Rock and Roll, until the cement sets.

path, originally uploaded by http://andrewskelton.net.

I’m feeling rather pleased with myself at the moment, I had a number of postal deliveries today after my recent stint on Amazon’s Black Friday sales. Along with a hard disk holder for the Xbox, my new soldering iron kit arrived but, more importantly, so did Rocksmith.. the Xbox game I had high hopes for fulfilling my dreams of being a Rock God (or more likely dashing them on the cliffs of despair). My hopes, after recent attempts with various console games, weren’t particularly high – after all I’d brought down Jenson Button’s well deserved reputation in only a matter of races on Codemaster’s incredibly realistic F1 2012 game (the game allows you to adopt any of the F1 driver personas to try and navigate your car around any or all of the racing circuits) I had some trepidation about curtailing two long held dreams in one week however having decided to persist with the driving game I found myself in a very favourable position after six full laps of a Chinese Grand Prix in second place with the leader in clear view, I thought all was not lost.

The package was thicker than your average console game (hark at me, having only just received the Xbox, it sounds like I’ve been buying games for it for years), containing a standard DVD/Blu Ray/Computer Case, the pack also contained the necessary USB to phono lead that would allow you to connect your guitar to the console to be able to play the game. I hadn’t really given the cable much thought but what thought I had given to it had presumed that it would not be up to the standard of the heavy duty guitar leads used to connect guitar to amplifier, so I was pleasantly surprised when I did get my hands on it, it looks like it’ll last more than just a few plays on the game. Placing the disk in console, I still had reservations, this was – after all – where dreams could wither and die. After the obligatory introduction spiel, the program helped you turn your guitar to the standard E, A, D, G, B, E before embarking on the first song, The Rolling Stones’ “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction”. I’d seen a number of people’s first attempts at this song, which weren’t exactly encouraging but eager to improve my guitar skills I attempted the song.. and you know what – I was pretty good. I was pretty good at the following Black Keys song and then having to repeat the songs but this time with extra embellishments during “a gig” I did well enough to attempt an encore, this time an unrehearsed Jarvis Cocker song which I also aced. This took me on to something I was more interested in playing, Red Hot Chilli Peppers and then low and behold.. the motherlode.. the one song that had really swung it for me, Queens of the Stone Age’s “Go With The Flow”. This was it.. time to test my metal… to step up to the plate…. to stand up and be counted (and any other dreadful cliche you can think of).. and stand up I did, literally. With my guitar slung low, legs the prescribed Rock God distance apart I gave a faultless performance of this rather intense song… a performance that was only marred when I tried to stand on the coffee table in lieu of a drum riser and try and perform a mid-air scissor kick that would make Pete Townsend proud… you can send cards and flowers to ward 666, Number of the Beast Ward, Berkshire!

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