Rock Band Classic Rock Track Pack Songs

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Malka Sedano

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Aug 3, 2024, 5:58:21 PM8/3/24

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Rock Band Track Packs (called Song Packs in Europe and Australia)[1] are a series of supplemental media discs for the Rock Band series of music video games. The packs are developed by Harmonix and Demiurge Studios (earlier packs were developed with Pi Studios), and distributed by MTV Games and Electronic Arts. The track packs are fully functional standalone games and do not require separate Rock Band titles to play;[2] however, on consoles that support downloadable content, the songs from these packs can be integrated with other Rock Band titles. The initial purpose of the track packs was to allow users of systems without support for downloadable content (PlayStation 2 and originally Wii) to be able to play some of the downloadable tracks. With the exception of the AC/DC pack, all songs in each track pack are available as downloadable content in online stores.

Rock Band Track Pack Vol. 1 (Rock Band Song Pack 1) was released for the Wii and PlayStation 2 on July 15, 2008. The addition was announced on May 5, 2008.[3] This disc contains 20 songs previously released as downloadable content for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 .[2][4] As there are only 20 songs, all tracks have been re-arranged into "Stages" instead of Tiers, with four "Stages" in total. The following songs are featured on this track pack:[4]

AC/DC Live: Rock Band Track Pack (AC/DC Live: Rock Band) was announced on September 29, 2008, and was released for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 on November 2. The Wii version was released on November 16, 2008. The pack contains all 18 tracks from AC/DC's Live at Donington DVD. The game, through pre-existing licensing deals that AC/DC has with the retail chains,[6] was only available at Wal-Mart and Sam's Club.[7] This exclusivity agreement was only applicable in the United States, and ended on November 4, 2009, when GameStop began selling new copies of the game for $20.[8] Each copy of the track pack includes a code that can be redeemed online to allow Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 owners to download the content to their console for use in other Rock Band titles. The game can also be played as a standalone title, including a number of achievements for Xbox 360 owners, but otherwise does not feature many of the gameplay elements of the full Rock Band titles, such as character creation or customization, online play, or a World Tour mode.[6] The track pack retails for $30 for the PS2 version and $40 for other consoles.[5][7] Harmonix has confirmed that the songs will remain exclusive to the disc release, citing AC/DC's preference to sell their music as full albums instead of singles. They have not ruled out releasing the content in the future should the band's views change.[9]

Rock Band Track Pack Vol. 2 (Rock Band Song Pack 2) is an expansion disc for the Rock Band series featuring 20 master recordings previously released as downloadable content on the Xbox Live Marketplace and PlayStation Network Store. Unlike the first expansion, Vol. 2 is available on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 as well as the Wii and PlayStation 2. Much like the AC/DC Live pack, the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions also include a code to download the songs to a hard drive for use in other Rock Band games.[11][12][13]The following songs are included on the game disc:[11]

Rock Band Track Pack: Classic Rock is an expansion disc for the Rock Band series featuring 20 master recordings previously released as downloadable content on the Xbox Live Marketplace and PlayStation Network Store. The pack is available for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and PlayStation 2. The Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions also include a code to export the songs to a hard drive for use in other Rock Band games.[14] The Track Pack can also be played as a standalone game for all systems in the same manner as the AC/DC Live and Track Pack Vol. 2,[14] and is also the first Rock Band Track Pack on Wii and on PS2 to be fully compatible with all Guitar Hero instruments.

Harmonix released a fifth track pack for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, and PlayStation 2. The disc features 21 songs, and for the first time includes songs never before seen in the Rock Band series. These songs were exclusive to Rock Band Country Track Pack for a limited time before being released to the Rock Band Music Store by late 2009 and early 2010. The Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions also include a code to export the songs to a hard drive for use in other Rock Band games. The Track Pack can also be played as a standalone game for all systems in the same manner as the AC/DC Track Pack and Track Pack Vol. 2.[15]

Rock Band Country Track Pack 2 contains 21 tracks, and was released for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii on February 1, 2011.[17] All songs on the disc were exclusive to the Track Pack before being released as downloadable content on November 8, 2011. The retail disc export is compatible with Rock Band, Rock Band 2, and Rock Band 3 while the standalone DLC is only compatible with Rock Band 3. Both the retail disc export and standalone "RB3 Versions" feature Pro Drum tracks and Harmony Vocals where appropriate while the "RB3 Versions" additionally have Keyboard and Pro Keyboard tracks added where appropriate. A Pro Guitar upgrade is available for the "RB3 Version" of "Ride" by Trace Adkins.[18] The "RB3 version" versions of this entire track pack are available as a bundle download in the online Rock Band store, under the name "Country Mega Pack."

