Greetings forums-dwellers. You may recall that last year I indulged my need to examine my interests statistically by creating a massive post taking a look at various statistics for 2011’s DLC. I thought it was pretty interesting, and since I work for a school and have two glorious weeks of vacation, I thought I would take another shot at doing it for 2012.

Feel free to take a look at the stats for 2011; it includes data such as number of DLC released by artist, genre, and decade, as well as top-selling DLC, and other assorted trivia.

Now, as of this posting, the DLC is official for the entire year, save for the last week, which has been leaked. It’s certainly possible that the leaked DLC will turn out to be inaccurate, but it seems likely to be legit, so I’ve gone ahead and compiled the stats to reflect the leaked songs. If need be, I will simply go back and update.

Last year I mentioned a few caveats -- particularly that I wasn’t going to be double-counting the Country Track Pack 2 songs. This year I had to make a decision about Blitz. Though not technically traditional DLC, Blitz was released instead of a regular week of DLC and was responsible for introducing a number of new artists to the platform. I therefore made the decision to count the Blitz artists as though they were DLC...but not to count the songs that were also released as separate DLC later.

Although I did count RB Blitz songs as though they were DLC, I decided not to count the Green Day songs released as DLC, excepting “Oh Love” and the pro-upgrades. The way I see it, the Blitz songs are otherwise unavailable (for the most part), whereas the GD:RB songs have been available for a long time. They don’t really “feel” like 2012 DLC, having been released in 2010. You may disagree with my designations, but hey, you can make your own wall o’ stats.

My other caveat is that this information is all gleaned from Rockband.com/songs, as well as the Wikipedia page. It is possible (likely) that there are mistakes here and there. Please let me know if you see one.


Alright, without further ado, here are the DLC stats for 2012!

Overall Numbers

Total Number of Songs Released for Rock Band in 2012: 179 (154, excluding Blitz)
Difference from 2011: -127

Average Number of Songs Released Per Week: 3.44 (2.96, excluding Blitz)
Difference from 2011: -2.36


Total Number of Pro-Upgraded Songs Released: 53
Difference from 2011: -79

Artists with the Most Pro-Upgrades is Unchanged from 2011.
Artists that now have multiple upgrades include the B-52's, Chicago, Huey Lewis & the News, Iron Maiden, the Offspring, Paramore, and Queens of the Stone Age (2 each) as well as Creedence Clearwater Revival and Linkin Park (3 each).


Songs Featuring 2 or 3-Part Harmonies: 159
Songs Featuring a Keys/Pro-Keys Part: 124
Songs Lacking Both Keys and Harmonies: 12


Biggest Pack of the Year: Maiden Epics (6 songs)
Smallest Release of the Year: Incubus - Drive (1 single)


Number of Distinct Artists Released: 100


Artists New to the Platform: 46
(Note: this excludes featured artists (Janelle Monae, Christina Aguilera) and includes Sublime as distinct from Sublime with Rome and the Black Crowes as being new to the platform)

Number of New Artists Last Year: 50
(Note that this included several artists in the Country Track Pack Volume 2. This year actually saw many more new artists than last year, in relative terms).


Artists with the Most Songs Released in 2012:

Iron Maiden (7)
P!nk (5)
Linkin Park (4)
Shinedown (4)
Three Days Grace (4)


DLC by Genre:

Alternative (21)
Classic Rock (18)
Country (3)
Emo (6)
Glam (4)
Grunge (7)
Indie Rock (6)
Metal (26)
New Wave (8)
Nu-Metal (14)
Pop/Dance/Electronic (4)
Pop/Rock (22)
Punk (4)
R&B/Soul/Funk (1)
Reggae/Ska (1)
Rock (30)
Southern Rock (4)

No songs were released as official DLC in the genres Blues, Jazz, Hip-Hop/Rap, Prog, or Other (in addition to other genre tags that Harmonix has never used).


DLC by Decade:

2010’s: 35
2000’s: 49
1990’s: 40
1980’s: 40
1970’s: 13
1960’s: 2

Note: While “the Weight” by the Band is from 1968, the live version we have is tagged as being a 1970s track. Along with that song, the oldest one we have is CCR’s “Susie Q.”


DLC Releases as Packs/Singles/Etc:

2012 saw mostly singles and 3-packs released. Here are the pack totals:

6 packs: 1 (Maiden Epics)
5 packs: 1 (Green Day 03, not counted in other totals)
4 packs: 3 (Gold Star My Heart, Linkin Park, and P!nk)
3 packs: 27

There were 9 artists that had 2 singles within the same week (Korn, Edgar Winter Group, Sum 41, Men at Work, Foster the People, Foreigner, Smash Mouth, Billy Squier, Kenny Loggins).

