The Stars Of Guitar Hero 5

If the Guitar Hero franchise is famous for anything, its getting Rock Legends into their games. Sure Rock Band are trying really hard to do it with Beatles Rock Band, but when it gets down to the nitty gritty, GH have the upper hand on this one.

This all started back in the days of Guitar Hero 3: Legends Of Rock. Activition and Neversoft made computer generated versions of Slash from Guns ‘N’ Roses/Velvet Revolver fame, and Rage Against The Machine/Audioslave famed guitar soloist Tom Morello. This was a really nice touch to the game, and in my opinion it gave Guitar Hero the boost it really needed to get into the big leagues of gaming.

World Tour, the forth installment of the series, then took the whole band thing which in turn, sprouted more potential for guest stars. You didn’t have just guitarists, but top performers on other instruments. From the likes of Sting on bass, Travis Barker on drums and Hayley Williams and the prince of darkness himself, Ozzy Osbourne on vocals. But Guitar Hero would not be Guitar Hero without the guitarists. On World Tour, you had Billy Corgan from the Smashing Pumpkins, Zakk Wylde from Black Label society fame, Ted Nugent! Who played his hit “Strangle Hold” and who can forget the Legend that GH World Tour resurrected, Jimi Hendrix.

Of course when I talk about these guest appearances I cannot forget to mention Guitar Hero: Areosmith and Guitar Hero: Metallica! To me it sounds as though Activition and Neversoft are trying to get hold of all the bands/musicians they know and cram them into games before Harmonix and EA even finish Beatles Rock Band.  I mean GH Van Halen is due before the year is out.

Now Guitar Hero 5 is pretty much just around the corner, yet again the guest list for this game is racking up. I mentioned briefly who three of the guest starts would be in an earlier posts but here, I am going to give you a rundown of who has been announced.

Shirley Manson

Lead singer of the band, Garbage, Shirley will be singing on the bands hit “Only Happy When It Rains”.  Sounds like a nice happy number, but here is a nice of Guitar Hero trivia for you, She is the second woman rock star to become a part of the GH family the first being Haley Williams. That’s two women to a stonking thirteen men. (that’s including the GH 5 line up as well) and they are both Red Heads…weird

Johnny Cash

The first to be resurrected for the game (yes in GH 5 there is more than one dead guy) and Mr Cash will be playing on his classic song, “Ring Of Fire”. I think it is great for GH not to just get hard rock and metal musicians into their game, and to me Johnny Cash is a legend that really needs to be recognised more.

Matt Bellamy

When I first heard that the Muse front man will be making an appearance, I pretty much jumped for joy, then hit my head… Any way with a Guitar legend like Bellamy you got to have a legendary song to go with him. So the Muse hit “Plug In Baby” will be fronted by the crazy string bending man himself. This is going to be great.

Carlos Santana

GH 3 had “Black Magic Woman”, two games later the Guitar Hero track list now has “No One To Depend On” and what better to mark this moment than have Santana play the song himself. Famous for his solos and Latino esque style this is sure to be a very solo-filled outing for Carlos’s gaming Debut.

Kurt Cobain

The so called Grunge God lives once more. This guy is the second musician to be resurrected for Guitar Hero 5, and his appearance on the game is huge. Playing two massive Nirvana hits “lithium” and “Smells Like Teen Spirit” this is only the second time Nirvana have made it to the GH franchise. The first being World Tour with “About A Girl”, So I see this as GH saying, sorry to deprive yo of Nirvana, here, have Kurt Cobain and two of Nirvana’s best songs.

Guitar Hero 5’s lineup looks pretty awesome, and is litrully just around the corner.  September 11th for us guys in Europe, I expect all of you to be rocking this game hard!

Garv!