Rock Band 2 Goes On Tour

by Dan Landis on September 16, 2008 at 12:40 pm

In an effort to promote the just-released Rock Band 2 (and the Rock Band experience in general), EA/Harmonix/MTV decided to take the show on the road. Up on the stage at the York Fair in York, Pennsylvania, I got my first taste of Rock Band 2 this past weekend, and it was sweet.

As I watched and took pictures of some random schmoes from the audience, I began talking to one of the Rock Band “Tour Crew” guys. Turns out that a bunch of locations all around the U.S. were assaulted by other Tour Crews, armed with copies of Rock Band 2 and mobile stage trailers. Then I was asked, “Do you wanna play?”

Um, duh? Of course I want to play! They took me around the side of the stage to the back and let me “practice”. I played a few songs before I got called up to rock out for an actual audience, and rock out I did. Unfortunately, the inexperienced fools I was playing with actually failed out, and no amount of stellar awesomeness from yours truly could keep the band afloat until the end of the song.

It was kinda neat, though, that I was the last man standing and got some cheers from the people in the audience that were impressed with my axe-shredding skills on Hard. It was an easy song, though– I’m not quite as good as they thought I was. Regardless, the feeling of fake rocking-out for an actual audience of real people was truly special. The Rock Band 2 special edition bundle should throw some fans in that box, or you could just get off your ass and actually participate in a Rock Band concert.

Can you guess which one of these awesome dudes is me?
(Hint: the one that is the most awesome)

My wife was given the duty of taking my picture while I was up there, but because of all the photo-snapping we had already done that day, the camera was unfortunately out of juice by the time I finally made it on stage. Since she couldn’t use taking my picture as a way to display the “I’m busy” signal, she instead was forced to fend off all these guys attempting to hit on her. In lieu of a picture of me, she scored a bag full of Stride gum for her troubles — I would still rather have the picture.

Even though my time was cut short with the game, the little bit of it that I did get to play really had me excited to run out and buy it. Fortunately for me, the game came out in a few short days and is at this point sitting in my 360’s disc tray. Expect the full Ripten Review soon.

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