Hi everyone! The Oreo from AIRHeads here. Today I’m very proud to release alongside fellow AIRHeads JIManji, jphn and Yaniv, AIRBag #3! This pack brings together 25 tracks spanning indie, alternative rock, post-punk, synth-pop and pop-punk. It’s a deliberately varied selection of some of our choice fav singles of the last 40 odd years.
Here’s a look at what’s included;
Dry Cleaning – “Scratchcard Lanyard”
Dry Cleaning’s “Scratchcard Lanyard” immediately drew me to the band when it released, a wonderfully weird and funny spoken-word poetic song with a great driving rhythm section and unmistakably quirked up post-punk guitar and bass lines.
Future Islands – “Light House”
With its sticky hook, “Light House” is one of my all-time favourites from Future Islands – marking a first full-band custom by the band in Rock Band! If you don’t count my unpitched version of Seasons (Waiting On You) from a decade ago…
Everything Everything – “Cold Reactor”
Everything Everything’s “Cold Reactor” was probably my most listened-to track of 2024 – a song that harkens back to COVID era loneliness through a great major key jaunt and with one of the strangest guitar solos I’ve ever charted.
Weezer – “1 More Hit”
“1 More Hit” is one of the most batsh*t Weezer songs to exist in my opinion – including an intro that recalls Enter Sandman and a full blown tempo shift into a Thrash Metal breakdown halfway through the song, without even mentioning the lyric “Pump it up into me, please Daddy”. Definitely check this one out.
Billy Talent – “This Is How It Goes”
Canadian legends Billy Talent get my second custom of theirs with “This Is How It Goes”, a tightly wound burst of punk and one of my all-time favourite album openers. Inarguably a huge banger and for my money the most fun chart of my side of the pack.
Wet Leg – “pillow talk”
After seeing them at a festival I knew I had to chart this one. “pillow talk” finds Wet Leg working a slammer of a guitar riff into some characteristically rough and sexy lyrics.
Spoon – “Do You”
Spoon’s “Do You” is a nostalgia bomb for me, from arguably my favourite album of their catalogue. Tough competition with ‘Hot Thoughts’ though, so keep an eye out from more of this era of Spoon in the future!
The National – “Slipping Husband”
“Slipping Husband” was the song that first turned me onto The National – a track they hardly play live due to Matt Berninger stating his older voice is not up to consistently doing the scream at the end, and wow what a vocal performance this song has! Plus some great interplay between electric and acoustic guitars, and a hooky bassline!
Two Door Cinema Club – “I Can Talk”
Two Door Cinema Club’s “I Can Talk” is another from their seminal indie-dance record, ‘Tourist History’ – can you believe how old we all are now? This song has the most blazing tempo of anything from the album, so it is deceptively difficult on drums!
Nothing But Thieves – “Ban All The Music”
“Ban All The Music” is an early cut from Nothing But Thieves, a tight and crunchy rock track with an extremely catchy guitar riff and a fun and varied mid-tempo drum chart.
The Psychedelic Furs – “Heaven”
The Psychedelic Furs’ “Heaven” brings some classic new-wave atmosphere to the pack, truly a cut I was surprised never made it to official DLC nor to have a custom so far!
Fontaines D.C. – “Favourite”
“Favourite” sees Fontaines D.C. tempering their usual post-punk edge with a warmer production and an immediately accessible melodic hook. Great timing as they’ve just announced their fifth album – play this song from Romance amongst others charted by fellow AIRhead BornGamerRob!
Mother Mother – “Problems”
Mother Mother’s “Problems” is a typically theatrical romp from the band and I believe has found recent new life via social media. Probably in my opinion the most unique chart across all instruments in my contribution to this pack.
Pinback – “His Phase”
“His Phase” showcases Pinback at their most ‘The Police’ – layering two sets of interlocking guitars with a very Copeland-inspired syncopated rhythm and overlapping vocal melodies bellowing into a hypnotic track, and again one of my long-time favourites.
White Lies – “To Lose My Life”
White Lies’ “To Lose My Life” is a great cheeseball of dark atmosphere and post-punk; with the instrument highlight being a dual contemporaneous Drum solo and Festival-style Lead charted violin solo!
The Menzingers – “Good Things”
The Menzingers close out my portion of the pack with “Good Things”, one of their most immediate pop-punk bangers. A great soaring vocal hook and a deceptively tricky guitar chart in the verses – please enjoy!
Well, that’s rivalled my largest contribution to a pack ever since 2023 at 16 songs. Next up, Yaniv! Take it away;
So for my part, I threw in a few singles. And handily, they ended up being one song from each decade. Click on the visualizer to download!
So here we are! Kicking off the 70s with Gang of Four’s “I Found That Essence Rare,” a classic blast of confrontational post-punk from the great “Entertainment!” album.
From the ’80s, I bring you the catchy, jangly chorus of Lloyd Cole and the Commotions’ “Rattlesnakes.” (I’ve been humming “She looks like Eva Marie Saint in On the Waterfront” the entire week…)
The ’90s get Afghan Whigs’ “Gentlemen,” all swagger, bitterness and ugliness, with some seriously heavy riffs.
Kicking off the new millennium with Rilo Kiley’s “The Execution of All Things” – an album I’m only just discovering, and wow, it’s quite beautiful. You can probably expect more from them in the future…
Then, taking a darker turn, we get the great, late Mark Lanegan and his “The Gravedigger’s Song.” A wonderfully nasty and relentless song, built around that dark groove and a classic unmistakable voice.
