Photo by AUXY ESPINOZA

Last night (July 8), participants in the opening stop of Guitar Hero: Aerosmith ROCKS the Hard Rock contest -- sponsored by Spin and the Hard Rock Café -- looked more like those professional pretenders (translation: actors) working at nearby Universal Studios, rather than the real life rockers who perform regularly at the adjacent Gibson Amphitheatre, which – like the Hard Rock Café – is also located along Universal City’s busy, tourist-y CityWalk. To further drive the point home that these gamers are, alas, mere video game mortals, players were flanked by a display case featuring Paul McCartney’s Hofner bass to their right, and one of Ron Wood’s well-worn Fender guitars to the left.

Nevertheless, after roughly two hours of string-less guitar heroics, Inglewood, CA’s Mario Golden emerged victorious out of an original field of 16. Although Golden doesn’t even know how to play a real guitar, he still went home with an armload of swag and a chance for win a trip to Boston to meet Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler, and -- if the rock gods are smiling down on him -- take home that classic rocker’s custom Guitar Hero: Aerosmith/Hard Rock Café/Red Wing Motorcycle. Golden won’t likely see any of his musical hardware autographed and displayed on Hard Rock Café walls any time soon., but -- to paraphrase a David Bowie lyric-- he was a hero, just for one day.

We Asked: Who is your favorite guitar hero in real life?

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