Members of Glassjaw, the Used, Less Than Jake, Mest and Story of the Year sat down on couches in the New Media lounge of Warner Bros. Records and shot their fans Wednesday morning. The shootings came in plain sight of a roomful of people via the Xbox Live, and the bands' respective fans shot back. Using headsets to communicate with each other, the band members wound through the cobblestone paths of Return to Castle Wolfenstein, making the occasional open plea for advice, like "How do you survive the rocket blasts? I've died three times."

Fans with gamer tags such as "Fatboy 24" and "Big Papa Vargas" used the online gaming system to join forces with or attack the bands, who played under the names "Less Than J," "Glassjaw Live," "Mest Live," "The Used Live" and "Story of the Y."

On a break from playing, Used bassist Jeph Howard acknowledged his gaming addiction. "I'm probably the biggest nerd on earth," he said. "All I do all day is practice and play bass and while I'm doing that I'll have an Xbox on and I'll be playing games at the same time. I've been playing the new Brute Force game a lot."

The breakfast event was part of a series of "playing the band" opportunities this summer, with the bulk of them taking place on the Xbox sponsored Lollapalooza tour.

While a majority of band members copped to a love for the latest in video game technology, Less Than Jake singer/guitarist Chris Neil represented the opposing view. "I haven't played video games since Nintendo 64, which is, like, archaic," he said. "I'm dating myself saying that. It's weird, I don't feel like I'm getting older in any other facet of my life except video games."

COLIN DEVENISH
(July 10, 2003)