Discussion Thread: DLC-10/2/12 - 3 Pack from 311! Down, Beautiful Disaster and Amber

[MagicMurderBag7]

I didn't realize they had released an album recently. I guess they are no longer a relevant band. Not as likely as I thought they would be.

[GNFfhqwhgads]

I didn't realize they had released an album recently. I guess they are no longer a relevant band. Not as likely as I thought they would be.

They were never all that relevant, they just popped up in soundtracks a lot. I would recommend the new album, it has more instrumentation than their previous borderline-acoustic stuff.

[bonethug0108]

How to Save a Life
Over My Head (Cable Car)
You Found Me
Heartbeat

If it's a 3 pack if/when we get them, the first 3 are easily my choices, though I admit I haven't heard more than the singles and a couple of other songs.

[88sBand]

Just not my kind of music, another skipped week for me.

Same. But I don't mind. Guess I'll buy older dlc. WAY older.

[Lowlander2]

How to Save a Life
Over My Head (Cable Car)
You Found Me
Heartbeat

If they weren't going to go above the norm of three songs for MB20, they aren't going to do it for The Fray.

[grumblevolcano]

One of the next two weeks will be singles from three different (new) artists then. Unless HMX is planning on having multiple packs in a single week again.

It is possible that the next 2 weeks are singles weeks with 2 new artists per week.

[bonethug0108]

Since people keep bringing up pre-80s songs, I found this info pretty thought provoking if you're really expecting much pre-70s instead of just 70s.

We have songs dating back to 1955, but between 1955-1959 we only have 1 artist(Johnny Cash). Needless to say, but pre-60s(and even 60s themselves) masters/rights just aren't easy to come by for various reasons.

Between 1960-1964 we only add 1 more artist(Roy Orbison).

1965 adds 2 more(The Who and The Zombies), and 1966 adds 2 more again(Otis Redding and Simon & Garfunkel; discounting The Monkees as it was a cover).

It should also be noted that Cash, Orbison, and Redding are from greatest hits type albums, so I'm unsure if they are original recordings. But up to this point we only have 6 artists over 12 years.

1967 adds 6 artists(The Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Grateful Dead, The Doors, Buffalo Springfield, Jefferson Airplane, and Procol Harum). This doubles the number to 12 artists over 13 years, but another pattern is becoming clear which I'll bring up later.

1968 adds 4 artists(Merle Haggard, Janis Joplin, Blood, Sweat & Tears, and Creedence Clearwater Revival). We now stand at 16 artists over 14 years.

1969 adds 6 artists(The Stooges, The Rolling Stones, The Jackson 5, Steve Miller Band, Norman Greenbaum, and B.B. King). That brings our pre-70s total to 22 artists over 15 years.

Now that pattern I was talking about is the farther back we go, we have fewer artists with just 1 or 2 songs and/or that are pre-rb3 dlc.

Starting with the oldest we have:

1955
Cash- 9 songs; all rb3 dlc

1960
Orbison- 9 songs; 3 rb3 dlc; 1 post-60s; according to blitz 6 are post-60s

1965
The Who- 17 songs; 1 rb3 disc; 13 post-60s
The Zombies- 2 songs

1966
Otis Redding- 5 songs
Simon & Garfunkel- 2 songs

1967
The Jimi Hendrix Experience/Jimi Hendrix- 34 songs; 8 rb3 dlc/disc; 4 post-60s; according to blitz 5 are post-60s
The Grateful Dead- 19 songs; 15 post-60s
The Doors- 13 songs; all rb3 dlc/disc; 5 post-60s
Buffalo Springfield- 1 song; all rb3 dlc
Jefferson Airplane- 2 songs; 1 rb3 dlc
Procol Harum- 1 song; all rb3 dlc

1968
Merle Haggard- 1 song
Janis Joplin- 2 songs; 1 rb3 dlc; 1 post-60s
Blood, Sweat & Tears- 1 song; all rb3 dlc
Creedence Clearwater Revival- 15 songs; 3 rb3 dlc; 7 post-60s

1969
The Stooges- 3 songs
The Rolling Stones- 1 song
The Jackson 5- 2 songs; 1 post-60s
Steve Miller Band- 5 songs; 1 rb3 disc; 4 post-60s
Norman Greenbaum- 1 song
B.B. King- 1 song; all rb3 dlc

7 of the 22 artists only have 1 song, but only 3 of them are pre-rb3(2 of which were disc songs, and the 3rd having a rb3 version available). Also the first artist with one song doesn't appear until 1967.

5 of the 22 artists have 2 songs. Of the 60s songs(8), 7 are pre-rb3. The first of these appears in 1965.