CORRECTION (July 8, 9:35 a.m.): A footnote in an earlier version of this story listed the incorrect call numbers for the classic rock station we monitored in Houston. It was KGLK, not KKRW.

Glamour Boy (1973): Hard/psychedelic rock band The Guess Who wrote this diss track towards the glam scene that was getting a lot of attention in the early 70s. Some people think that the song particularly mocks David Bowie, Elton John, and Alice Cooper. I can even hear some Elton John influences in the sound of this track. Some hard rock fans dismiss glam rock as just gender bending, but in actuality, some glam rock acts really know how to put on a show.

Prince of the Punks (1977): A few years before the song was written, Ray Davies saw Tom Robinson performing and was so impressed he signed his band Caf Society to his record label, Konk Records and produced their first and only album. The album flopped, only selling 600 copies.

Amarok (1990): Virgin had humble beginnings in the 70s. Richard Branson and Nik Powell ran a small record shop that specialised in krautrock imports called Virgin Records and Tapes on Notting Hill Gate in London. The name came from how they were virgins in business.

From there, they started their own label and the first artist to be signed to the label was a young multi-instrumentalist named Mike Oldfield, who brought the label success with his famous, critically acclaimed album, Tubular Bells. Over the next decade and a half, his relationship with the label was strained because of disagreements over royalties and poor marketing of his music.

Everything, other than possibly the keyboard parts, had been played on 'real' instruments and recorded using real microphones. The drum kit came as a set of untreated files, with separate tracks for each drum (top and bottom for the snare), overheads, mono ambience and stereo room mics. The main instruments in the mix were electric guitars, bass and, after the drums kick in around a third of the way through the song, some electric organ, played and recorded through a rotary speaker, and a Clav-like Wurlitzer line.

All the drums were fed to their own stereo bus, and I set up dedicated buses for the main vocal (which had been double-tracked), the backing vocal and the guitars. I also added a parallel compression bus fed from an aux send in Logic and inserted a UAD Fatso emulation, set to 'Spank' mode and with its input gain cranked up to give the excessive degree of squash that I find parallel compression typically demands. I then proceeded to colour-code the various tracks and add some icons where I felt they were needed, just to make project navigation that bit quicker and easier when the mix was underway.

A little preparatory work can make the job of mixing easier. As well as pruning out unwanted sections of audio, and colouring channels for easy navigation, Paul set up many of the buses and effects that he felt would be appropriate to the track well before he started mixing in earnest.

Bill had been concerned that some of the keyboard layers were getting lost, so I added some rotary speaker to the main intro pad and then 'peaked up' its mid-range EQ, just to help it cut through. All these atmospheric layers were panned to give a sense of stereo spread and some auto panning was applied to the pad with the clunks at the end, to create a bit more movement.

Playing over the top of this atmospheric bed was a repeated palm-damped chugging guitar phrase. This was played pretty consistently, and in many songs I'd have been happy to leave it as was, but in this case I wanted it to sound more hypnotic, and as the song had been recorded to a click, I found the best couple of bars then looped them, which did the job. Bill wanted to try a delay line on this riff, presumably to get a 'Run Like Hell' sort of feel, but the timing of the riff didn't really lend itself to this. Any tempo-sync'ed delay stayed behind the notes, making it almost inaudible, and changing the delay time simply upset the rhythm of the riff itself. In the end I decided to firm up this guitar part, which had a fairly clean sound, using a UAD 1176 plug-in compressor, and then applied a small amount (10 percent) of Early Reflection ambience from Logic's Platinumverb, with 124ms of pre-delay.