Definitions

Sorry, no definitions found. Check out and contribute to the discussion of this word!

Etymologies

Sorry, no etymologies found.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word guitar hero.

Examples

    Sorry, no example sentences found.

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • This is so true.

    December 24, 2008

  • Also, Bagpipe Hero, as seen here, would be pretty awesome.

    January 13, 2009

  • Ha!

    January 14, 2009

  • Excellent! Further suggestions: banjo hero, harp hero, tuba hero.

    January 14, 2009

  • They have those, kind of, on Wii Music. :)

    I nominate Fife Hero. Or we could make it cooler by calling it War Flute, seen here. (Caution: opens a YouTube clip with some naughty language.)

    January 14, 2009

  • sackbut hero, theorbo hero, tubulum and drumbone heros (Blue Man Group!)... and so begins another list. Hope the Guitar Hero parent company Activision Blizzard is reading this.

    January 14, 2009

  • I feel a bit of an idiot but can someone explain what Guitar Hero actually is, or does? It seems to be basically karakoke air-guitar, which is fun of course, but where does the games console come in?

    January 14, 2009

  • Yarb - you actually play a guitar of a kind in Guitar Hero. It's a guitar with color coded keys that you play (like making chords on strings) and strum along with the "music" on tv.

    Wow, that was lame. Sorry. I'm sure someone else will come along and do a better job.

    January 14, 2009

  • Accordion hero.

    January 14, 2009

  • Yarb and dc -- I've never played Guitar Hero, but my understanding is that the goal of the game is to match the notes on the guitar to the notes on the screen, in real time.

    Here's an example.

    January 14, 2009

  • Thanks ptero! The sad thing is, I actually have played Guitar Hero quite a bit...apparently too much as my ability to string words together into meaningful, um, er, what-cha-ma-call-its... seems to have suffered!

    January 14, 2009

  • Cool. Is it easier than playing a real guitar? And if so, does this spell the end for the traditional electric instrument?

    I can foresee a future game called "Guitar Hero Hero", the object of which is to mimic someone playing "Guitar Hero".

    January 14, 2009

  • It's a bit easier than real guitar, but only because it doesn't require such a large hand-span.

    The right hand can be a bit annoying, though, because it doesn't always pick up the movement.

    January 14, 2009

  • It's much easier, yarb. But it's not the end; just because you're playing a video game called Rock Band doesn't mean you're actually in a rock band. You start out at "beginner" which is basically teaching you how/when to strum. The next level up (you can pick any level you want, you don't have to go through them from the bottom) adds three "fret" buttons; the next level, four; and the songs get harder as you move through the game.

    Guitar Hero is wildly fun--there's also a bass guitar, vocals, and drums, though to play bass guitar at the same time as guitar (with a friend, say), you have to have two of the little guitar doohickeys (they're the same, only you can tell it you want to play the bass line and that's what it will project on the screen). And you have to buy the drum set doohickey separately too.

    How does the console come into it? You put the game into the Wii console, put the Wii remote into the guitar-shaped doohickey--the one the guy's playing in the YouTube video pleth linked to--and then you can dance around the room as if you're holding a real (if tiny) guitar. (Guitar Hero versions are available for PlayStation and XBox as well as Wii.)

    Wow. I sound like a friggin' commercial.

    January 14, 2009

  • Thanks both. With the advent of Guitar Hero, I can't but fear for the noble art of air guitar. I once attended the UK national air guitar championships (it was in Brighton).

    January 15, 2009

  • But that's just it, yarb, it isn't the same thing at all. You should play it first.

    Then fear for the future of air guitar.

    January 15, 2009

  • Yup! We got the wii Rock Band for Christmas. I haven't played a video game since pong and tetris. I've never done karaoke. But try to wrench my Rock Band microphone or guitar out of my hands and you'll pull back a bloody stump!

    January 15, 2009

  • I'm more worried about air guitar than the real thing. Air guitar is imaginative and creative; it requires the purely mental conjuration of an alter-ego and scenario, as well as the dexterity of the real guitarist. Now that our kids (and their parents) have this bedazzling gizmo to distract them, will anyone bother to do it the old-fashioned way? Whither morris-dancing, thence goes air guitar.

    January 15, 2009

  • Well, no, because what happens when the power goes out?

    Also... morris dancing?! I actually work with someone who does it. And I live in Virginia.

    I got it! Morris dancing hero!

    January 15, 2009

  • Yarb: Take heart. I, for one, don't play Guitar Hero and don't plan to start. However, I do play air guitar whenever possible.

    I also have an air trumpet and an air saxophone, but I never play them all at once.

    January 15, 2009

  • Air guitar is so gloriously impromptu, while guitar hero requires accessories and electricity and things. I don't think it'll ever fade away. Like a steering wheel drum kit, the air guitar is always there when you need it...

    January 15, 2009

  • I hope you're right, trivet and reesetee.

    January 15, 2009

  • I'm not very good on the steering wheel drum kit, I'm afraid. My thumbs keep getting tangled in the spokes.

    January 15, 2009

  • Steering wheel drum kit hero!

    January 15, 2009

  • Ooh, that could be dangerous.

    January 15, 2009

  • Morris dancing! I loves it! I must do it, very, very soon!

    January 16, 2009

  • Suddenly I see the light . . .

    January 16, 2009