Just Another Statistix

Allow me to go on record as saying, "we were warned."

Ever since the Dance Dance Revolution craze, Jeanne and I have shared a common interest in the "rhythm" game genre. As an alternate exercise mode when dealing with inclement weather from summers after 9am in Houston to surprisingly cold winters in Atlanta, we enjoyed "stepping" together. Then along came Guitar Hero.

Having little to no interest in playing guitar personally, though Jam Sessions on the Nintendo DS serves as a fantastic introduction to chords, I easily found myself dismissing the five fret buttoned, whammy bar and toggle switch strumming affair that is Guitar Hero. But, rumors after Harmonix sold the rights to the game to Activision and intended to release a new franchise based on a four piece band complete with microphone, guitar, bass, and drum peripherals piqued my interest.

Having little to do with gaming with me beyond occasional Super Puzzle Fighter 2 Turbo, Rampage World Tour, and of course two incarnations of Dance Dance Revolution, the sell to Jeanne worried me. Thinking of her past experiences with various choirs, I chose the path of singer for her as a lure, but she quickly went for the guitar to reconcile her bad experiences with acoustic bodies and their blister producing taut strings that drove her to abandon her own guitar back in college.

As for my instrument of choice, I possessed no intention other than percussion. The closest I approach to a background in music rests in an electronic piano I bought a few years ago to further my appreciation by learning to play chords and to read sheet music. Neither proved to be very easy on my own. My thought process centered around the notion that while playing first person shooter games on the PC, if I could run and strafe with one hand while returning fire and dodging with the other, couldn't I keep separate signals going to either hand on the piano? But in the end what really killed my interest was never finding any sheet music reading exercises that could keep my attention for any length of time.

Between Target sales, coupons, and more coupons I successfully lowered the Rock Band package price from $170 down to below $135, which left Jeanne both sold and interested to join in. The whole premise of Guitar Hero rested on competing with other guitarists for world domination, but Rock Band offers to bring family units or other groups together to practice, perform, and then dominate the world. The exposure to the realm of percussion sold me on Rock Band verses Guitar Hero, but its focus on cooperation in turn forced me to sell it to Jeanne as well.

"We have awoken a sleeping giant."

Jeanne quickly took to the game much more than I could have anticipated. From her early gaming days of asking to play with me, now she made sure she knew how to set the game up in my absence to practice on her own. At first we took turns playing different instruments. Beginning on the easy difficulty setting she enjoyed drums as much as she did guitar, but I quickly grew tired of guitar and opted to play bass while she took to the throne. Soon we would settle on our primary instruments and be led in different directions.

As we both moved on to the medium difficulty setting, I realized that the office chair I dual purposed as a drum throne grew very uncomfortable and without modifications to both the extremely loud drum pads and terribly uncomfortable kick peddle, my progression and interest might fade. A trip to good old Michael's yielded some felt and foam padding significantly reducing the deafening clack-clack-clack from the drum set that overwhelmed the game's audio, my sixth edition "The Professional Chef" became a heel rest for the kick pedal allowing me to rest my foot at a much more flat stance, and after a trip to guitar center Jeanne brought back an actual drum throne. Jeanne's course through the medium difficulty setting led her not to seek increased comfort while playing but instead to pick up the microphone and attempt singing while playing guitar. Easily distracted and too often trying to take on catchy songs she didn't actually know, failing out of songs cut her diversion short while the hard difficulty setting showed me bass drum patterns that no amount of comfort would allow me to complete.

Finally we reached the third step in Rock Band from picking it up, to becoming obsessed by it (Jeanne played daily for at least an hour if not two), and now to becoming statistics. Many reviewers quipped that Rock Band might convince gamers to take on the roll of amateur musicians, especially drummers since the game's drum kit resembled the physical layout of a real one enough for an easy transition after learning many different styles of beats from the game. Enter early 31st birthday presents to each other.


Having spent our 30th birthdays packing then on the road moving across the country, we decided to splurge this birthday and acquire musical instruments to take what the game taught us into the real world hopefully with additional instruction from outside resources. Last weekend I received the Yamaha DTXplorer, a rare commodity on the internet with every store except the one from which I ordered it backordered for over a month. Kraft Music shipped it to me free and even threw in for free a smaller and more comfortable drum throne, drum sticks, and most importantly: a nice set of headphones. This weekend Jeanne will order an electric guitar with its less tensioned strings along with all the accompanying equipment to make it work from an amp and tuner to picks and cords.

So far the transition for me has been quite smooth. Given the ability to accompany songs on my MP3 player, I find myself blending into many seamlessly. From obsessively and constantly adjusting the positions of the pads in my kit to pricing snare and cymbal upgrades, I think a new hobby and excellent distraction has come my way. In one form of accomplishment, I now play practice sessions long enough for me to grow tired and have to take a rest (>1 hour). As a additional geek bonus, every time someone switches on the DTXplorer drum module, it displays the amount of times the pads have been hit - I've passed 50,000 in about a week.