Guitar Hero's hardest song ever makes a comeback

Activision launched a special event in Guitar Hero Live today, and with it comes the return of the franchise's most notorious track: "Through the Fire and the Flames" by Dragonforce. From now until Feb. 8 at 7 a.m. PT, players can check out the Shred-a-Thon channel on Guitar Hero TV, Live's online streaming mode, to play five intense songs on a constant loop.

The most familiar of these tracks —€” which include songs by Lamb of God and Megadeth — is "Through the Fire and the Flames." After its introduction to the series in Guitar Hero 3, the song quickly gained notoriety as Guitar Hero's most intense track.

"Through the Fire and the Flames" became a mainstay on YouTube at the height of Guitar Hero's populartiy, as players uploaded clips of themselves surviving the nearly 8-minute song; you can check one of YouTube's most viewed (and not work-safe) videos in that genre below.

"Through the Fire and the Flames" even made it into the Guinness Book of World Records in 2009, after one dedicated guitarist played a near-perfect rendition of the song to the tune of 973,954 points. In his journey to the record books, the Guitar Hero fan claimed to have broken 80 plastic controllers while attempting to conquer the song.

Currently, "Through the Fire and the Flames" and the other Shred-a-Thon tracks are only available to play on Guitar Hero TV. Following the event's conclusion, however, the Dragonforce song will be available as part of the regular Guitar Hero Live game.

Guitar Hero Live is out on PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One and Wii U. A version of the game is also available for iOS platforms. For more on the game and its TV mode, check out our review.