Sharon Van Etten’s “Afterlife” closes the set for the 2020s with something poppy and catchy, yet more reflective and haunted – a great song from an under-appreciated artist. Enjoy!
Thanks Yaniv! Also contributing to the release is jphn with two awesome tracks;
Hi all, jphn here! Threw in two singles this time around, the first being “Auto Pilot” by Queens of the Stone Age! This chilled-out stoner groove features beautiful harmonies from Homme, Oliveri, and the late Mark Lanegan, and remains one of my personal favorites from Rated R.
Bringing a different kind of “high energy” is my second song “Between Us & Them” by Moving Units! Featured in the racing game “Juiced” and Foundation Skateboards’ “That’s Life,” this dance punk tune is tailor-made for Rock Band with its infectious bass line and angular riffs. Both very different moods, but both very fun to play!
And last but certainly not least is JIManji with a modern heater of a track;
boygenius – “Not Strong Enough”
So I’ve had this song stuck in my head the past few weeks and I just knew I had to chart it for an event like this. This band comprises of 3 indie artists that formed together to make a supergroup, hopefully we get more from them in the future cause they did such an amazing job with this album. This song specifically and the album even won Grammies back in 2024. Best Alternative Music Album, Best Rock Song and Best Rock Performance. The highlight of this song is the vocals in my opinion, the harmonies blend so effortlessly and each of the girls has their moment to shine. Hopefully we get more charts from this band soon cause they shouldn’t be slept on.
*Phew* that’s all folks! I hope you download them all and find a new favourite amongst the picks – these are some great songs and lots of underrepresented artists in rhythm games across the 25 tracks. Enjoy them and look out for the next AIRheads release coming your way soon!
Thank you all so much for this pack! I always get so excited seeing a new release from AIRHeads, both for songs I’ve always wanted in the game and as a way to explore new songs/artists that are right up my alley. For example, I’m only familiar with Pinback’s first three albums, but this song sounds great so I think it’s finally time to check out the others haha. Special thanks for that Spoon track (can never get enough Spoon!!) and Slipping Husband, which is a top 5 National song for me and one I cannot wait to play in RB. Thank you all again!
Very happy to read this, thank you and I’m glad I made some picks you like!
Can always count on you to leave such thoughtful comments, thanks!! Just curious, what are some other songs/artists you’d like to see charted one day?
It’s the least I can do for all the work you all do! I don’t want to suggest too many things because I know you’re all in it for the love of the game, and I don’t want to come off as annoying so of course take all of this with a huge grain of salt. (Okay coming back I got carried away, sorry about that!!)
Thinking about more recent indie/alternative artists, I would love to see more Alex G (some of the semi-recent tracks like Runner and June Guitar would be so much fun) and Alvvays (I know a bunch of their big singles have been charted already and I’ve played them a ton, but I would die to get anything from Blue Rev, which has become one of my favorite albums ever). I don’t know if you’re familiar with Liquid Mike, but anything from their last two albums would be a blast to play (Pacer and Crop Circles are my personal favorites). There’s a couple Big Thief tracks already, but Not or anything off Dragon New Warm Mountain would be awesome. More from the Mountain Goats would be great, I’ve been loving Days but Bleed Out has a lot of RB potential imo. Wednesday, Horsegirl, and Ratboys are some more bands/artists that have put out albums in the last couple years which contain great RB candidates. And for something a little less “buzzy” than those groups, the Argentinian band Pacifica have two albums out, Freak Scene and In Your Face, that are a lot of fun and would be great to play in game, although that’s a bit of a stretch to suggest lol.
And this is a little bit on the older side, but anything off The Meadowlands by The Wrens would be divine, although if I could single out one song it would be Happy. I don’t know how popular they are really but that album has some incredible stuff on it. Anyway this ended up being way longer than it should have been so I’m going to cut myself off there. I apologize for the ridiculously long comment and of course I will not expect to see anything here charted, it’s just fun to type out a wish list of sorts and I definitely got carried away hahaha.
I wouldn’t have asked the question if I didn’t want a long answer 🙂 We are evidently very aligned in music taste, so I appreciate your recommendations just as much even outside of a Rock Band context. My favorite part about this all is finding new songs to love. Just to reply to some of the artists I recognize here:
Lots of Alex G I would love to do!! The only reason it hasn’t happened yet is that I’ve always been so daunted by his harmonies and discerning what’s just double-tracked within them. Might be worth revisiting now that harmony separators exist…
I’ve been getting more tracks from Wednesday/Horsegirl/Ratboys in my Discover Weekly recently, and mostly all of them have been added to my Rock Band Ideas playlist. I should really give them a broader listen.
I’m not familiar with that Wrens album as a whole, but I absolutely adore “Boys, You Won’t” from it and have considered charting it before. I’ll give the full album a listen sometime.
Sorry for the late response! I did not consider how hard the Alex G harmonies would be to decipher hahaha totally understandable. Always love seeing your work with this game and I’m glad my long reply did not scare you off haha. Also, Boys, You Won’t is fantastic and if you like that you’ll definitely enjoy some of the other songs off that album.
Hey Harrug, always appreciate your support and comments! Definitely took note of that list, some I’m familiar with and I put some of them on the playlist, excited to listen, so we’ll see what happens in the future. And not to give much away, but for one of those artists you might get some songs sooner than you’d think…
Oooh well consider me very curious indeed! I would be thrilled with any of those artists getting songs so whoever it is, I am looking forward to it 😁 And thank you for your work as always Yaniv, in pretty much every release you do I end up downloading at least one song, even for artists I was previously unfamiliar with.