The following 8 artists had 2 separate DLC releases over the year (includes artists with DLC and on Blitz): Iron Maiden, P!nk, Three Days Grace, Shinedown, Elton John, My Chemical Romance, All-American Rejects, Green Day).


Bands Getting Additional Packs:

Black Keys 02
Creedence Clearwater Revival 02
Evanescence 02
Maiden Epics (follows Iron Maiden 01)
Megadeth 01 (follows 2 albums)
Linkin Park 02
Green Day (received multiple packs and albums previously released in GDRB)


Miscellaneous Stats:


Songs Featuring a Female Vocals Part: 24 (13.4%)
[Last Year: 37 Songs (12%)

Songs Featuring a “featuring”: 3 (fun. featuring Janelle Monae, Maroon 5 featuring Christina Aguilera, and Santana ft. Rob Thomas)

Live Songs: the Band - the Weight (live)
Re-Records: Collective Soul - Shine
This is significantly fewer than in years past.

Miscellaneous Trivia from Other Forums Members:

Bonethug: This is the first full year of DLC that saw no full albums released.
Bront20: There were 3 cover songs released this year (Can't Get Enough of You Baby, Why Can't We Be Friends, and Come on Eileen).

By Country, non-U.S.:

United Kingdom (England): 9 (Bush, Cutting Crew, Dragonforce, Elton John, a Flock of Seagulls, Iron Maiden, Modern English, Queen, Rick Astley)
United Kingdom (Wales): 2 (Florence & the Machine, Bullet for My Valentine)
Canada: 5 (the Band, Barenaked Ladies, Carly Rae Jepsen, Sum 41, Three Days Grace)
Australia: 2 (Men at Work, Midnight Oil)
Finland: Nightwish
(Any I missed?)


Previously Only on a RB Title, Finally DLC:

-Featured in RB3, Finally DLC: 4 (Chicago, Huey Lewis & the News, Tears for Fears, Whitesnake).
-Featured in Multiple RB Titles, Finally DLC: Elton John
-Featured in Lego RB, Finally DLC: Korn, Sum 41
-Featured in RB1, Finally DLC: the Strokes

There are now 29 artists (including the Sounds) in Rock Band 3 that have had no DLC released. The biggest ones include: the Beach Boys, the Cure, Dire Straits, INXS, and Primus. Yeah, there are others, but I’d argue these are the main 5.


AOGH - Already on Guitar Hero

Counting RBN, there were 40 songs released this year that were already available in some form in one of the non-portable Guitar Hero games. See the Completing Guitar Hero thread for more.

AOGH1: 3 (Edgar Winter Group, Sum 41, Megadeth)
AOGH2: 5 (Rage Against the Machine, Allman Brothers Band, the Toadies, Anarchy Club, Brian Kahanek)
AOGH80s: 2 (Quiet Riot, A Flock of Seagulls)
AOGH3: 4 (Living Colour, Slayer, An Endless Sporadic, Prototype)
AOGHWT: 4 (Korn, Bullet for My Valentine, 311, Sublime)
AOGH5: 2 (Bush, Sublime)
AOGHWOR: 2 (Edgwar Winter Group, Bush)
AOBH: 3 (Angels & Airwaves, Everclear, Poison)
AOGH:VH: 1 (Killswitch Engage)

AOGH DLC: 14


Here’s the really cool stuff: Top Selling DLC!

I checked two sources for this: the forums thread that looks at the top-ranked XBL DLC sales and the section of Keldon's site that tracks DLC. The first source can tell actual sales rank (though not actual figures), but only for XBox and it differentiates between packs and singles. Keldon’s site is subject to some inaccuracies (it only tracks played songs, so people playing on multiple accounts are double-counted and people with unplayed DLC are undercounted) but on the whole gives a pretty good idea of sales. Note that the XBOX Live information is the most recent supplied in the forum thread.


