On Sunday, my family had a birthday barbecue for D (my sister) and me. My birthday is actually this weekend and D's falls on the following weekend, but since we both have other plans on our official days, we decided to celebrate early.

Per tradition, we sang "Happy Birthday" in perfect harmony¹, blew out the candles on our shared cake² in one go, and opened a few gifts.

While the fiber optic Christmas lighthouse (from my folks) and the tropical-themed photo frame (from the family dog) I received were quite impressive, both were slightly overshadowed by the gift I got from D: Rock Band 2.

After the mandatory photo with the unwrapped gift, it took us only a matter of minutes to rip the box and packaging to shreds (like mature adults), assemble the drum kit and guitar, and have the game up and running on the Wii I had brought over (to play Mario Kart).

For the record, the first song I attempted was "Eye of the Tiger" (on the drums). My first song on vocals was "Hungry Like The Wolf". And my first song on guitar was "Pretend We're Dead" (I believe).

Now that I've had three days to play it, I wanted to share a few thoughts about the game.

- It is AWESOME! To fully appreciate the previous sentence and most basic of sentiments, you must imagine it being said by Rhino, the hamster, from the movie Bolt.

Okay, now that I have that out of my system, I will try to be more articulate in expressing my thoughts.

- I love the instruments. They aren't as cool as their musical counterparts, but they have a Simon Says quality about them I find appealing. They don't take up much space, which is good in a small dwelling. And as a bonus, they are wireless.

- I love the characters. They are like Sims, but edgier. You can customize them to your heart's content and as you progress on tour (earning money, fans, and stars), you can buy them apparel and accessories. My first dollars went to getting my guy a pair of Elvis Costello glasses. Money well spent, I'd say.

- Downloadable songs are cooler in concept than in practice. I'm stoked I can download additional songs, especially ones that are more my taste, like those from Weezer and Gorillaz, but I'm bummed I have to pay for each track. Free would be nicer. (That said, I still bought "The Sweater Song" because, well, it's "The Sweater Song".)

- Singing in Simlish rocks! Okay, the lyrics are in English, but I find my vocal scores are higher when I focus more on pitch and less on words. The result is something that sounds a lot like Simlish -- wobbly and somewhat hoarse Simlish.

- It's addictive. I had a feeling it would be, but not to the degree I experienced. On Monday, when I got home, I hopped behind the drum kit and was there for HOURS. It was impossible to pull myself away. After each song, I wanted to see how well I could do on the next one, and the one after that, and so on and so forth. I wanted to earn more fans and more stars. Right now, my band, The Night Watch³, is this close )( to upgrading from a van to a DeluxuLiner. I know it's silly, but it's the most awesome kind of silly I've encountered in a long time. I can already see an intervention in my future.

- A streaming music mash-up would be sweet. I wish there were a way to combine the music preference/discovery prowess of Last.fm or Pandora with the game play of Rock Band. Right now, there are tons of songs I'd like to play, but the bands and titles aren't available (or I haven't found them yet). My current Top 10 Most Desired Artists are:

1. Green Day
2. Vampire Weekend
3. All-American Rejects
4. Barenaked Ladies
5. Vienna Teng
6. Lisa Loeb
7. Snow Patrol
8. The Beach Boys
9. Brandi Carlile
10. Jonathan Coulton

- Playing with the sound on is important. I tried playing a song with the television muted and it was a jarring experience. With the volume up, I'm rocking the snare, the bass, and the hi-hat (on the easy level). With it down, I'm simply beating on rubberized plastic.

Now, if you'll pardon me, I think I'll spend a couple of minutes daydreaming about how my band is going to take Chicago by storm.

¹ Not in harmony with each other, but with the imaginary singers in our heads. In my case, it was The Beach Boys, and I was singing Mike Love's part.
² My mom claims we have a joint celebration every year because our birthdays are a mere week apart, but I maintain we celebrate together so they can save on cake expenses.
³ It's a reference to Discworld and the early days of the City Watch. I've got Angua on vocals, Carrot on guitar, Detritus on bass, and myself on drums. And since I can't bear to leave anyone out, I like to imagine Colon, Littlebottom, and Shoe singing back-up⁴, Nobbs playing the cowbell, Visit selling merchandise, and Vimes managing the band.
⁴ Reg Shoe is a member because it's good luck to have a zombie in the band. I'm sure that's written somewhere.