Rock Band

[austin_tycho]

Stevie made some room in his schedule for me to go over and do some singing. I don't think I did terribly well; I don't have any quantifiable evidence for this but I just didn't feel like I was in the groove as much as I have been at times past. Also, Rock Band released a bunch of AC/DC songs and we did several of those- and those are hard bastards to sing. I had to drop an octave half the time and it doesn't sound right when you do that (not to mention if you're singing it as opposed to screaming it, but that may be a style nitpick :P ). Anyway, in my continuing desire to obsessively chronicle what I sang, I went to Wikipedia to get the difficulty ratings for the vocal tracks, but they've taken them down for some reason. Fie! All that's left to me is the ratings Rock Band uses, which go from zero to five dots, then five angry dots. In other words, seven levels. The additional indignity is that they have no ratings listed for the AC/DC songs we did, and I know at least one of them had a five angry dots rating for the vocal part ("High Voltage", if I recall correctly). I did, oh, I dunno, maybe 2/3 of the songs on medium and 1/3 on hard. I got 100% on several of the medium songs- mostly ones I was really familiar with. The lowest score I remember getting was 77%, though I don't recall which song. Anyway, the list. There's a couple of repeats, since I'm using a different rating system.

"La La Love You" The Pixies (0)
"Perfect Drug" Nine Inch Nails (1) Why do I love this song so much? It's so cheesily emo. Maybe that's why.
"Vasoline" Stone Temple Pilots (1)
"Bodhisattva" Steely Dan (1) Holy shit, this was insanely difficult on guitar.
"Buddy Holly" Weezer (1) AKA "Fuckin' Buddy Holly". It came up on random or else I wouldn't sing this one. I don't know why it annoys me so.
"All Mixed Up" The Cars (1)
"Celebrity Skin" Hole (1)
"Baba O'Riley" The Who (1) I managed to get 100% on this one- thanks in part to the version Tracy Bonham sings.
"Still Alive" GlaDOS (1)
"Nine in the Afternoon" Panic at the Disco (2)
"Complete Control" The Clash (2)
"Bye Bye Love" The Cars (2)
"Bad to the Bone" George Thorogood (2) Yes, I picked it. And yes, I laughed my way through it.
"De-Luxe" Lush (2) Is this song in 12-8? Why I believe so! That makes it cool.
"Wonderwall" Oasis (2)
"Brainpower" Freezepop (2)
"One Way Or Another" Blondie (3) Another "so that's the lyrics, huh?" moment. Major creepy stalker song.
"Girl's Not Grey" AFI (3)
"Alive" Pearl Jam (3)
"Under the Bridge" Red Hot Chili Peppers (3) Thanks to Weird Al, the opening notes to this song trigger the thought "Oh, it's that Flinstones song."
"Something About You" Boston (3)
"Moving in Stereo" The Cars (3) I love this song, and know it backwards and forwards, but I cannot sing it as sung worth a damn... too low.
"Round and Round" Ratt (4) I have no idea why this gets such a high difficulty rating. It's your standard hair metal song, not much to it.
"Livin' on a Prayer" Bon Jovi (4) Another one sung with rolled eyes. At least it wasn't "Dead or Alive".
"New Kid in School" Donnas (5)

And here's the AC/DC songs I mangled, which are as mentioned unrated:
"For Those About to Rock"
"Hell Ain't No Bad Place to Be"
"TNT"
"Back in Black"
"Money Talks"
"High Voltage"

Alright, I just have to put these ratings to the other songs I've sung. Dammit, somebody has to!
9/25
"Hungry Like the Wolf" Duran Duran (0)
"Pretend We're Dead" L7 (0)
"I Was Wrong" Social Distortion (0)
"Man in the Box" Alice in Chains (0)
"Rockaway Beach" The Ramones (0)
"Interstate Love Song" Stone Temple Pilots (0)
"Today" Smashing Pumpkins (1)
"You're No Rock 'n Roll Fun" Sleater-Kinney (1)
"Sorrow" Bad Religion (1)
"Closer to the Heart" Rush (1)
"Nine in the Afternoon" Panic at the Disco (2)
"Welcome to the Neighborhood" Libyans (3)
"Roxanne" The Police (3)
"Peace of Mind" Boston (3)
"I Bleed" Pixies (3)

9/13
"Creep" Radiohead (0)
"Learn to Fly" Foo Fighters (0)
"Here It Goes Again" OK Go (0)
"Black Hole Sun" Soundgarden (1)
"Baba O'Riley" The Who (1)
"Behind Blue Eyes" The Who (1)
"Tell Me Baby" Red Hot Chili Peppers (1)
"All the Small Things" Blink-182 (1)
"Skullcrusher Mountain" Jonathan Coulton (1)
"Should I Stay or Should I Go" Clash (1)
"Train in Vain (Stand by Me)" The Clash (1)
"Just What I Needed" The Cars (1)
"All Mixed Up" The Cars (1)
"My Iron Lung" Radiohead (2)
"Wave of Mutilation" Pixies (2)
"You're All I've Got Tonight" The Cars (2)
"When You Were Young" The Killers (2)
"Don't Cha Stop" The Cars (2)
"Bye Bye Love" The Cars (2)
"Limelight" Rush (cover version) (2)
"Can't Stand Losing You" The Police (3)
"Sugar Magnolia" The Grateful Dead (3)
"Synchronicity II" The Police (3)
"Gimme Shelter" The Rolling Stones (4)
"New Wave" Pleymo (4)
"My Generation" (Live at Leeds) The Who (4)
"Tom Sawyer" Rush (cover version) (4)
"Foreplay/Long Time" Boston (5)

Comments

[psylent1.livejournal.com]

I'm kinda surprised "Bodhisattva" was on there; curious choice Steely Dan made given their other stuff. Anyway...

Why did you rate "Interstate Love Song" as 0?

[mielikki.livejournal.com]

These are the ratings Rock Band gives to the vocal tracks. Zero means it's a really easy song to sing, according to them. I'm not sure I agree with their assessments, but there you have it.

Now I have to go listen to Bodhisattva again.

[psylent1.livejournal.com]

Ok - confusion. I thought those were ratings you'd applied.

It's just that I can think of a half dozen Dan songs that would be better suited for RB, like "Reelin' In The Years" or "Time Out of Mind." That the guitar part for "Bodhisattva" was that hard is almost like they're mocking RB players.

[mielikki.livejournal.com]

Hell, I'd like to sing 'Hey Nineteen' for that matter.

Nah, my ratings would be completely different. Maybe after I do this a couple more times I'll make a list of favorite songs to sing, and songs I hated singing. There's a lot of "meh, that was okay" too. So I guess I'd have a three-star rating system.