Here then, is the best-selling DLC that came out this year, according to XBOX Live ranks (number is sales rank):

Santana (ft. Rob Thomas) - Smooth (539)
Sum 41 - Fat Lip (587)
Train - Drops of Jupiter (615)
Men at Work - Down Under (616)
Rick Astley - Never Gonna Give You Up (623)
Incubus - Drive (695)
Poison - Every Rose Has its Thorn (738)
Cutting Crew - (I Just Died in Your Arms (769)
Everclear - Santa Monica (786)
Owl City - Fireflies (788)
Good Charlotte - the Anthem (834)
the B-52’s - Love Shack (846)
Tears for Fears - Head Over Heels (857)
Sum 41 - Still Waiting (872)
Mudvayne - Happy? (913)


Here are the best-selling packs, according to XBOX Live ranks:

Bush 01 (746)
Three Days Grace 01 (843)
Hall & Oates 01 (964)
Bullet for My Valentine 01 (981)
Huey Lewis & the News 01 (1017)
Gold Star My Heart (1029)
Rage Against the Machine 01 (1051)
Linkin Park Park 02 (1078)

You’ll probably notice that most of these songs are from the first part of the year. Obviously it’s not really fair to compare songs that have had 11 months of sales opportunities to more recent ones, so we can break it down a little differently (Notice, though, the strong sales for Cutting Crew, which was a later release).


Here are some notably high ranks for some songs released in the latter half of the year:

A Flock of Seagulls - I Ran (So Far Away) (997)
Sublime Pack 01 (1126)
Three Days Grace - Animal I Have Become (1147)
Kenny Loggins - Footloose (1219)
Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe (1281)


Here are the most played songs across ALL systems, not just XBOX (number is the quantity of scores recorded):

Santana (ft. Rob Thomas) - Smooth (32,983)
Three Days Grace - I Hate Everything About You (29,487)
Sum 41 - Fat Lip (28,803)
Korn - Freak on a Leash (28,651)
Men at Work - Down Under (27,469)
Train - Drops of Jupiter (27,031)
Heart - Alone (26,359)
Rick Astley - Never Gonna Give You Up (26,347)
Bullet for My Valentine - Tears Don’t Fall (25,239)
Bush - Machinehead (24,078)


Here are the 5 most played songs that came out in the 2nd quarter of the year:

Train - Drops of Jupiter (27,031)
Bullet for My Valentine - Tears Don’t Fall (25,239)
Rage Against the Machine - Killing in the Name (22,235)
Bullet for My Valentine - Your Betrayal (20,818)
Incubus - Drive (19,014)


And the 5 most played songs that came out in the 3rd quarter:

Cutting Crew - (I Just Died) In Your Arms (18,251)
Linkin Park - Breaking the Habit (15,313)
the B-52’s - Love Shack (14,585)
Linkin Park - New Divide (14,284)
Linkin Park - Burn it Down (14,206)


And from the final quarter:

Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe (12,446)
Sublime - Santeria (11,531)
A Flock of Seagulls - I Ran (So Far Away) (10,746)
Sublime - What I Got (9,673)
Three Days Grace - Animal I Have Become (8,799)


And here, according to Rockbandscores, are the tracks released this year with the fewest plays, ie, the lowest-selling DLC for 2012:

Midnight Oil - Power and the Passion (1,387)
All-American Rejects - Gonzo (1,530)
Cracker - Teen Angst (2,331)
Dave Matthews Band - Mercy (2,296)
Smashmouth - Why Can’t We Be Friends? (2,607)
Smashmouth - I Can’t Get Enough of You Baby (2,708)
the Band - the Weight (live) (2,981)
Staind - Not Again (4,495)
Queens of the Stone Age - In My Head (5,119)
Mastodon - Curl of the Burl (6,021)

There are some personal favorites in there, that are tough to see. I actually really like the 3 lowest-selling tracks on that list. Also, note that I excluded songs that were released in the last month of the year, but the Black Crowes’ “Sometimes Salvation,” and the Toadies’ “Tyler” and “Away” are all likely to end up being very low sellers.

Edit: RBN Stats

Number of RBN Songs Released in 2012: I'll figure it out later. :-P

Top Selling RBN DLC of 2012, per rockbandscores.com:

