Bands' sales are feeling the 'Guitar Hero' effect

— -- DragonForce guitarist Herman Li and his speed metal bandmates used to play the video game Guitar Hero. Now, fans are flocking to the band after finding their song Through the Fire and Flames in the latest installment of the game, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock.

"Our CD sales have gone up, and we are high up the charts on digital downloads," Li says. "It's great. We don't play commercial music. It took everyone by surprise."

More fans were converted last month when Ellen DeGeneres invited a young Guitar Hero expert onto her talk show to play DragonForce's song, considered to be the toughest of all songs to play. (Go to YouTube and search for "Ellen" and "guitar hero"; you can also find her playing the game herself.)

"Somehow it seems our music really connects with the younger generation, gamers and non-gamers," says Li, 29. "This is a game that is driving music sales when everybody is complaining about the video game industry taking money from movies and music."

The Guitar Hero effect is real. DragonForce saw digital sales of Through the Fire rise from fewer than 2,000 weekly to a high of 37,825 the week ending Dec. 30, a week when many who got the game as a holiday gift were playing it. (Only one GH III song sold more, Guns N' Roses' Welcome to the Jungle at 38,330.)

Also since the game came out in late October, DragonForce's album Inhuman Rampage has been atop Billboard magazine's Top Heatseekers chart four times (it dropped to No. 4 this week). Overall sales of the album have reached 230,000, much more than the 75,000 sold in the band's adopted home, the United Kingdom.

"There has been a steady buzz on the band, and you could just feel their star rising. Then (Guitar Hero III) hit, and it catapulted it to an entirely new level," says Jonas Nachsin, president of DragonForce's label, Roadrunner Records.

Two other Roadrunner artists, Slipknot and Kill Switch Engage, have seen increased sales from inclusion in the game. "You might be surprised. It's not only digital sales but significant full-length sales of CDs," Nachsin says. "Competition (to be in future games) will probably be more fierce because everyone can see what it does for a band."