Reuniting with Rock Band video game, a millennial teenage pastime [Unscripted column]

In 2009, my parents made a deal with my older brother.

Their generous offer: attend an outing with us as a family, and they’d purchase Rock Band – a rhythm video game a la Guitar Hero that included guitars, a drum set and a microphone to “play” along to the music.

They bought the game; he never went to the outing.

Being the goody-two-shoes that I am, I rolled my eyes at my brother’s brattiness. But I benefited from this broken deal, too. For my 17th birthday, my friends and I played Beatles Rock Band for hours. I sang “Drive My Car” and “Taxman” at the top of my lungs in between bites of my mom’s homemade macaroni and cheese.

It was pure, privileged teenage bliss.

It was also one of the last times I saw that video game set. Soon after, my brother took it to a friend’s house and it never returned. I pleaded with him to retrieve it. When he finally agreed to, months later, he brought back only the game disc — which was useless without the instruments.

Sixteen years later, I still wasn’t over it. I longed to fill the Rock Band-shaped hole in my heart.

Earlier this year, I decided to poke around local auction house websites in case anything sparked my interest — both for a story, and for potential shopping. I saw a Beatles auction from Reading auction house Attic to Auction. I flipped through it thinking I may find a funky piece of decor.

But, I found something better. A full Beatles-themed Rock Band set of instruments, complete with a branded “drumhead” and replicas of the Fab Four’s guitars. I bid on it, hoping those shopping a Beatles auction would be older collectors not interested in such child’s play.

Luckily, I was right. I won without contest.

My dutiful husband not only picked up the instruments but helped track down small missing pieces on eBay to make them playable. He also found the actual game discs for cheap at local shops like Just Press Play.

We spent the next few weeks testing the instruments in our Frankensteinian set-up, gleefully reconnecting with what had been a teenage pastime for both of us. It became a sweet after-work activity. What better way to wind down after a stressful day than picking songs for your sweetie to sing as you fumble through the instrumentals?

These test sessions provided plenty of giggles, too. At one point, we needed to make sure the drums, guitar and microphone all worked together before we invited friends over — but my husband and I are a two-person household. So, we jerry-rigged a microphone headset, in which I put an elastic headband around my face, as if I had the mumps, and slid the microphone in one side while I tried to play guitar to “Lazy Eye” by Silversun Pickups.

The real fun, though, came when I celebrated my birthday a few weeks ago. We crammed about 15 friends into our tiny row home, and they enthusiastically signed up for songs as if we were running a karaoke bar.

I watched my childhood friends and college buddies become bandmates as they sang in harmony. I unsuccessfully tried to keep up on the drums to Devo’s “Uncontrollable Urge” but kind of rocked at singing Paramore’s “Misery Business” and Rilo Kiley’s “Portions for Foxes.” And I will never get the image, or sound, of my husband’s cousin Patrick cathartically belting a Linkin Park song out of my head.

It was a darn good party, and a great way to heal my younger-sibling rage about the missing Rock Band set of yesteryear.

Before the big event, I sent my brother a cheeky message about repurchasing the set, which he “liked.”

That’s nice, but he still won’t be borrowing it anytime soon.

Jenelle Janci is LNP | LancasterOnline’s Work & Play team leader. “Unscripted” is a weekly entertainment column produced by a rotating team of writers.