Dave had mentioned the Rock Band Network on his web site back in July so I thought I’d go ahead and send him an update to let him know about RBYRB and that I was working on some megaphone songs for the game. Well he devoted a pretty good portion of his most recent episode (255) to talking not only about my band (score!) but also about Rock Band Your Rock Band. I just have to say a HUGE thank you to Dave…go check out his show and his eBook!

Xbox 360 / Wii / PS3
Available: November 3 / November 5 (PS3)

Foo Fighters Pack 03* (560 / $6.99):

• “Best of You” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “The Pretender” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Wheels” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Word Forward” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)

Nirvana Bleach Pack* (440 / $5.49):

• “About a Girl” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Blew” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “School” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)

Individual songs:

• Joan Jett & The Blackhearts – “Fake Friends” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)

*Track packs not available for purchase on Wii; all tracks sold individually.

PSP
Available: November 5

• Bullet For My Valentine – “Waking the Demon” ($1.99)
• System of a Down – “Toxicity” ($1.99)

[via Joystiq]

We just released a big update to the RBN tools.

We updated Magma (version 1.1.0) to allow PAL versions of Rock Band 2 to transfer songs. There are no other functionality changes, but you will get notified that there is an available update the next time you run Magma. If you are running the North American build of RB2 you can install it if you wish. Just be sure you select the correct region for your Rock Band 2 disc when you install.

We also added a sample song .zip file for you to try out.

We also made a ton of changes to our Reaper addons.

For the PC, install the new Addons after you have installed Reaper. If you have already installed the addons you can safely run the installer again and it will properly overwrite any old files.

For the Mac, double click the .dmg and it will mount a disk on the desktop. Open that and double click the script called “Run to Install”.

Because we know that Mac users are inherently smarter than PC users, we also require you to do more work.* There’s one preference that’s unaddressed with the installer. Go to

Preferences->Media->MIDI

and check “RBN Friendly MIDI editing settings”

That’s it. Now check out these shiny new toys:

RBN Template:
- Fixed note colormap assignments
- Added RBN Preview windows to all appropriate tracks
- Turned off Reasynth playback for Instrument tracks
- Lowered Reasynth on vocal track to -12dB
- Changed Project Timebase for items/envelopes/markers to Beats(position only) to reduce destructive tempo track edits
- Fixed positioning of PART VOCALS track name text event
- Changed example “Lyric” text event to Lyric event type
- Added initial [crowd_intense] text event in EVENTS track at bar 3 as a reminder to add crow animation events.
- Added initial [verse] text event in VENUE track

RBN Blank Template
- Added RBN Preview windows to all appropriate tracks
- Turned off Reasynth playback for Instrument tracks
- Lowered Reasynth on vocal track to -12dB
- Changed Project Timebase for items/envelopes/markers to Beats(position only) to reduce destructive tempo track edits

A brief note about the Blank Template. You should open this template project whenever importing RBN MIDI files into reaper, it will make sure the note name mapping will be applied to the MIDI track you import.

Keymap Changes
- Added Unison Burn action to Keymap
- Added new keymap ‘P’ for opening a selected tracks fx chain, Really handy for bringing up the RBN Preview window quickly and easily
- Fixed keymap for shifting lyrics left and right on Mac

New Templates!

Autodrum Template
This project is designed to automatically generate a great starting point for expert kick and snare authoring when you have separate kick and snare stems.

How to use:
1) Insert your kick stem into the track labeled Kick, and your Snare stem into the track labeled Snare
2) Insert any other tracks you need for tempo mapping into other tracks
3) Tempo map your song
4) When your tempo map is set, open the fx channel for the Kick and Snare Tracks, you’ll notice a ReaGate plugin has been setup on each track.
5) You’ll need to adjust the threshold value on these plugins (the leftmost slider) so that the slider is set a little below the volume of that drum being hit. As you play the kick and snare track, you’ll notice a green meter around that slider that follows the volume of the track.
6) Click on the timeline just before the first hit in your drum tracks and hit record.
7) At the end of your song, hit the record button again. You notice that you’ve recorded a bunch of MIDI notes on the PART DRUMS track
8) You should quantize those notes by selecting them in the MIDI editor window and hitting Q, which will bring up the quantize menu (I recommend quantizing to 32nd notes, or perhaps even 16th notes if your drum part is simple enough.
9) You can then set about cleaning up your expert drum part and adding cymbal gems to it.

Mix Template (found in your Program Files/REAPER folder, or in the Templates folder in the Mac install DMG file)

This is a Template made to get your tracks much louder. We’ve been very impressed with the quality of the mixes being submitted to RBN, so for most people this won’t be necessary, but this template can help if you need a little more oomph from your tracks. I’ve also included a “Mix Game Stems” action in the Mix Template folder that you can import from the action list in Reaper. This action, used in conjunction with the Mix template, will normalize all tracks to the same gain value, and will render new files including the fx in the template. You should use this action with caution, as it’s a pretty drastic change.

* Technically that’s what we call in the industry “Not True”, except for the more work part.

The GameSoundCon in San Francisco 1/14 & 15
Rock Band Network Training Sessions

Sessions cover:
• Musician’s Introduction to the Rock Band Network
• Creating Rock Band Stem Mixes
• Using REAPER to map controller data to your song
• How to use the MAGMA tool to package your song into Rock Band format & Xbox 360 Auditioning
• Uploading your song for peer review & download
• Making your song fun to play
• Controlling Lights, Crowd Reaction and other Rock Band features

For more information on the conference:
http://www.gamesoundcon.com/

Use Promo Code “HARMONIX” and register for only $295

Also, according to the official GameSoundCon site, they don’t have any plans to bring RBN training elsewhere in the country but if you want to see it near you, you can contact them at info@gamesoundcon.com

Xbox 360 / Wii / PS3
Available: October 27 / October 29 (PS3)

Rob Zombie Pack 01* (440 / $5.49):

• “Burn” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Dragula” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Superbeast” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)

Wolfmother Pack 01* (680 / $8.49):

• “New Moon Rising” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Pilgrim” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Sundial” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “White Unicorn” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• “Woman” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)

Individual songs:

• Liz Phair – “Rock Me” (160 / 200 Wii Points / $1.99)
• Morningwood – “Best of Me” (80 / 100 Wii Points / $.99)
• Morningwood – “Sugarbaby” (80 / 100 Wii Points / $.99)

*Track packs not available for purchase on Wii; all tracks sold individually.

PSP
Available: October 29

• Sonic Youth – “Kool Thing” ($1.99)
• Steely Dan – “My Old School” ($1.99)