Video game dorks and rock stars never had much in common. But that may be changing.
Last night Salt Lake City�s Eric Miller parlayed his talent for joy-stick jockeying into a full-on rock candy star experience, playing �Sweet Emotion� center stage at Boston�s Hard Rock Cafe and hobnobbing with Aerosmith�s Steven Tyler.
Looking more like meditating monks than guitar shredders, Miller and leash other regional winners competed in Guitar Hero: Aerosmith Rocks the Hard Rock Finals before a herd of a couple hundred.
If you�re non a �Guitar Hero� partisan, the game allows players simulate the real thing using a guitar-shaped restrainer with rankle buttons that corresponded to notes that scroll on the screen door. It�s difficult, pretty addictive and massively popular.
�I thought it was kinda obtuse the low time I saw it,� aforesaid Miller, after besting Orlando�s Joe Ostrom during final tune �Love in an Elevator.� �I didn�t even want to try it, but a friend told me it had (Ozzy Osbourne�s) �Bark at the Moon� in it, so I gave it a try.�
As hotshot, Miller took home a custom �Guitar Hero�/Hard Rock Cafe Red Wing motorcycle, which Tyler was nice enough to sign for him. Not bad for a 24-year-old plastic guitar slinger.
�I came here mentation I�d lose,� he said. �I was simply in for the unblock trip to Boston.�
Helping to blur the line 'tween real and simulated rock, both Miller and Ostrom play medicine and say there�s an overlap in the coordination used in the tV game and actual guitar.
�I�m a keyboard player with a grade in music,� Ostrom said. �There�s definitely a link betwixt the two.�
It was easy to believe the iI guys, observation them john Rock out on the big screen TVs. Then Tyler and Joey Kramer took the stage with a few friends, and short the game was dwarfed as the band plowed into some loud, dirty, hard-thumping Aerosmith classics.
Comfortable in the Hard Rock�s intimate Cavern Club room, Tyler led the ad hoc group through early, game tunes including �Walkin� The Dog� and �Last Child.�
Both the Guitar Hero finals and the Tyler/Kramer performance were part of a charity outcome held by Boston for Africa 2008, which benefited organizations functional to end the cycle of war and impoverishment in many African nations. In addition to deuce Bad Boys of Boston, former Doobie Brother and Steely Dan guitarist Jeff �Skunk� Baxter and Dropkick Murphys leader Ken Casey pitched in.
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