When I was first learning how to play guitar, I subscribed to all the guitar magazines (Guitar Player, Guitar For the Practicing Musician, Guitar World), and bought a lot of songbooks. Many magazines and songbooks boast “note for note transcriptions” of your favorite songs and solos, and although I couldn’t read music, myself and many other aspiring musicians learned from tablature, which had six lines representing the strings of a guitar, and numbers on the lines indicating what frets you need to finger.

A sure sign to me that the Guitar Hero phenomenon hasn’t slowed down was when I walked into Guitar Center and saw the Guitar Hero songbook, just like the ones I learned my favorite tunes from, displayed prominently.

The songbooks for Guitar Hero and Rock Band are from Hal Leonard, a leading sheet music publisher. In a press release for the songbook, Jeff Schroedl, Vice President of pop and standard publications for Hal Leonard, said, “We’ve gotten many requests for a songbook, so this should appease the game’s rabid fans who aspire to play the guitar for real, or get better at it. Our songbook lays out the notes and tab for them to actually learn the songs they know so well from the game.”

As Schroedl told us, it took about a year total to get it all together, including securing the song licenses, and getting all the approvals from Activision. He won’t say exactly how many copies the book has sold so far, except that “it sells as well as our top artists. It’s early, it’s been out a month and a half, but out of the gate, it’s an A list book in terms of sales.”

Jim Meinhardt, advertising manager for Hal Leonard, says, “It’s our biggest selling songbook by a wide margin for 2007, and it came out late last year.” Meinhardt says book is already in its third printing. Unless a music book is a big seller, a title can have a single publication, then wind up out of print because another printing would be too expensive. Clearly, that’s not a problem with Guitar Hero.

None of this would be happening without the game inspiring kids to pick up the guitar for real, and it’s given many bands a big boost as well. “It’s probably getting more kids involved than anything the music industry is providing us with at the moment,” says Guitar World editor in chief Brad Tolinski. “The band Dragonforce has gotten a boost because their song, “Through the Fire and the Flames,” is the ultimate Guitar Hero song. It’s the most challenging track on Guitar Hero, and all these kids are aspiring to play it.”

Above: The band Dragonforce

“A lot of bands I’ve spoken with have told me it’s improved their visibility substantially,” says Schroedl. “I don’t know if it’s saving the industry, but it can’t hurt. Talking to a lot of industry people, the consensus is it’s helping.” Guitar World also recently ran the sheet music for “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” another Guitar Hero favorite the readers wanted to learn.

In the gear industry, Peavey are now making guitars that you can really play and use as controllers for Guitar Hero. The guitar case company Coffin Cases are now making casket shaped cases for Guitar Hero controllers. And in response to all the latest Guitar Hero mania, the cover of the June issue of Guitar World, due to hit the stands in April, will promise: “How to Become a Real Guitar Hero: It’s Not Just a Game!”