WELCOME!

Hello all, and welcome to the Rhythm Bastard Experiment!

Why did I start this site?
Ever since I first tried it at the DigitalLife Expo in 2005, I've loved the Guitar Hero (and Harmonix in general) games. It has encouraged me to take up the actual guitar, not only so I can play my favorite hits, but because I enjoy writing my own songs as well. Eventually Rock Band came out, and expanded on everything. I'm not as gung-ho about it as I used to be since taking up the real thing, but it's always a hit when friends come over.

I started this site to chronicle my experience learning the songs from the Rock Band game in order learn new songs, and improve my overall playing/writing skills.

Why Rock Band? Why not Guitar Hero?
Yeah, I'd like to go the GH route too, which is why for the first 18 hours this blog was operational, it was called the "Rock Band Experiment". Rhythm Bastard has the RB initals, so I wouldn't have to change the address.

As per why Rock Band, there were three infulencing factors:
1. Rock Band 2 is coming out, and I'd like to give Rock Band 1 a proper send off. (Finally got a PS3 (or rather, mooching off my little brothers))
2. Even though I've only been playing for a year and a half, I at least know enough that some of GHIII's note charts are off.
3. The idea behind GHI's setlist was "OK, a couple newer songs (Stellar, Fat Lip), a couple older songs (Texas Flood, Godzilla), and the rest songs EVERYBODY tries to play on guitar when they first start out". GHII chose more obscure songs by popular bands, and the less said about GH80's the better. With Rock Band, these are songs everybody knows, by bands most people are familiar with.
4. Rock Band dialed in the difficulty curve better than Harmonix's previous games. So songs like "Blitzkreig Bop" are on a lower tier than "Say It Ain't So", because less skill and dexerity are required.

Ironic: I own stock in Activision.

Are there any rules?
Yes, all good experiments have boundaries. The parameters are:
1. I must play all the songs on the current tier before moving onto the next one. The tiers are defined by this site.
2. In order to declare a song "beat", I have to be able to play along with it to the recorded version in its entirety.
3. I can use any method to determine notes (i.e. Tabs, chords, PowerTab, etc.)
4. In addition to the five songs per tier (the main 45), I add one DLC chosen by me, and I add one DLC song chosen by the readers. The list is here. The only exception is Tier 1.
5. .mp3s of (just) me playing the song (and butchering the vocals) will be provided.
6. But most importantly, I WELCOME ALL OUTSIDE HELP. You know something I don't? Share it. This blog is an entirely personal thing, to chart progress and express frustrations and triumphs, but also to help out future Bastards who undertake this task.

Enjoy the site!