1 of the 22 has 3 songs. All are pre-rb3. They appear in 1969.

These 13 artists combine for 18 songs from the 60s. 13 of them are pre-rb3.

The other 9 artists all have 5 or more songs. They combine for 126 songs. 75 of these(about 60%) are from the 60s. 48 of them are pre-rb3.

[thatmarkguy]

Since people keep bringing up pre-80s songs, I found this info pretty thought provoking if you're really expecting much pre-70s instead of just 70s.

As best as I can tell, accurate info, but I'm not sure of the point it's trying to make. I'm not really expecting much more 60s, for many of the reasons commonly stated (masters issues most prominently).

Though there are some prominent late-60s albums that have undergone remasters in the past 20 years that likely have some more modern separated stems. We know that King Crimson licensed a track from their 1969 debut album for Guitar Hero 5 so we know two major hurdles are absent: they have no fundamental opposition to their music being in a videogame and their stems from that era are available in a videogame-usable form.

Similarly, if mid-60s Zombies is separated and the band/rightholders is amenable to working with HMX, it should stand to reason that their later-60s stuff (Odessey and Oracle) is probably available as well.

Still, the majority of the "pre-80s" wishlist is from the 70s. Even beyond the known unavailability of the mega-acts (though pre-RB3 many would have thought The Doors and Billy Joel and Stevie Wonder and Yes and The Bee Gees to be absolute nonstarters as well), there is a wealth of iconic music from that era that is most-likely-available if only as fraction as much effort was put into satisfying fans of older music as (a) is put into satisfying fans of modern music and (b) HMX used to put into satisfying fans of older music. At this point, even hitting up one-hit-wonders from the 70s (like HMX has done several times in recent memory for the 80s) would be welcomed. I can't imagine Ram Jam, Focus, or The Five Man Electrical Band are putting up the Led Zeppelin style "We're too big for your little game" stonewall.

[jeronemitchell]

Still, the majority of the "pre-80s" wishlist is from the 70s. Even beyond the known unavailability of the mega-acts (though pre-RB3 many would have thought The Doors and Billy Joel and Stevie Wonder and Yes and The Bee Gees to be absolute nonstarters as well), there is a wealth of iconic music from that era that is most-likely-available if only as fraction as much effort was put into satisfying fans of older music as (a) is put into satisfying fans of modern music and (b) HMX used to put into satisfying fans of older music. At this point, even hitting up one-hit-wonders from the 70s (like HMX has done several times in recent memory for the 80s) would be welcomed. I can't imagine Ram Jam, Focus, or The Five Man Electrical Band are putting up the Led Zeppelin style "We're too big for your little game" stonewall.

What if the difficulty is not effort, but costs? What if these older tracks aren't as cost-effective as the newer ones? Remember that this is not a function of pure sales; it is a function of sales compared to the prices/costs required to license the songs, both in terms of money paid to artist/label and costs to "massage" the tracks to Rock Band form...

[Dragonclaw]

What if the difficulty is not effort, but costs? What if these older tracks aren't as cost-effective as the newer ones? Remember that this is not a function of pure sales; it is a function of sales compared to the prices/costs required to license the songs, both in terms of money paid to artist/label and costs to "massage" the tracks to Rock Band form...

I'm sure there are lots of artists from all decades who vastly overestimate what a music game should be paying. But I'm reasonably sure that many of those artists you see on compilation disks at Target for $7.99 can't be THAT pricey when they are either willing to take their cut of a $7.99 (at retail) album they share with 12-25 other bands, or a studio who owns the songs outright and is willing to sell songs so cheap. I'd say they could go a long way hitting on the smaller guys with 1-2 hits...

Harry Chapin - Cat's In The Cradle
Don McLean - American Pie
3 Dog Night - Mama Told Me Not To Come, Old Fashioned Love Song, Joy To The World
Stephenwolf - Born To Be Wild
Bachman Turner Overdrive - Takin' Care Of Business, You Aint Seen Nothin Yet
Gordon Lightfoot - The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald, Sundown
Jim Croce - Bad Bad Leroy Brown, You Dont Mess Around With Jim, Workin At The Car Wash Blues
Dan Fogelberg - Leader Of The Band
Supertramp - Give A Little Bit, Take The Long Way Home
ELO - Don't Bring Me Down, Evil Woman
The Moody Blues - Knights In White Satin, I'm Just A Singer In A Rock N Roll Band, Wildest Dreams
The Blues Brothers - Soul man

There's also all the 70's artists with lots of material that have songs in game...To be prefectly honest, if we just got some more from the artists we currently have (Heart, Elton John, Chicago...) and even half of the tracks I mentioned, spread out over the next 2 years I'd be pretty happy with the 70's content in game.