How to Be a Rock Bander and Guitar Hero: THE SEQUEL!

Intro: How to Be a Rock Bander and Guitar Hero: THE SEQUEL!

Is all that shredding still not impressin' the opposite gender? Maybe you need to scream and bang some rubber pads! This is Part 2 of my Rock Band coverage. If this doesn't impress anyone, maybe it's time to play a real instrument.

STEP 1: The Basics

No matter what instrument you're doing, circular or squareular notes will come down a lane with at least four different columns, maybe more. You have to make these notes explode when they cross a line somehow, whether it be pushing on a bar, hitting a pad, or vibrating your vocal cords. Everybody got it? Good. On to step 2.

STEP 2: Singing

There are many factors that can hinder or enhance your singing capabilities.

The Environment
A warmer and more humid area to play loosens up your vocal cords and may allow you a greater range when singing.

Puberty!
You're 12 and a half, Jimmy. Put off singing until your voice doesn't crack.

Have a Drink
Taking a swig of water every so often helps, but a fruit-flavored juice is much better. If you don't have a juice drink at your house, you can take a bite of a juicy fruit.

Happy Medium
Look, singing on Expert is no fun at all. You have to sing like a robot. I suggest staying low on your levels. Unless you're a competitive player and you don't want to have fun.

STEP 3: Drumming

There are a few things you should be aware of while banging the drums.

Light Foot
You don't have to slam the kick petal to get it to respond. Tread lightly on it so you can get those sections with quick bass beats.

Light Hands
Same thing here. Don't slam the pads as hard as you can. For one thing, it's really loud when you bang them like crazy. Also, putting a lot of weight behind the stick can slow you down, and you don't want that while playing on Expert.

Drum Hero
The Guitar Hero World Tour is substantially better than the Rock Band ones. Even if you get the cymbal attachments for the Rock Band 2 drums, its unclear which one you're sposed to hit and it takes away from the experience when you hit the crash cymbal and you get a floor tom.

STEP 4: Mic + Instrument

Practise makes Perfect
If you wanna play guitar or drums or bass and sing at the same time, I strongly suggest doing the song with just the vocals first. This helps familiarize yourself with the song so you can focus on the instrument.

The Stand
A good mic stand for all three instruments would be one with a boom. That way, you have plenty of space in front of you, so you don't bump into the stand and knock it over. You can also clear the drums with the boom, so you don't have to do some crazy redneck rig with, like, a piece of Gorilla tape keeping the mic stuck to the ceiling, and place the drum under it so that it hangs there like one of those pull-down microphones that old-timey announcers used.

Comments

[Owenmon]

Yerm.... The GHWT Drums break very easily.

[Brother_D]

I have found that out, but I was talking about the layout more than anything.

[Owenmon]

Oh. Well the Rock Band 2 drum design doesn't make it any less-fun,

[Flumpkins]

Look, singing on Expert is no fun at all. You have to sing like a robot

Robots sing???

Robottney Spears?
Michael Robotson?

[Brother_D]

Ha ha. I meant that you have to stay on right on one pitch and you have no elbow room for your voice.

[frollard]

Thats what singing a song to replicate the original means :D granted you can't be as artistic. It would be silly to assign an expert 'passing good' score to people who sing like crap and off tone. Think the bars on karaoke night. Good tips, but could definitely use some expanding.

[cici1810]

Can someone explain to me what do you have to do when there are turquoise hands waving in the vocal trek? How do you score on this? And eve though I've noticed you get points for free form, on some songs you get a lot, and on other only a small amount. How do you have to do a free form to score really well? slow, quick, with lots of waving your voice, with keeping it the same?? Any tips on this?

[Brother_D]

I'm not sure I know what you mean. Are you referring to Rock Band 2? I don't own that. Or are you talking about Guitar Hero World Tour? Because I haven't played with the singing very much on that. If you specify what part you mean I could be able to help you.

[cici1810]

I am talking about GHWT. I don't know what I have to do when these waving hands come. Do I have to talk, scream, do I get any points for that? And on the freeform (those interfering light waves) on some songs I get a lot points (like over 10k through one wave) and on others like only 100 something. I do not know what I do differently, and why these points are so different. Btw, cca 92% is my best accomplishment on most levels, and usually it's between 80 and 90%. Is that good, bad or average?? Noone else in my company wants to sing, so I cannot compare, and we are in Croatia which is not a recognized country when we wanted to register online, so I cannot see how others are doing:) Just being curious K

[mkkrushmt]

in ghwt, the yello freeform bar when singing will periodically pop up, the way to get points on this is to sing notes that are in the key of the song, a good idea here to get lots of points is to just sing the melody of the instrumental part, hope this helped, -Alec

[Brother_D]

That sucks about not being able to register. The waving hands are your cue to clap to activate star power if you're feeling it. The freeform pointage probably varies from song to song, and the length of the freeform section probably has something to do with it, and the speed of the song could affect it too. There are many factors to consider. The most plausible one, however, is that when the freeform section comes up, you could have a different point multiplier than the last song you played, causing you to gain more points.

As for percentages, 80 to 90% is a very good score. And if you want to compare your scores, stats are uploaded on The Guitar Hero Community Website very frequently. I hope this helped.

[Flumpkins]

Elbow? Uvula (Hangy ball)?

[Brother_D]

Ummm...

[Flumpkins]

ok

[The Landon]

But it is fun!! Well, the only con is that the highest ive got on expert is 90%