As an apartment-warming and belated birthday present (oh yeah, I’m officially twenty-three), a friend of mine sent me and my two San Fran roommates a copy of Rock Band for Wii. It arrived in an Amazon box so big the UPS guy could barely speak while carrying up the stairs. Even once I got it open, I had no clue what could be inside. I stared at the blue cloth sack it was wrapped in–since it was too big for wrapping paper–and wondered if someone had sent up a midget in a coffin.
Of course, when I opened it up, I realized it was the perfect apartment present: it brings the three of us together, plus we can piss off our new neighbors. After only a few nights of note strumming, we’ve already received a note under our door telling us to rock out less hard. Oops.
While playing Rock Band, standing between my fiancé on drums and our buddy on guitar, I sometimes can’t help but think of it as the threesome game. We already know that the Wii is the system of swingers. Heck, if I sprung for a base guitar it could be a straight-up orgy. That would really piss off the neighbors.
Bonnie Ruberg is a sex, technology, and video games journalist who contributes regularly to publications like The Economist, Forbes, and The Village Voice. By day she's also a comparative literature PhD student at UC Berkeley, where she studies French, English, gender, sexuality, surrealism and perversion. You can reach her at [her first name and last name, all one big word] AT gmail DOT com.
July 17th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
There are just so many puns to make.
Though I apologize for this one in advance, I had not heard it till recently, but a friend’s sister made the comment while the two of us were playing Guitar Hero: “Jam out with you clam out.”
Yeahhhhh I bombed the song after that cause I couldn’t stop laughing.
Also, there is the distinct possibility that after hearing some of the songs played 10 or 20 times the neighbors would welcome the noise of an orgy over say Sabotage.
July 17th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
Sorry, I’d give some thoughtful response, but I’m still stuck on the idea of “jamming out with your clam out” :).
July 17th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
You have no idea how spot on you are about this. Or maybe you do. ;)
July 17th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Oh trust me, I know exactly what I’m talking about. Not in this current arrangement of people, but… Heck, I’m going to see you in a month and change. Remind me to tell you about it ;).
July 17th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
I once played Rockband at one of the other local gamestores. I was playing drums and this one girl was playing guitar. After 2 hours we got a microphone so I gave another customer the chance to play the drums and went on the mic…. I could sing two songs before they snatched the mic out of my hand. Though my vocals are already not the best. My WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII at the improvising parts really didn’t help either.
July 17th, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Dude, you got in two hours of Rockband in a public place? Whether or not you can sing that’s a pretty impressive streak! When I’m in a Target I can barely ever bring myself to wrestle controllers from the hands of greedy seven-year-olds.
July 17th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Let it be noted that I considered calling our band “Three-Way”, but I figured our flatmate’s out-of-town girlfriend might not appreciate the joke.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:59 am
So very true. So very true.
July 18th, 2008 at 11:24 am
Bonnie I am great friends with all employees of the Digifan. The customers usually think I am an employee myself so basically only some asked if they could. and those two hours weren’t everything all together it was 5 hours and the employees themself snatched the microphone because they found it a bad idea to let me ruin a mic that still needs to be sold. So after the mic was snatched I went on the drums again.
July 18th, 2008 at 11:56 am
I’m curious which instrument you prefer. I find myself still leaning toward guitar, though drums are a nice challenge. I still haven’t warmed up to vocals, but I do enjoy watching the wind sock move up and down as I make or miss notes…
July 19th, 2008 at 9:07 am
I prefer the drums as a condition with my health makes fine motoring skills difficult. Wich immediately makes it difficult to reach more than buttons on the guitar. With the singing part I don’t know much of those songs wich makes it less enjoyable and also even less appealing for those who are in hearing distance.
July 21st, 2008 at 6:30 pm
Yeah, when I don’t know the songs I find myself humming along, trying to follow the ups and downs of the windsock. Sometimes it works surprisingly well, but it’s sure not a lot to listen to :).