emotion. (There's not much room for guys doing non-heteronormative things at shows, and I already have a couple strikes against me: I have long, blond hair that I refuse to dye, spike or mohawk and wear glasses.) I have not yet listened to Animal Pharm since returning and considering the intensity of that feeling when I first heard the song, I'm not looking forward to it showing up by accident on my iPod.

Entering Chicago without real prospects except sleep and write as much as I can in a low pressure environment doesn't really feel like anything except the idea that I'm disappointing my parents and friends isn't coming back. It's returning to whatever I was doing in between semester of college.

I already return too much. I can't even listen to Explosives and the Will to Use Them without returning to those thoughts of days and nights in Meadville. (I can assure you, moving back to the big city has neutered my nightlife considerably. Maybe when I start getting back out to shows will my life get more interesting, but for now, I am comforted by my stacks of books and videogames to be read and played.) Perhaps I am expecting too much of myself to rid myself of deeply entrenched feelings with songs only days removed from my previous context. Alex (via Kristian) is right: The memories invade the things I keep with me.

I recognize that it is probably emotionally unhealthy for me to return to gut wrenching songs over girls and people but hell, there's a bounce in my step when I hear "Arson at 563" or "Terribly Softly" that I don't get anywhere else.

It's not all bad news, though. I'm getting to bed here a lot earlier than I would I would at Allegheny, I'm taking better care of myself and I'm watching what I eat. Gimme a couple days and I'll probably get more exercise, too. Part of me is happier here, in between the sadness that comes along with being separated from a group of people you're close to. But! Within a couple months, my high school friends will be back from their colleges and I will hopefully be seeing them on weekends or weekdays, if I am lucky. They will lift my spirits, and hopefully, I can lift theirs, if they need lifting. Please don't remind me that it won't be like this next year.

I have returned to my parent's house. The problem is, I just need to come back.

Quality Or Quantity: Transitions

This is part of an experiment. I'm challenging myself to write something between four hundred and seven hundred words every day this week, after I got a bunch of positive feedback about it on Twitter. Maybe this is the first out of five. Maybe this is the first out of seven. I don't know, but there's going to at least four more coming, so if you're reading this on May 12 or 13th, keep your browser pointed here throughout the week.

The inside jokes: Quality or Quantity is a Bad Religion song, if my memory is right, from Against the Grain, my favorite record of theirs. Early in the Eleven Names development, Zach and I had an argument about quality versus quantity, that, famously, got nowhere and lead to my aggravation.

Thanks.


I don't think I can usefully avoid writing about transitions. Certainly, there's obvious parallels in my own life, in the form of graduating from college and then trying to figure out what I should do now that I have a little bit of time. I'm tightest in college with people a grade above me and my friends from around this city, I haven't seen in far too long.

There's still a room full of my college things in the room across from this one, but I can't really get started working on clearing it out until I sort through which clothes are dirty and which aren't. That might be a fool's errand, but I need to get on some kind of errand sooner rather than later. Not to mention that I left all my PlayStation 2 games and most frighteningly my memory card back in college, and I'm hoping the games got stashed in one of my friend's cars to be brought back to New Jersey or California, where they can be sent back to me. (Edit: the games are now in New Jersey and can be sent to me soon!)

These parallels strike me deeper than I want to admit, whether it's in what I do or how I want to crash back on the bed as opposed to calling up whatever the hell red mango is (apparently, it's an upscale place for frozen yogurt) and see if they're hiring, or having to look at all the t-shirts I've brought back from college and kept since high school and think, these are going to have to go.

That last example is painful to think about because of what those shirts mean to me and what they represent. I mean, really, how am I going to let go of a classic Midtown shirt, considering that band broke up three, four years ago (and I loved Save the World, Lose the Girl)? Or a relatively new Kid Dynamite one? My memories of rocking out on the Metra Electric Line after work at the Midway office are entwined with that shirt. (And I hope I'm never letting go of my Zombie Apocalypse shirt.)

Transitions, man. Black t-shirts to black button up longsleeves. Maybe then to white button up longsleeves. But then, this is all part of growing up, right? Putting away those childish things to make room for new adventures. The movement from "has lots of talent" to actually using that talent, or actually submitting those writing samples somewhere.

It's putting one foot forward in front of the other, whether it's from Meadville to Chicago, Chicago to Pittsburgh or from one block to another, the house to the concrete walls where a beach should be overlooking Lake Michigan. It's about not comparing myself to hipsters, or hipsters bitching about hipsters or to anyone else. The journey of a lifetime begins with a single step and putting the foot in the shoe and then that shoe on the pavement is the transition.

I know, intellectually, that I don't have to put away my videogames, and if I did, it would be an incredible waste of time, talent, emotion and desire, but that they're not (or shouldn't be) a social or intellectual focus on par with the other activities that will take up my time and imagination. I love writing columns. I think it's what I want to do until I can't think or analyze anymore. I also love videogames and punk rock music. Perhaps I don't have to choose between writing or the two other things I love, but figure out how to do all three at once.

That synthesis would be amazing. Getting paid to write (something I enjoy doing) about video games and punk rock music (something else I enjoy). Integrating my interests (both leisurely and on the clock) and taking the steps to make that reasonable for employment is a lot of hard, boring work of finding a website, a niche, a style, promotion and also just a lot of composition and, finally, content generation. It's not glamorous, (but then again, neither is selling high-end frozen yogurt) but it must be done if I want to, in the future, do what I want and be the person hanging above my own head making sure the work gets done.

Maybe that's the real transition.