Free Stuff Time: U.S. Air Guitar Championships H-Town Regionals (6/13!) Giveaway

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UPDATE: FYI, since the initial post I’ve heard from The Golden Ghost himself, and apparently not only has he recovered from last year’s injuries, but he will be competing again this year. Go support, y’all!

I know, it’s a little hard to fathom, even for somebody like me who’s spent countless hours air-guitar-ing (okay, I actually mostly air-drum, to be honest) to the metal albums of my youth. But the U.S. Air Guitar Championships do exist, even still, and the Houston regionals are this coming Saturday, June 13th, at Warehouse Live. Hordes of fame-hungry vapor-lick-playing heroes will “rock” the stage in garish, sometimes terrifying outfits, doing anything and everything they can possibly think of to blow the audience away and win a coveted slot at the nationals.

Just ask Jacob “Hurricane Bear” Calle — last year he entered the competition as “The Golden Ghost” and, as (weirdly) uncovered by the heeb’n’vegan blog (and hilariously pondered upon after by the Houston Press‘s Dusti Rhodes), he broke his freaking leg jumping down from the ceiling of the club. While “playing” Mötörhead’s “Ace of Spades,” naturally. Rumor has it that he was favored to win ’til his fall, but he ended up placing third, with Houston sending Rip Darko to The Big Show instead.

Folks, that’s dedication, right there. Breaking a limb’s bad enough when you’re rocking out on an actual guitar with a real-live band, but doing it with nothing up there to back you up…damn. I can’t even contemplate it.

Now, with that in mind, we here at Space City Rock are happy to announce that we’re in a position to hand out 2 guestlist spots to one lucky winner — it could be you, ladies and/or gents. If you want to check out the air-wankery for yourself this weekend, just drop an email to “gaijin” at “spacecityrock dot com” with the Subject line “The Golden Ghost lives!”. Do it fast, because we’ve got to pick a winner pretty quickly…

By the way, in case you think this is all utterly ridiculous, um…okay, yeah, you’re pretty much right. But hell, I’m all for ridiculousness, and I have to admire the U.S. Air Guitar folks’ sincerity and dedication. Here’s their official mission statement:

US Air Guitar is devoted to taking our nation’s unofficial pastime out of the bedroom and putting it up on the world stage. Founded in 2003, the US Air Guitar Championships have grown into a major national event that reaches more cities, fans and competitors every year.

In a time when US political, economic, military and athletic dominance faces unprecedented challenges around the world, it is our belief that air guitar represents one endeavor our country can dominate without controversy. US Air Guitar is here to make this possible.

Wow. Air guitar as the key to world peace? I can’t even really make fun of that; it’s too damn cute to mess with, y’know? And c’mon, how cool would the world be if we all air-guitared one another instead of shooting and blowing one another up? It certainly couldn’t be worse.

Final Note: For all you wannabe pseudo-rockstars out there, be aware that yes, you can still enter the H-town regionals. Should you dare…