Another day, another out-of-touch old rocker who thinks that games like Rock Band are stopping people from playing real instruments. This time around, it’s the turn of former Rolling Stone Bill Wyman, who believes that kids are being encouraged not to learn proper music because he’s old and frightened of new things.
“It encourages kids not to learn, that’s the trouble,” he tells the BBC, as if he knows this for a fact. “It makes less and less people dedicated to really get down and learn an instrument. I think is a pity so I’m not really keen on that kind of stuff.”
Pink Floyd’s Nick Mason echoes Wyman’s sentiments, claiming that Rock Band annoys him: “It irritates me having watched my kids do it – if they spent as much time practising the guitar as learning how to press the buttons they’d be damn good by now.” Mason hasn’t ruled out contributing to future Rock Band games though, because his sentiments about the games aren’t overruled by his sentiments about making money. Nice to see he’s got his principles intact.
You know, I think it’s hilarious how news outlets love to run stories about Rock Band not encouraging people to play instruments, while at the same time running stories about how violent games DO encourage people to commit violent crimes. If music games discourage music, why don’t violent games discourage violence? It’s a brilliant double standard.
But yeah, sure, let’s agree with the ancient old musicians, and while we’re at it, let’s demand that Pokémon fans force real animals to fight, and that Gears of War fans put real chainsaws on real machine guns and carve up real people.
Morons.
[Thanks, Alex]
