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Air Guitar

You, too, can be a pro air guitarist in these easy steps.

"Okay, the pretend guitar solo ends now!"

—Kim Possible

Making pretend guitar motions with your hands, placed as though you are holding an invisible guitar. Leaning is optional. Popular in The Eighties, but still done. There are championships for this. People have sold air guitars on E Bay for a sizeable amount of money. Some argue that the idea has since been replaced with the plastic hit, Guitar Hero.

No one's watching. Go ahead, rock along to that song that won't leave your head. We won't tell anyone.

Less common versions are Air Violin and Air Piano. A variant is the "substitute guitar". Tennis racquets and (in the UK and Australia) cricket bats are commonly used for this. See Instrumental Weapon when this is done with weapons.

Examples:

Advertising

Madame Tussauds once ran a poster campaign in the Underground which showed an empty guitar case and promised a free air guitar with each visit^*case not included.

Anime and Manga

In the second ending of Xxx HO Li C Maru, Moro and Mokona play air guitar, bass and battery.
Yui from K-On! played this during the Chrismas Episode.
The video accompanying the ending theme for Boku Wa Tomodachi Ga Sukunai has Yozora doing this...next to Sena, who's playing an actual electric guitar.
Seen in an episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion. Done by Aoba, one of the bridge bunnies, during a moment of leisure.
Prussia from Axis Powers Hetalia does this with a broom in one story.

Film

Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure
- "Air Guitar cures air pollution"
Woody Allen's Bananas has a scene with an air chamber band. Woody eventually asks them to keep it quieter. (Originally, there were supposed to be instruments, but they never arrived and Woody decided to roll with it.)
In a deleted scene in The Original Kings of Comedy, Bernie Mac entertains the audience after he has broken his mic and is waiting for a new one by picking up the mic stand and pretending to play the bass guitar with it.

Literature

The book Thinning the Herd tells us how this can go horribly awry - a 16-year-old fell out the window while jumping on the bed and playing air guitar. He was three stories up.

Live-Action TV

A MADtv skit had an air guitar emporium. Guest star Joe Walsh used one to smack down a thief who tried to steal Jimi Hendrix's air guitar.
In the old Knight Rider, Michael does air guitar whilst posing as a "bona fide" rock star. Do real rock stars do this?
Scrubs. The Janitor forms an air guitar band with Ted and Lloyd the delivery guy. Turk joins, slights Kelso and to get back at him Kelso bans air guitaring in the hospital.
An episode of the Canadian kids' show The Latest Buzz has Wilder and his father entering an air guitar championship.
A 6th season NCIS episode has Tony participating in an air guitar contest online, while Ziva gives him grief about doing something so childish. It ends with her making sure she's alone, air-rocking out, and laughing.
An episode of Boomtown had an ex-convict whose hands had been broken by his cell-mate. He used to play air-guitar and imagine his favourite song to deal with confinement. The cell-mate, however, did not appreciate this habit.
House recently had a Patient of the Week whose corpus callosum was cut, thus his left and right hemispheres worked independently and he had an alien hand syndrome. His left hand had didn't let 13 make an autopsy so they put on some rock and the patient's left hand started playing air guitar.
Just Shoot Me! had an episode where Nina found out the guy she was dating that week was lead guitar in an 'Air Band' with Finch and Kevin.
The J Pop band Arashi formed an airband for their late night tv show with someone on air vocals, two air guitarists, air keyboard and air drums.
Frasier and Niles on Frasier play "air violin" in one episode.
In one episode of Flight of the Conchords Bret sells his guitar and is forced to play air guitar. Murray, the band's manager, begins to write bad reviews of the band since he "can hardly hear it. No, you'd have to be deaf to hear that".
In one of Supernatural's DVD extras Jensen Ackles does an epically funny mime to "Eye of the Tiger", including using his leg as an impromptu replacement for a guitar.
The Colbert Report: In the beginning of every 'Sport Report' segment Stephen rocks out on the air guitar. At one point he points out that he can play air guitar even with a broken wrist.
On Green Wing, a guy tells Karen she looks like a queen... specifically, Brian May. He illustrates this with an air guitar riff. She responds by smashing his air guitar.
How I Met Your Mother: Barney does that a few times.
Boy Meets World: When the normally uncultured Shawn takes an interest in classical music, he starts playing "air violin":
Shawn: This is the part where the violin rocks!

Music

Horribly invoked in the music video for Journey's "Separate Ways" ... in some shots, the members of the band are shown playing air guitar, air keyboard, and air drums. Yes, real musicians are pretending to play the instruments they actually know how to play.
- Slightly less badly, "(I Just) Died In Your Arms" starts off with an air...cello?
- Awesomely invoked in Meshuggah's video for "New Millenium Cyanide Christ." The video features the band headbanging in their tour bus, with the guitarists air guitaring (featuring the lead guitarist's accurate air soloing), the drummer hitting air drums with his real drumsticks, and the lead singer lip-syncing into a ballpoint pen. Your mind will be blown.
The music video for "Chunky Chunky Air Guitar" by The Whitlams is a mockumentary about the 9th Annual Air Guitar World Championships.
Mentioned in Emily Osment's "All The Way Up" as one of the things she likes to do, including biting nails, waking her friends up at 3AM and playing Rock & Roll loud enough to make the windows shake.
The Republic Tigers have a song called "Air Guitar" which incites the listener to do exactly this, for which they even provide the requisite guitar solos.
The music video for Area 7's "Nobody Likes A Bogan" features the tennis racquet/cricket bat substitute variant.
"Air Guitar" by comedy band Tripod and the Umbilical Brothers, a miming comedy duo, is all about how ridiculous it is for somebody to win an award for air guitar.
"They're just jumping around in tight pants.
"There's already a job where you do that.
"It's called a lead singer."
- Then the Umbilical Brothers interrupt and they duel between a real guitar and an air guitar.
Joe Cocker, anyone?! Gloriously captured during his Woodstock performance.

