Charlie Daniels upset that 'Devil Went Down to Georgia' in Guitar Hero III

by Justin McElroy { Apr 8th 2008 at 12:30PM }

We thought that the inclusion of "The Devil Went Down to Georgia," as the final song in Guitar Hero III was a pretty inspired choice, but it seems not everyone was as thrilled with the selection, including Charlie Daniels, the song's author. The Christian country star (who no longer holds the rights to the song) recently posted about the game on his blog, his primary beef seeming to be that El Diablo can win.

He wrote that the song "is supposed to be a lighthearted novelty about a fiddling contest between a country boy and the devil and the devil always loses." But, he goes on to say that GHIII features "a guitar-playing devil who battles the player and very often wins." ... So, is Daniels complaining about balancing issues? Because, if so, we totally agree. The devil's way too tough.

But we do feel compelled to point out that the game never says the main boss is the devil. In fact, he has a name and it's Lou. Maybe Lou isn't a devil at all, maybe he's just deformed like that guy from Mask. So we ask you, dear reader, what's the worse sin? Letting the devil win in a video game or calling handicapped people demons? We think the choice is pretty clear.

[Via Bit-tech.net]

Tags: activision, guitar-hero-iii

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

PojoMofo @ Apr 8th 2008 12:36PM

you have to hold the guitar up to your chin and play it like a fiddle for the full affect

voodoo_craig @ Apr 8th 2008 12:39PM

You have to twat the guys at Neversoft on the chin with your guitar to get the full effect!

Boss battles ruined my GH3!!

Hala Madrid!!! SSBB Code:3866-7729-0830 @ Apr 8th 2008 2:02PM

Yes I do that too but I like to use the rock band guitar for this song and through the fire and flames the guitar hero guitar sucks for this songs

Sir Fidlious Wong (Zeon Defense Force) @ Apr 8th 2008 3:47PM

This would be really hard to do, if the controllers weren't fiddle scale....

Ukalali Hero for the win....

CubeGuy @ Apr 8th 2008 4:17PM

@Hala

I'd love to know how you managed to do that. =/

Sir Fidlious Wong (Zeon Defense Force) @ Apr 8th 2008 4:24PM

He plays those guitar games sooooo good, not even compatibility problems slow him down....

PojoMofo @ Apr 8th 2008 9:02PM

LOL @cubeguy

I have cat-like reflexes and a giraffe-like neck

FOXHOUND @ Apr 8th 2008 12:37PM

Jack Daniels is my last boss.

Jomolungma @ Apr 8th 2008 12:41PM

Well, Lou is supposed to be short for Lucifer probably - it was in the movie version of Constantine (yes, I saw it). But I have no problem with the devil winning. It was part of my deal with him that he must win all digital boss battles with me in order for my requests to be fulfilled. So go right ahead there Beelzebubba... rock on.

baby sea tuna @ Apr 8th 2008 1:55PM

The movie version of Constantine...also, you know, The Bible.

jayeffaar @ Apr 8th 2008 2:20PM

They call the Devil "Lou" in the bible? I did not know that...

t_m @ Apr 8th 2008 2:36PM

You don't remember when he was chatting with Jez in the desert?

Martez @ Apr 8th 2008 2:38PM

OMG, NOT EVERYBODY HAS READ TEH BIBLEZ?!?!

Sir Fidlious Wong (Zeon Defense Force) @ Apr 8th 2008 3:49PM

I read the bibbles once. My favorite character was Robocop. He lead the lame to justice with his hot metal.

Arttemis @ Apr 8th 2008 12:42PM

I'm upset that the cover sounded like such shit. What I heard was just disgusting.

Knight Marquise @ Apr 8th 2008 3:01PM

Agreed...the cover was terrible.

Nate @ Apr 8th 2008 3:21PM

It was awful. It doesn't work AT ALL for the guitar. Plus it was never meant to be a real duet, so it doesn't actually work well as a battle either.

HighFiveJesus @ Apr 8th 2008 12:43PM

Unfortunately he's a country christian lovin bumpkin type so naturally this would bother him. Fortunately he wrote a great song so i don't let it bother me. Unfortunately, i hated the metal extreme cover in the game.

tmacairjordan87 @ Apr 8th 2008 12:44PM

well no shit of course the devil can win. wouldn't be much of a game if there was no chance of losing

merf1350 @ Apr 8th 2008 12:44PM

I think someone's just mad he sold the rights instead of his soul.

thesimplicity @ Apr 9th 2008 2:46PM

He didn't sell the rights to his song. Like most people who have contracts with major distributors, he never had the rights to begin with.

7718 @ Apr 8th 2008 12:45PM

I don't play guitar hero games, but I do like Charlie Daniels Band's great music. Perhaps everybody would be happy if next time they used other great songs like "Still in Saigon" or "Wooley Swamp", man those are great songs.

Courtney @ Apr 8th 2008 2:17PM

I want some "Uneasy Rider" to play along with (okay, may not be a great game song, but still one of my favorites).

Disregarding the Christian themes, I always feel for artists who have lost control of their work and have to watch it used in ways they would never approve.

Nigeria: Cody ChesnuTT Defense Force @ Apr 8th 2008 12:46PM

I would make a joke about Joystiq being a tad slow but I can't really think of one right now...

