Bon Jovi sides with Nirvana members on Guitar Hero use of Kurt Cobain

Tue, 22 Sep 2009

Jon Bon Jovi has spoken out about the use of Kurt Cobain's avatar on the new Guitar Hero game, and the Bon Jovi front-man has sided with remaining Nirvana members, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic.

As LickLibrary reported, Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl were compelled to make a statement on the matter, after Courtney Love had expressed her discontentment in no uncertain terms via a stream of tweets, pushing the blame for the controversy firmly onto Nirvana’s remaining members.

Subsequent to this, Grohl and Novoselic released a statement, in which they expressed their disappointment and dismay at the functionality of Kurt’s character in the game.

The joint statement closed by saying:

“While we were aware of Kurt’s image being used with two Nirvana songs, we didn’t know players have the ability to unlock the character. This feature allows the character to be used with any kind of song the player wants. We urge Activision to do the right thing in “re-locking” Kurt’s character so that this won’t continue in the future.”

It was after footage of the Kurt Cobain avatar surfaced on the internet singing Elton John and Bon Jovi that the uproar was sparked.

Now, Jon Bon Jovi has agreed with the Nirvana pair, by expressing his empathy toward their situation.

“I don’t know that I would have wanted it either. To hear someone else’s voice coming out of a cartoon version of me? I don’t know. It sounds a little forced,” he told the BBC.

The new Guitar Hero game has caused much protest and controversy. Artists such as Bill Wyman (Rolling Stones) and Nick Mason (Pink Floyd) have spoken out over the game, and have received numerous rebuttals from the gaming and tech communities.

The debate will surely continue to rage on. On the one hand, young people are being introduced to artists they may not have heard before, and perhaps even influenced into picking up a guitar for real. On the other, these same young minds could be dissuaded from learning to play an instrument, when they can easily play on the computer generated version, and artists like Kurt Cobain, could have their reputations tarnished during the process.

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