Crunch Time, T-Minus 3 months

So, with the beginning of the next week, we've hit the 3 month mark. We've hit crunch time. This is the time when we kick up our practicing and we start refining our technique. We start making it so that we aren't practicing passing songs now; we are working on getting great scores. Some people still call this a long shot for us, but it's not a long shot, not by any means.

New DLC is being released every week. It's hard to afford it all, but we are making due. If anyone would like to help us out, feel free to donate.

RockPedal Review

Okay, so here it is. The RockPedal review I promised. Let's start from the top.

The RockPedal comes in a big brown box. It's a decently weighted box and the pedal is surrounded by your standard brown paper (similar weight to newspaper). It also comes with a very professional warranty and info sheet to help you get your pedal to the appropriate settings for you. Also, this sheet also contains information needed to contact the people at RockPedal in case you have any trouble whatsoever. On to the pedal itself.

The pedal is very solid. It's full metal, top to bottom, save the sensor itself, and the velcro on the bottom. The bottom is a solid plate, so it sits flat on the floor. There are 3 strips of velcro on the bottom of the pedal, each about 6 inches long, to keep the pedal from moving on carpet. This works very well. 

Moving up from the bottom plate, we have two spikes (one on each side of the footboard) that can be screwed down into carpet to keep the pedal from moving, if it's still moving after the pedal is placed on carpet. These spikes have not been needed in my playing with the pedal. 

If you have the pedal facing you (it angles up and away from you and the carpet spikes are on the far side of the pedal), on the right side, you will find a screw sticking out away from the pedal and at an angle upwards. This screw allows for you to clamp the pedal down onto a practice pad (from what I gather). Right above this clamp screw (still on the right side), we find the spring tension adjustment screw. How this works is a three step process. The first step is to loosen the screw that is holding the spring tension adjustment from moving. The second step is to adjust the spring tension adjustment to pull on the spring further, or to release the spring a little to make the pedal easier to push down. This won't make a huge difference in your play. The last step is to tighten the screw back down once you have made the adjustment to suit your needs. 

Moving on the other side of the pedal, on the left side of the footboard, we find the holder for the drum key. In the middle, facing you so that you can read the word "pulse" inscribe on it is the footboard. This is where all the action takes place. You push this part down to activate the sensor and cause the pedal to hit. 

Moving further up the pedal, back over to the right side, and above the spring, we have another tension adjustment that does this in a roundabout way. How this tension adjustment works is when you loosen this screw, you increase the angle of the pedal, causing it to travel further to trigger the sensor, and causing it to pull the spring farther which creates more resistance.

Moving on over to the left, the next screw we find is for the beater to be inserted. The next screw is the lower of the two last remainng screws. This screw is what determines exactly when your pedal will trigger and how much your pedal will travel past the trigger point. This one was the one I spent the most time adjusting first. Once I got this one right, it's pretty much a "Set it and forget it." I have not touched it since I got it exactly where it is. How it works is that it has you increase the angle of the pedal to trigger the sensor later and decrease the angle to have it trigger earlier. Decreasing it too much will cause it to smack into the clamp bar, while increasing it too much will cause the pedal to not trigger at all. 

The last screw is the screw that releases the double chain drive from the pedal. You shouldn't ever need to touch this.

I think one of the coolest things about this pedal is the use of a proximity-style sensor. It doesn't have any parts that smack together, nor do any of the sensor's parts move. If this pedal didn't have a wire, you would probably never have know it could be used for Rock Band. The sensor blends in with the rest of the pedal. This pedal is the most professional looking pedal I've seen.

Playing with the pedal is interesting. It can be played out of the box, but I was double hitting with it a lot out of the box. I adjusted the pedal to hit just before the pedal bottomed out. Being that this is pretty much an actual pedal that can be used with a drum kit, you can do a lot of the foot techniques to achieve double bass hits and other pedal tricks. 

