Guitar.com - A place for guitarists to call home

Metal coming back? Guitar hero helps bring new fans.

I think the popularity of guitar hero is helping to get new guitar fans and students all over the world. Activision stated on January 21, 2008 that North American sales from all of the Guitar Hero franchise has exceeded one billion dollars with over 14 million units sold and excluding downloadable content.[1] Over 20 million songs have been sold as downloadable content as of July 2008.[55] Guitar Hero and the way it is used have been a focus of intense study by sociologists across the country. Most notably, a group of Duke University cultural anthropologists undertook a study of video game culture and preferences amongst undergraduates. The study concluded that Caucasian males were more than ten times more likely to enjoy Guitar Hero than EA Sports Madden football. On the other side, African-American males almost exclusively played Madden when given the choice between the two games. The study cited Duke's Psychology center at 723 9th Street as a crucial force of inspiration for the topic. The scholars admit that they have no clear conclusion as to why the results were so lopsided.[56]

Guitar Hero has made several appearances in popular culture. Guitar Hero II is the centerpiece of an episode of South Park entitled "Guitar Queer-o", in which Stan and Kyle get hooked onGuitar Hero II and end up being treated as though they are real-life rock stars. The episode was first broadcast on November 7, 2007, 10 days after the American release of Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock.[57] The episode of Metalocalypse entitled "Dethvengance" featured a black Guitar Hero controller on the bed of a boy attempting to download music from the band Dethklok illegally. The song playing on his computer is "Thunderhorse," which is playable on Guitar Hero II. In the Metalocalypse episode "Dethkids," a sick child composes a song for Dethklok rhythm guitarist Toki Wartooth using a Guitar Hero controller.[58] Ellen DeGeneres has played Guitar Hero several times in 2008 during the monologue of her syndicated talk show. In the January 25, 2008, episode she is seen playing along to "Barracuda", which segues to Heart performing the song for the audience.[59] During the season 7 finale of American Idol, finalists David Cook and David Archuleta appeared in separate commercials for the games, where they each parodied Tom Cruise dancing to "Old Time Rock and Roll" in the movieRisky Business.

My gear recommendations:

Archived posts

Search Blogs

Metal coming back? Guitar hero helps bring new fans. - I think the popularity of guit...

This is your home page. Here you'll see real time activity on guitar.com from the forums, groups, blogs, music and gear recommendations and more. You can add whatever content you want to your home page via rss and move it around via drag-and-drop.

Tell others about yourself, your favorite music, gear, movies, genres you play, set your screenname, share your bookmarks, embed vids and more. If others buy music or gear based on your recommendation, you get a commision.

Start or add to discussions, embed outside URL's for discussion, embed vids and have your music and gear recommendations seen.

If you've got something to say, chances are someone wants to read it. Write your blog for education or amusement, embed vids or images and pass out the link. Guitar.com gives you advertising revenue generated from your blog pages.

See what you're fellow musicians are listening to and watch YouTube videos based on artist names.

Ever wondered just how musicians get that sound? On guitar.com musicians list the gear they use and tell you why they use it.

List stuff for sale or swap in our classifieds section.

Create and manage groups. Make them private or public. Manage them at anytime.

Learn a tip trick or lesson from other musicians and professional educators in the Get Educated section. Have a tip trick or lesson to share? Create your blog, mark it as educational and drive traffic to it from here.