Psychostick - BEER!! (6,270)
A Day to Remember - the Plot to Bomb the Panhandle (5,996)
An Endless Sporadic - Impulse (5,360)
Weebl's Stuff - Amazing Horse (4,472)
Asking Alexandria - Dear Insanity (3,879)
Asking Alexandria - Reckless & Relentless (3,717)
Alestorm - Shipwrecked (3,297)
the Red Jumpsuit Apparatus - Reap (Radio Edit) (3,028)
Asking Alexandria - To the Stage (2,794)
A Day to Remember - Sticks and Bricks (2,361)
Eurobeat Brony - Discord (The Living Tombstone Remix) (2,300)
Jaron & the Long Road to Love - Pray for You (2,323)
Alestorm - Back Through Time (2,201)
Toby Turner - I Can Swing My Sword (ft. Terabrite) (2,055)
Eden's Curse ft. James LaBrie - No Holy Man (1,978)
The Guild featuring Felicia Day - (I'm the One That's Cool) (1,919)
Solution .45 - Gravitational Lensing (1,865)
John Parr - St. Elmo's Fire (1,852)
Powerman 5000 - super Villian (1,842)
An Endless Sporadic - From the Blue/Point of No Return (1,829)
An Endless Sporadic - Anything (1,807)
Lil Deuce Deuce - I Like Trains (1,793)
Eiffel 65 - Move Your Body (1,756)
Lemon Demon - BRODYQUEST (1,725)
Close Your Eyes - Song for the Broken (1,661)
the Faceless - XenoChrist (1,598)
Machinae Supremacy - Rocket Dragon (1,576)

2X Bass Pedal
Asking Alexandria - Reckless & Relentless (880)
An Endless Sporadic - Impulse (689)
Asking Alexandria - To the Stage (578)
Alestorm - Shipwrecked (558)
Solution .45 - Gravitational Lensing (397)
Solution .45 - Lethean Tears (395)
the Faceless - XenoChrist (347)
Asking Alexandria - Dear Insanity (303)
Engel - Sense the Fire (295)
Strikken - Ashes (292)



See next comment below for Blitz stats and my concluding thoughts...

Earlier this year, after Blitz had been out for a couple of weeks or so, I decided to take a look and see which tracks were the most played. Here's what it looked like then:


fun. ft. Janelle Monae – We Are Young (9173)
Maroon 5 ft. Christina Aguilera – Moves Like Jagger (8976)
Barenaked Ladies – One Week (8756)
Foster the People – Pumped Up Kicks (8442)
Rick Springfield – Jessie's Girl (7916)
Living Colour - Cult of Personality (7639)
Collective Soul – Shine (7008)
Avenged Sevenfold – So Far Away (6986)
Kelly Clarkson – Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) (6879)
Foo Fighters – These Days (6779)
Tears for Fears – Shout (6615)
Soundgarden – Spoonman (6546)
P!nk – Raise Your Glass (6317)
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Give it Away (6125)
Elton John – I'm Still Standing (5930)
My Chemical Romance – Sing (5754)
Quiet Riot – Bang Your Head (Metal Health) (5627)
Shinedown – Diamond Eyes (Boom-Lay Boom-Lay Boom) (5349)
Queen – Death on Two Legs (5251)
Iron Maiden – The Wicker Man (5240)
blink-182 – Always (5075)
Great White – Once Bitten Twice Shy (4984)
Kool & the Gang – Jungle Boogie (4812)
Fall Out Boy – A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More “Touch Me” (4204)
All-American Rejects – Kids in the Street (3254)

And here's what it looks like now:


Maroon 5 ft. Christina Aguilera – Moves Like Jagger (18,755)
fun. ft. Janelle Monae – We Are Young (18,665)
Foster the People – Pumped Up Kicks (17,455)
Barenaked Ladies – One Week (17,244)
Living Colour - Cult of Personality (15,153)
Rick Springfield – Jessie's Girl (15,146)
Kelly Clarkson – Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You) (14,241)
Avenged Sevenfold – So Far Away (13,681)
P!nk – Raise Your Glass (13,238)
Foo Fighters – These Days (13,151)
Collective Soul – Shine (13,010)
Tears for Fears – Shout (12,766)
Elton John – I'm Still Standing (12,435)
Soundgarden – Spoonman (12,271)
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Give it Away (12,012)
My Chemical Romance – Sing (11,534)
Quiet Riot – Bang Your Head (Metal Health) (11,256)
Queen – Death on Two Legs (10,860)
Shinedown – Diamond Eyes (Boom-Lay Boom-Lay Boom) (10,805)
blink-182 – Always (10,686)
Iron Maiden – The Wicker Man (9,956)
Kool & the Gang – Jungle Boogie (9,260)
Great White – Once Bitten Twice Shy (9,227)
Fall Out Boy – A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More “Touch Me” (8,873)
All-American Rejects – Kids in the Street (6,642)

The color cutoffs are semi-arbitrary and meant for ease of reading. Remember, these are simple play counts for the Blitz songs that get played in RB3. Obviously the ones now available as DLC may be temporarily inflated, but not too much, judging by the numbers.

