On Sale (until Oct. 31)… School Of Rock

The newly updated (to version 1.1) School of Rock has just seen a huge price drop from $6.99 to a mere $.99. As a fan of the movie, the app caught my eye when it was first released, but, I wasn’t  in the mood to drop another $6.99 on something that had an equal chance of being being good or being little more than a movie advertisement.

With a price drop down to $.99 I was willing to take the plunge.

Friends, trust me, this application isn’t "little more than a movie advertisement". It happens to be a much more complicated and well-done application for the iPhone than I expected.

They describe it this way–

Unleash your inner rock star with this interactive music experience! Inspired by the hit movie, the School of Rock App delivers cool features that allow you to learn about music and then riff with some of the greatest rock songs of all time.
* Play Along with Classic Rock Tracks – Join in on fan favorites featuring songs by Lynyrd Skynyrd, The Scorpions, Royal and more while you record your jam session
* Rock to Your Own Music Collection – Play along with any song in your iTunes music library
* Try a Variety of Authentic Instruments – Actual "axes" from some of the leading names in music.
* Go through the School of Rock – Learn guitar, bass, keyboard and drums and master the basics of rock ‘n roll music theory through interactive lessons that will expand your knowledge and deepen your appreciation for what it takes to play like a pro
* Test Your Music Skills – Challenge yourself to trivia questions, quotes and memory challenges to raise your score

The fact that this is a serious application is obvious from the second you start up the application. It is the first time that I’ve seen an application use video clips to actually explain the application and described how the game is played.

In addition, it turns out that this application isn’t a game at all. Rather, within this one application are a series of different games. And most of them aren’t that easy.  Much to my surprise, an application called "school of rock" actually tries to teach you something about music and rock ‘n roll. You can take the "axe" quiz  and see if you can identify the guitar. You can take the "name that note" quiz and see if you can name the note being played on the guitar strings. You can play one of the games that are akin to Tap Tap Revolution such as the drummer game.  In short, there’s tons to do, and while using it, you might even learn a little something about rock ‘n roll.

Oh, and it’s also an advertisement for the movie. 🙂