...it's a real shame that as a creative person he has lost the rights to his property and Activision are using it in a way he disapproves of.

I read some of the comments on Kotaku and it was awful. Absolutely awful. So much bigotry. Just because this man believes letting the Devil win is wrong. If that's what he believes then that's what he believes. We should respect it without devolving to base, crass, insults.

I'm sorry. This isn't aimed Joystiq. It's just that the comments at Kotaku were so...

...forget it. I've got clothes to wash.

jayeffaar @ Apr 8th 2008 2:19PM

"Just because this man believes letting the Devil win is wrong. If that's what he believes then that's what he believes."

Without commenting on Daniels' beliefs (which I don't share), isn't that also what the game wants you to believe? In the game, letting the Devil win IS wrong, which is why your goal is to win. Shouldn't that be enough? Shouldn't that be like in real life? (or at least real life the way christians see it)

Sir Fidlious Wong (Zeon Defense Force) @ Apr 8th 2008 3:45PM

I don't know... I tend to take the morningstars side. He's a hell of a nightclub owner...

Kamizar @ Apr 8th 2008 12:46PM

Maybe next time you'll actually use 2 banjos for dueling banjos, and then your game opinion might be worth something old man...

LaughingTarget @ Apr 8th 2008 1:32PM

I can't believe you just confused Deliverance with Charlie Daniels.

s256 @ Apr 9th 2008 2:49AM

"oh screw it you awful little nerds."

I love you.

Kamizar @ Apr 9th 2008 8:25AM

Eh, the version I have is the CDB version and you can hear that one is guitar and the other is banjo...

Also, people can't take a joke?

Bananarama @ Apr 8th 2008 12:47PM

When I'm looking for a parking spot handicapped people are the devil, because they have the best spots but no one ever seems to be using them

Nigeria: Cody ChesnuTT Defense Force @ Apr 8th 2008 12:52PM

I laughed, because laughing at the handicapped is the essence of good comedy.

THE WICKER MAN (BWF) (GT: Dalek Prime) @ Apr 8th 2008 12:55PM

or poor taste! ;) just like anyone giving two farts what charlie thinks about the boogeyman. Im offended Greek gods can be defeated by kratos!

LaughingTarget @ Apr 8th 2008 1:30PM

All classic Greek dieties were fallible and were beaten by mortals in many stories. Kratos doing so isn't beyond the stories.

THE WICKER MAN (BWF) (GT: Dalek Prime) @ Apr 8th 2008 3:05PM

Its a joke asshole. You win know it all prick award for the day.

tactics @ Apr 8th 2008 4:37PM

wickerman: he's right though. and that makes you wrong. and rude.

THE WICKER MAN (BWF) (GT: Dalek Prime) @ Apr 8th 2008 4:46PM

It was a joke that did not state any belief...oh screw it you awful little nerds. I thought that would be less offensive than refering to an existing religion but some little shytes never skip a beat do they. I passed the 4th grade, of course ive read greek mythology. C*nt.

Kizzle @ Apr 8th 2008 12:54PM

I'm far more offended that "boss battles" and "power-ups" were introduced to the Guitar Hero series.

jsn @ Apr 8th 2008 12:56PM

this should be filed under religious nonsense.

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Apr 8th 2008 1:09PM

Or under "Gross abuse of license"

SugarDaddy @ Apr 8th 2008 1:15PM

Religious nonsense indeed. Gross abuse of license? Haha, you are just full of comedy, Crono. First of all, it's the guitar version of the song, not the fiddle version. So depicting the devil playing guitar vs you, the player, seems to be exactly what the song is about (save the fiddle part)! And Charlie Daniels doesn't even own the license! So you are just completely off-base as usual.

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Apr 8th 2008 3:32PM

God your such a hate-filled person, SugarDaddy.

Have you found that anarchist country to move to yet?

How would you like it if one of your most well known creations was perverted (clue: there is no "guitar version" of this song by Charlie Daniels), into the utter trash that the GH3 version of the song is.

File the above posts under "Religious Intolerance".

Sir Fidlious Wong (Zeon Defense Force) @ Apr 8th 2008 4:22PM

If the license allowed the guitar version to be made, no matter how awful, the license allowed it to be made. There is no gross license abuse since the license holders, IE the guys Charlie Daniels sold the song rights too, was perfectly okay with this.

Meanwhile, if Charlie Daniels really wanted complete control over his songs, he wouldn't have sold em off as times got rough. CD was in a fairly unique position of owning his songs, unlike The Beatles or majority of artists for that matter. So while he sold away his rights to manage his own material, he also sold away his rights to control his own material...

Crono (NDF - Knight of the Old School) @ Apr 8th 2008 5:13PM

Sure its not abuse in the legal sense, but you'd have a hard time finding many people who are fans of the original work who think the GH3 rendition is any good.

mirilene @ Apr 8th 2008 12:56PM

I'm STILL upset at that horrible cover of the song. If you want a cover, look to Hendrix's Watchtower or Metallica's Turn the Page or Tuesday's gone for how to do a cover properly.

If you want bullshit, look to madonna or whoever the hell screwed up "devil went down to georgia"