Now, per user WIIBARON's advice, I'm listing the DLC total at this point (roughly the end of 2012) here: 43,365,245. Now it can be compared to next year's total, Drake willing! I didn't have the foresight to save that number last year. I did note the figures for the twenty top-sellers, however, so they can be compared to their new lifetime sales (for example, Linkin Park's "In the End" was previously at 105,700, now is at 132,500). The sale songs also seem to be posting great numbers.


Anyhow, that is the end of the wall of stats. As I look through the releases, it’s obvious that this was a much more subdued year for Rock Band DLC...however! Harmonix very clearly made it a priority to release many, many artists that were new to the platform this year, including some very big “gets” and some that were previously only available on GH (Bush, Sublime, Three Days Grace, Matchbox Twenty, 311) or PowerGig (Dave Matthews Band).

I made some predictions last year for what was likely to appear in 2012, based on cd releases, tours, and Harmonix’s tendency in 2011 to release 2nd packs. My record was...so-so, at best. Hopefully in 2013 they will continue to release their unbroken string of DLC. It’s always nice to see big new bands come to the platform, but it would also be nice to see follow-up packs for some of the many huge bands that debuted in the last couple of years (Coldplay, Stevie Wonder, Matchbox Twenty, 311, Sublime, Dave Matthews Band, and Elton John in particular, in my book). Many people are disappointed that they are going to be trickling out the Blitz songs as DLC...personally, I’ll take any reassurance that I can get that there is a DLC schedule still being maintained in the mid-future!

Hopefully you all enjoyed these stats, or at least got a kick out of how nuts I am for putting this much effort into something like this. Please let me know if you spot any glaring errors, or have any suggestions for an awesome stat that needs inclusion. Oh yeah, I may go back and do some RBN stuff, at some point (Edit: added some).

If you give me a cool stat, I will credit you in the initial post. If you correct an error I will thank you in comments, whistle innocently, and surreptitiously edit the post as if the mistake was never there!

Nice post. I can see this as one big-as infographic.

Quote:

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Sum 41 - Fat Lip (587)
Train - Drops of Jupiter (615)
Incubus - Drive (695)
Poison - Every Rose Has its Thorn (738)
Cutting Crew - (I Just Died in Your Arms (769)
Everclear - Santa Monica (786)
Owl City - Fireflies (788)
Good Charlotte - the Anthem (834)
Tears for Fears - Head Over Heels (857)
Mudvayne - Happy? (913)

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Last year there was something like this big mega-post and I planned on getting all the singles from the top 10 (or what ever number it was) list that I didn't have. This year leaves me with these singles. There's 3 of these that I'm not sure why I have not bought yet.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by queuemark

And from the final quarter:

Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe (12,446)
Sublime - Santeria (11,531)
A Flock of Seagulls - I Ran (So Far Away) (10,746)
the Black Keys - Lonely Boy (10,355)
Sublime - What I Got (9,673)

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Lonely Boy was released in August (the 3rd quarter).

Bands Getting Additional Packs:

Black Keys 02
Creedence Clearwater Revival 02
Evanescence 02
Maiden Epics (follows Iron Maiden 01)
Megadeth 01 (follows 2 albums)
Linkin Park 02
Paramore 02
Green Day (received multiple packs and albums previously released in GDRB)

This was Paramore 01, they only had two on disc songs (That's What You Get and Misery Business), crushcrushcrush in RB1 DLC and Pressure in the Fueled By Ramen pack.

Also, the first two Green Day packs that came out in RB2 era DLC weren't part of GDRB. They were given to you with the GDRB+ edition as a code, but weren't part of the actual game.

Nice. Love stats.

Pretty sure Midnight Oil are an Australian band.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by grumblevolcano

Lonely Boy was released in August (the 3rd quarter).

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by dudemann14

Bands Getting Additional Packs:

Black Keys 02
Creedence Clearwater Revival 02
Evanescence 02
Maiden Epics (follows Iron Maiden 01)
Megadeth 01 (follows 2 albums)
Linkin Park 02
Paramore 02
Green Day (received multiple packs and albums previously released in GDRB)

This was Paramore 01, they only had two on disc songs (That's What You Get and Misery Business), crushcrushcrush in RB1 DLC and Pressure in the Fueled By Ramen pack.

Also, the first two Green Day packs that came out in RB2 era DLC weren't part of GDRB. They were given to you with the GDRB+ edition as a code, but weren't part of the actual game.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by sonicnerd23

Pretty sure Midnight Oil are an Australian band.

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Correct on all counts! I will edit shortly. Thanks! Also, before anyone else catches it, I realized B-52s have 2 pro songs.

Ooooooh, shiny.