Newspaper Comics

Opus from Bloom County was discovered by his friends doing this, thinking he was alone.
Steve: Shall I let the Air Groupies in now?
Funky Winkerbean's Crazy Harry won an international air guitar competition.

Radio

BBC Radio DJ Mark Radcliffe often admits to air drumming. Guests often "play" other instruments. Someone once claimed they did air lighting rig.

Video Games

Klavier does a very convincing one in Apollo Justice Ace Attorney, up to and including actually sounding like a real guitar.
There is an Air Guitar emote in RuneScape, earned when you unlock 500 songs in the game.
Some of the Guitar Hero games have an "air guitar" cheat, that makes the characters play air guitar.
- There is a product on the market with the Guitar Hero license that will play a guitar riff if you move your hands in front of it to facilitate air-guitaring. It's a popular Internet joke. That said, while you can't learn guitar from Guitar Hero, it does help one's air guitar skills.
- For pre-orders of Guitar Hero World Tour, Gamestop is offering free air guitars.
One of Nero's more extreme taunts in Devil May Cry 4 is to strum an air guitar in front of his enemies. And if you stop and listen, It's actually making real music.
The Pyro in Team Fortress 2 plays air-guitar with almost all of his melee loadout items when you taunt with the melee item out.
- Medic also pretends to play violin with two of his bonesaws.
The Magic monster from the first Monster Rancher game has an attack called Diversion, which is a psychic air guitar attack.
The male Forsaken in World Of Warcraft play an air guitar when they use the /dance emote.
Spoofed in Wario Land: Shake It! There's a treasure called the Air Guitar which is just an empty outline of a guitar.
Rock out anywhere and anytime with this nonexistent axe. WHOOOOO!
Backyard Skateboarding has the Big Air Guitar Solo.
A few routines in Dance Dance Revolution Hottest Party 2-3 have the dancers air-guitar to some songs. They're insanely adorable when they do this!
Played straight in the first Fable but subverted in the sequel, where you use a lyre instead.
At least one song in the Just Dance series of games feature this.
Both Modern and Classic Sonic will do this at some point in Sonic Generations.
Asagi does this in Disgaea 3.
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow: Soma Cruz's crouching animation, when spammed rapidly, makes it look like he's rocking a wicked air guitar solo.
Brain Dead 13: After defeating Dr. Neurosis and seeing his lair explode, Lance says, "Cool! Back to work!" then does a strumming air guitar before leaving on a truck.
In Double Dragon Neon, the Lees do this after beating a level.

Web Comics

In the introduction to Kid Radd, it's mentioned he's real cool, but by mid-'80s standards, and Radd does air guitar just to make that clear.
Shredded Moose: Here.
Parodied in an Ozy And Millie strip, here. Note: Ozy is, technically, cheating.
John of Homestuck plays air guitar when recreating the final scene of Con Air, completing with the soundtrack having someone vocally imitate a guitar.

Western Animation

Motor Ed from Kim Possible enjoys air guitar and "Woaaaah!" noises. Seriously.
- So does Dr. Drakken.
An episode of Doug has Skeeter playing air guitar because his parents couldn't afford a real one. He and Doug take turns playing it and passing it to each other.
Most of the Family Guy official art will have Chris Griffin play the air guitar, although he doesn't do it at all in the show.
The Weekenders: Tino plays air guitar when he fantasizes of playing "Extreme Jacks" when looking for a sport he can participate. He had an agreement from Tish to never air guitar again. He does it again in the end of the episode.
Total Drama Island: "Up the Creek" features Cody doing this in the confession outhouse to celebrate partnering up with Gwen for a challenge; halfway through his solo the camera cuts to Gwen talking about how she thinks Cody is childish and annoying, then it cuts back to Cody (who is still playing) to prove her point.
The end of an episode of American Dad features Steve and Snot playing air guitar to Joe Satriani's "Always With Me, Always With You."

Real Life

There have been, and still are, several championships, whether national or global, for this.
- Which was mocked by the comedy band Tripod. The singers/guitar players are upset that despite the fact that they actually went and learnt guitar, they get less awards and accolades than air guitarists. When they performed the song on The Sideshow, The Umbilical Brothers came on and had a guitar-off with them, with the Brothers playing an air-guitar and making awesome and realistic guitar noises with their mouths, overshadowing Tripod, who were playing actual guitars. Go figure.
The Musical Instrument Museum in Arizona has an exhibit full of guitars. The last display case contains an empty guitar case, complete with impressions in the felt. The plaque beside it reads, "Air Guitar. Materials: Nitrogen, Oxygen, Carbon Dioxide, and Dreams."
- Also contains trace amounts of noble gasses and self-delusion.
Some clever people have created software that allows you to actually play an air guitar. [1]