Pitchfork

LET'S GET READY TO RUMBLE!!! December 20, people. It's goin' down.

Last night on "The Colbert Report", history was made as Stephen Colbert accepted the Decemberists' challenge to a guitar solo duel.

(For those not keeping score at home, it was actually a counterchallenge to Colbert's original challenge for viewers to insert Colbert's "Green Screen Challenge" into the band's "Re-Animate the Decemberists" contest. If that makes any sense.)

"The Decemberists may be thieves, but they're not cowards," Colbert said, going on to quote the message the band relayed via this very website.

He continued, "Decemberists, you walked right into my trap. Or didn't you know that I was lead singer and guitarist for the 1980s new wave sensation Stephen and the Colberts?"

(Cue amazingly realistic faux 80s new wave video featuring Colbert squeezing out a rudimentary solo.)

"It's called a whammy bar, deal with it! And if you think that's nasty, wait 'til you hear some of the stuff from my hit metal album Symphonies of the Infernal. I am going to jam out a solo with so many dominant sevenths and ascending pentatonic patterns it'll make Yngwie Malmsteen sound like Raffi."

He even pronounced "Yngwie Malmsteen" correctly! (Maybe he knows the right way to say "tain".) Colbert invited the band onto his show on December 20. ("I'm even giving you home-field advantage by having the contest in December.")

"At last we will see who reigns supreme."

Then he did this: \m/

Pitchfork received confirmation that the Decemberists have indeed taken Colbert up on his invitation. Colbert will duel it out with multi-instrumentalist Chris Funk, who offered Pitchfork his "strategy for total guitar solo challenge domination:

"I'm going to dust off my white high-top Reeboks, slide on my stirrup pants and chug a two-liter of Mountain Dew."