I've used the pedal for a good week now, and it's phenomenal. It's well worth the money. If you've hit the brick wall with the stock Rock Band pedal, or you pedal has broken one too many times, I would suggest investing in this pedal. I hit the brick wall with the stock pedal, and I've stepped my game up by investing in this pedal. It is the Official Pedal of 500 Songs to Freedom.

The link to the RockPedal website is RockPedal.com.

RockPedal Teaser

Rock Pedal is THE official pedal of 500 Songs to Freedom. I bought it and it is amazing. It is very smooth to play with. I have nothing but praise for this pedal. I'll do a much more in depth analyzation of it at a later date.

13 Hour Rock Band 2 Review

After playing Rock Band 2 for around 13 hours, RedDevilD and I have some thoughts about it. RedDevilD's main thought is: "Everlong occurs way too much in the later Mystery Setlists." My main thought: "Rob the Prez-o-Dent is BS."

Overall, the setlist is pretty good. Some songs I could care to do without. The rerecorded Ace of Spades '08 was a pretty big letdown. It seems like it was trying to be too "heavy" if you will. Some songs to note were Eye of the Tiger, Battery, and Painkiller. Eye of the Tiger was the first song we played and was actually pretty fun. Battery wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be on drums (sightread expert with a 90%). Painkiller, there's not much to say except for this is REALLY hard on drums. Everything is fast in the expert chart.

I was surprised at the types of charts. The drum charts seem to be taking a very different path than Rock Band did. There's much more varied charts earlier on, and the latter tier chart are much more difficult. There were multiple songs that were FC'd by myself and RedDevilD. I thought that the timing window was smaller and so did RedDevilD.

The World Tour isn't much different from Rock Band. There are now daily challenges. There are new venues and the venues that are there are much better looking. Anytime you get the option do to a music video with lasers, do it.

Week of 9/15 DLC: Peace Sells . . . but Who's Buying? and Rock Band Tour 1 pack

So, this coming weeks DLC is going to be the Megadeth album Peace Sells . . . but Who's Buying? and the Rock Band Tour 1 pack. The Megadeth album looks very promising in my eyes, and RedDevilD and I feel the same about the RBT1 pack. We aren't fans of it. The songs are:

Peace Sells . . . but Who's Buying?

Megadeth - Wake Up Dead

Megadeth - The Conjuring

Megadeth - Devil's Island

Megadeth - Good Mourning / Black Friday

Megadeth - Bad Omen

Megadeth - I Ain't Superstitious

Megadeth - My Last Words

Rock Band Tour 1

The Cab - One of those Nights

Dashboard Confessional - Hands Down

Panic! At The Disco - She's a Handsome Woman

Plain White T's - Natural Disaster

The Megadeth album should be available for $10.99 (880 MS Points) and the RBT1 pack should be $3.99 (320 MS Points).

On a side note: RedDevilD and I have been playing Rock Band all day. Tomorrow, we'll be playing most of the day, and on Sunday, we'll be going through the career mode on RB2 with a few other people (probably 5-6 total).

More DLC

Just bought more DLC, bringing my total DLC count to 159 songs. My total song count is 217. RedDevilD and I are planning on finishing up the remaining DLC on Saturday, and playing Rock Band 2 all day Sunday. Hopefully, we can get some reviews of the songs up for Rock Band 2.

All That Remains + Stephen and the Colberts DLC

The All That Remains pack was released today for PS3 ($2.99) and earlier this week on Tuesday for the 360 (240 MS points). The ATR pack is definitely a pain in the butt for drums and from what I understand, and from RedDevilD's point of view, really fun to play on guitar. Haven't looked at the other charts really, but will definitely have to.

Also, Stephen and the Colberts have a song for free up on the XBox marketplace and soon to be on the PS3 Store for free.

This DLC is definitely welcome. I've been waiting for some joke songs (Colbert) and songs to make me cry (ATR). The New Songs are:

All That Remains: Chiron

All That Remains: This Calling

All That Remains: Two Weeks

Stephen and the Colberts: Charlene (I'm right behind you)

EDIT: PS3 Store just allowed me to download the ATR pack, but SaTCs still wasn't available. It's 5 before 5pm on the east coast.