I am a lazy bastage. There was one point in early 2007 where I was good at Guitar Hero. Not great - just good. I could beat Expert just fine, and that's about it.

Then my buddy Slunks ran an impromptu Guitar Hero II tournament. I came in second, only to get slaughtered by another buddy of mine, ShenlongBo. This tourney was the first time I had ever full-combo'd a song (i.e. hit 100% notes without over-strumming) - the victim being John the Fisherman.

Then my buddy Zaps started a Guitar Hero *league* (yeah, on Scorehero he holds the #1 score in Less Talk More Rokk for the PS2 version of GH2), and in the Expert bracket only the kick-assinest players competed. I was consistently in the middle or bottom of the pack. People were talking about full-comboing all sorts of crazy songs, "squeezing", and other such ridiculous pro nonsense. This league probably the one reason why I developed the tenacity to finally beat Jordan on Expert, and later five-star it. Not a huge feat for Guitar Hero pros, but it was ginormous for my loser self.

Thing is, the Guitar Hero league was held as a Gamespot Union. Lotta guys left Gamespot over the Gerstmann dealie, and with league "support" being built into guitarhero.com and most of the interest flowing to Rock Band anyway, there's little talk of a new season of the League for Guitar Hero III. Without direct and organized competition, and no - simple leader boards aren't enough, I haven't felt the urge to study star paths or how to FC any songs - even simple ones. (I 100%'ed When You Were Young, which is really easy, but I didn't care to FC it nor do I have the motivation to anymore.) As a result, I'm just not as good as I once was, and Guitar Hero for me got really, really fun when I was insanely good (relative to my real life friends of course - so maybe "insanely decent" is a better term).

I could join another league or look for tournaments, but honestly, the lack of competition also leaves me with a lack of pressure, and in turn a lack of unnecessary stress. So... it ain't yer fault, Guitar Hero. I'm just heading down a spiral of indifference, and I don't ever think I'll care if I never beat Through The Fire And Flames. I guess maybe now it's time to start catching up on my goddamn backlog, which is 32148967932842934879 games long. (Final Fantasy X, is that you calling my name?)

Postscript: I just remembered that some of the smarter, extra-special folks out there will likely point out - potentially with, heaven forbid, a smattering of cynicism or sarcasm - the astonishing fact that playing rhythm games doesn't, in any way, make you musicians (even when the people who play these games never once claimed that they were musicians because of it. ZOMG - you learn something valuable every day!) But in case anyone was wondering, Guitar Hero and Rock Band do not make me a musician. The fact that I practiced and played the cello for 16 years, though, does.

Post-postcript: The King has impeccable timing.