Rock Band

Game Info

Now you and your friends are the stars

You’ve got a singer, a drummer, a bass guitarist, and a guitarist…now all you need to do is form a band and set up a rocking setlist.  It’s up to you how famous you’ll become.

Rock Band was the real game changer in the “music” game business.  Guitar Hero really developed the concept (a lot of Rock Band creators came from the Guitar Hero camp but were part of the Harmonix deal with MTV when Activision bought RedOctane), but Rock Band perfected it by adding multiple instruments.

Both Rock Band and Guitar Hero work off most of the same play style, but by adding drums and singing, it really opened the game up to more people.  In addition to the multiple instruments, the MTV tie seemed to legitimize the brand for many artists who previously had not had their work on video games.  The result was a varied set list and tons of downloadable content.

Rock Band Complete Setlist:

“29 Fingers”—The Konks (Unlockable)

“Are You Gonna Be My Girl”—Jet

“Ballroom Blitz”—Sweet

“Beetlebum”—Blur (European Version)

“Black Hole Sun”—Soundgarden

“Blitzkrieg Bop”—Ramones

“Blood Doll”—Anarchy Club (Unlockable)

“Brainpower”—Freezepop (Unlockable)

“Can’t Let Go”—Death of the Cool (Unlockable)

“Celebrity Skin”—Hole

“Countdown to Insanity”—H-Blockx (European Version)

“Creep”—Radiohead

“Dani California”—Red Hot Chili Peppers

“Day Late, Dollar Short”—The Acro-Brats (Unlockable)

“Dead on Arrival”—Fall Out Boy

“Detroit Rock City”—Kiss

“Dirty Little Secret”—The All American Rejects (Wii Version)

“(Don’t Fear) The Reaper”—Blue Öyster Cult

“Don’t Look Back in Anger”—Oasis (Wii Version)

“Electric Version”—The New Pornographers

“Enter Sandman”—Metallica

“Epic”—Faith No More

“Flirtin’ with Disaster”—Molly Hatchet

“Foreplay/Long Time”—Boston

“The Hand That Feeds”—Nine Inch Nails

“Gimme Shelter”—The Rolling Stones

“Go with the Flow”—Queens of the Stone Age

“Green Grass and High Tides”—The Outlaws

“Here It Goes Again”—OK Go

“Hier Kommt Alex”—Die Toten Hosen (European Version)

“Highway Star”—Deep Purple

“I Get By”—Honest Bob and the Factory to Dealer (Unlockable)

“I’m So Sick”—Flyleaf (Unlockable)

“I Think I’m Paranoid”—Garbage

“In Bloom”—Nirvana

“Learn to Fly”—Foo Fighters

“Main Offenders”—The Hives

“Manu Chao”—Les Wampas (European Version)

“Maps”—Yeah Yeah Yeahs

“Mississippi Queen”—Mountain

“Monsoon”—Tokio Hotel (European Version)

“New Wave”—Pleymo (European Version)

“Next to You”—The Police

“Nightmare”—Crooked X (Unlockable)

“Orange Crush”—R.E.M.

“Outside”—Tribe (Unlockable)

“Paranoid”—Black Sabbath

“Perfekte Welle”—Juli (European Version)

“Pleasure (Pleasure)”—Bang Camaro (Unlockable)

“Reptilia”—The Strokes

“Roam”—The B-52’s (Wii Version)

“Rock ‘n’ Roll Star”—Oasis (European Version)

“Roxanne”—The Police (Wii Version)

“Run to the Hills”—Iron Maiden

“Sabotage”—Beastie Boys

“Say It Ain’t So”—Weezer

“Seven”—Vagiant

“Should I Stay or Should I Go”—The Clash

“Suffragette City”—David Bowie

“Time We Had”—The Mother Hips (Unlockable)

“Timmy and the Lords of the Underworld”—Timmy and the Lords of the Underworld (Unlockable)

“Tom Sawyer”—Rush

“Train Kept A-Rollin”—Aerosmith

“Vasoline”—Stone Temple Pilots

“Wave of Mutilation”—Pixies

“Welcome Home”—Coheed and Cambria

“When You Were Young”—The Killers

“Won’t Get Fooled Again”—The Who

Add another guitar for bass and you’re set…now if Harmonix could figure a way to store this all

The result of the varied setlist was a great game that veered away from the harder music of Guitar Hero and opened it up to more players.  I also feel that the composition of Rock Band songs is usually a little easier than those of Guitar Hero songs (especially the early Guitar Hero games).

Rock Band does have its flaws in its band mode.  The tour mode is only can be played with two or more players.  This is something they rectified for Rock Band 2 and made the game more enjoyable.  If you have friends over, they don’t want to be forced to play random songs, they want to play what they want to play…not a prescribed setlist.  This goes ditto for the online players too…They generally don’t want to help your “band” by playing some of the lamer songs of the game.

This game put Guitar Hero on the run and with the release of Rock Band 2 which cleaned up a lot of Rock Band’s little issues, Guitar Hero just never caught up.  Rock Band’s songs are still fun and most can be transferred to other Rock Band games, so if you haven’t picked up the original Rock Band you can usually get it cheap…it is worth it just for the amount of songs you can add to your music “library”.

Related Links:

Rock Band 2

Rock Band 3

The Beatles:  Rock Band

Lego Rock Band