Guitar Hero’s Tracklist Had a Secret That You May Not Have Realized

Guitar Hero’s extensive track list is famous in the music gaming genre. The franchise has hundreds of popular songs across many genres and years. From well-known hits like Weezer’s Buddy holly to other ones like Stevie Wonder’s Superstition, the Guitar Hero series has many tracks that, no matter the age or preference manages to excite players. At the same time, they try to keep up with the notes and lyrics.

The Guitar Hero franchise started in 2005 on the PlayStation 2 console, and at the time of its release, it received a lot of praise from the gaming community. The game came with its unique controller that made the novel experience even more memorable, along with 30 tracks spanning from the 1960s to 2005, besides some bonus tracks. This title surprised everyone in 2005, and from that success alone, it spawned a franchise that has been around ever since.

It turns out that many of the songs that players enjoyed playing throughout their games were not the original ones from the artist. According to Guitar Hero’s wiki, a lot of the tracks featured across many games were covers of the original songs, so while you were singing to the tunes of Nirvana’s Heart-Shaped Box, it was not the original audio from the song. This may disappoint many players, but it should not be a big deal; many players do not pay attention to the background music when they are playing Guitar Hero. The background music functions as a guide for the players who do not know the song or the ones who get lost after missing a note or a piece of the lyric.

The cover versions were mostly used in Guitar Hero because artists did not allow to use of the master track or because it was not available. Luckily not all Guitar Hero titles have tons of cover versions. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock had significantly fewer cover tracks, and every game since Guitar Hero: World Tour has not used cover songs at all.

Even though Guitar Hero Live’s sales were underwhelming, according to Activision, the franchise still lives in many players’ memories. Fans of the series can only hope for an announcement on the next sequel if that ever comes to question.

If you have not played the last title of the Guitar Hero franchise, make sure you read our Guitar Hero Live review and find out how good the experience is.