From Video Games To The Music Industry: Guitar Hero's Effect

In my previous blog post entitled, "An Obsession Over Stars: Industry and Economy Booster", I mentioned how the music industry was benefiting financially from the obsession that the American public has with celebrities such as Britney Spears. This week I explored the blogosphere to find what others were saying about the music industry and how it could be saved. One of the blogs that I came upon is found in The New York Times, which was written by David Edery, a worldwide games portfolio manager for XBOX Live Arcade, a research affiliate of the M.I.T. Comparative Media Studies Program, and author. His blog entitled, "Can Guitar Hero Help Save the Music Industry? A guest Post", offers a lot of valuable information with hard evidence that he has found while doing his research for his book. Guitar Hero and Rock Band, which were both created by Harmonix, allow its users to "play" their favorite songs with different peripherals such as a guitar (see left), drum set, or a microphone. The games come preloaded with a wide range of songs from different times of the music scene. Mr. Edery mentioned that the president of Universal Media Group claims that songs that were included in Guitar Hero will sell two to three times better than average. Another example is when Guitar Hero: Aerosmith (see right, below) generated more revenue for Aerosmith than any of their individual albums. Mr. Edery also mentions the deal that has been developing between MTVN and the Beatles that would create an entirely new music game based on the Beatles' music. A product such as this one which is expected to be released for the 2009 holiday season will generate a lot of revenue for the music industry. My second article is found in USA Today, it is entitled, "Bands' sales are feeling the 'Guitar Hero' effect", and it is written by Mike Snider. Mr. Snider makes mention of the Guitar Hero effect, which is when a song appears on Guitar Hero and its digital downloads increase exponentially. One of the biggest genres that is being affected is classic rock, with artists such as Kansas seeing an increase of young teenagers in their shows. Guitar Hero has also recreated interest in old music tracks that no longer have had any marketing attached to them, which has created revenue that was and probably would no longer exist. In addition to posting my comments directly on these blogs, I have also posted my comments below.

Can Guitar Hero Help Save the Music Industry? A guest Post
Comment:
Mr. Edery,
First and foremost I would like to thank you for taking the time to write this very informative blog. In your post you have mentioned almost entire positive that have come out of having such a game as Guitar Hero. It is a fact that a lot of artists have seen their music sales increase after being included in Guitar Hero and other artists have gone as far as creating their own version of Guitar Hero. The biggest example being the Guitar Hero: Aerosmith game, which produced more revenue for them than any of the individual albums, as you mentioned. I was wondering if there were any negative outcomes, for artists or the music industry, that were coming out of video games such as Guitar Hero and Rockband. Has there been any backlash among fans? Maybe they feel like their favorite band has sold out to mainstream corporate America by allowing their music to appear in video games. You said that not only had digital download sales increased but also full album sales. Currently it appears that everyone is benefitting and generating revenue by Guitar Hero, but will there be a time when Guitar Hero's download sales will cannibalize the sales of digital downloads and full albums? I was wondering if in the future, the consumers would be willing to spend money on duplicate copies of the same song? For now it seems like the video game industry is the new medium to be used for distribution and marketing of new music. This can already be seen by the influx of copycat video games, will the music industry's record labels have to come together or will maybe each create their own video game to distribute their artists music? I believe that if this sort of thing happens, the novelty feeling will disappear for the consumer and such video games will become unpopular and obsolete. I hope to read your next blog post and see if how you expect the music industry to react to such technology and how it will change their business models for the long run.

Bands' sales are feeling the 'Guitar Hero' effect
Comment:
Hello Mike,
I wanted to say thank you for writing your article on such a current and popular trend that has hit the consumer and music industry by surprise. In your article you mentioned the Guitar Hero effect, which is the increase in sales for an artist after they appear on the Guitar Hero video game. I wanted to ask if you had come up with that term or if someone else created it? In your article you mentioned how some underground or not so well known bands had seen an increase in sales after the release of Guitar Hero III. I was wondering if the increase in sales was greater for groups that were well less known in comparison to mainstream popular artists? I was also wondering if you believe that all artists were seeing Guitar Hero as a platform they wanted to be on. I am not sure if solo artists such as Justin Timberlake or Kanye West would benefit from games such as Guitar Hero or Rockband, seeing as their band is usually not the most important part of their performances. You mentioned that only song had shown a drop in sales, was this due to the fact that the fans of that artist felt betrayed by their favorite song being commercialized for the whole general public? I cannot wait to see how the music industry reacts to such new technology and if these videos games do end up being the saviour to such a struggling industry. I hope you keep us updated on any new developments that occur.