“Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, on a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.”
— 1 Corinthians 15:51-54

The Rapture is coming.

On April 9th, everything changes.

Downloads available at http://db.customscreators.com/

With our favourite rhythm game franchise winding down its official content stream, a group of custom chart authors decided to work together with the goal of celebrating this franchise’s incredible run: offering you one more Tuesday of great downloadable content releases. This coming Tuesday, April 9th, these authors are unleashing a collaborative release of 35 customs (plus variants), one of the largest and most diverse selections of new content released in the history of this title. The Rapture brings you brand new, full band customs, as well as complete conversions from other rhythm titles, many of which feature multitrack audio and pro guitar/bass upgrades.

The tracks you can expect to see in this release cover a diverse portfolio of musical tastes and include all of the bells and whistles you would expect to see in official downloadable content, including all applicable instruments, all difficulties, custom venues and lighting, multitrack audio (when available) and a standard of quality that looks to match or even exceed Harmonix’s gold standard.
In addition to this release, we are pleased to announce that the Rock Band: Harmonies Project will be making its return on Friday, April 12th, bringing over twenty new harmony upgrades for tracks from your existing catalogue as well over forty additional RBN 1.0 pro drum upgrades. In addition to this new content, RB:HP brings with it a new release schema that extends upgrade to support to keys and pro keys upgrades, pro guitar and pro bass upgrades, fixes for broken charts, and more! Of course, these upgrades will be lonely, so we’ll have a special edition single from one of our authors’ catalogue to round out the release. Which one? I guess you’ll have to wait and see.
Of course, the Rapture is not merely a one-time content extravaganza. Admittedly, though it did start out this way, the tagline says it best: everything changes. The authors contributing to the Rapture have decided to coordinate their efforts, forming the Customs Creators Collective (C3), a growing stable of custom charters working to keep our favourite rhythm game alive by providing a constant injection of new content. Reflecting the diverse taste of C3’s authors, these releases will cover artists ranging from niche outfits to multi-platinum artists, and genres ranging from pop to metal to blues to dance. Be sure to tune in every Friday for a reveal of at least three pieces of new custom content released day and date with the announcement.
The Customs Creators Collective is also actively looking for authors to join our team either on a short-term or long-term basis. If you’re an author who can put out quality charts that have all of the necessary components, and are willing to help us meet our goal of providing regular, weekly releases, please let us know via the Join link on our blog. If you’re an author who may be unable to devote to a longer-term commitment, but still want to contribute the occasional current (or even past) release to the Collective, by all means, get in touch with us as well. If you’re an aspiring author looking to get into charting songs (or legacy upgrades), well, keep an eye out, as we’ll be looking to release some guides and tutorials over the coming months.
All files can be downloaded through the C3 Songs Database located at http://db.customscreators.com/

Who are the Authors?

The Rapture features contributions from members of the new Customs Creators Collective. Each author is well established within the community and has a reputation for delivering high quality custom charts. You can find out more about each author under the Author Profiles section of the blog. They are credited alongside their contributions, the details of which you can find below.
As mentioned in the previous section, we are always looking for new authors who are willing to contribute to this project either on a committed or casual basis. If you are interested in contributing to this project, you can contact us via the Join the collective! link at the top of the blog.

What is Being Offered This Week?

A total of 23 new custom songs (plus variants) are being offered in this release, including packs from a variety of artists, an assortment of singles, conversions from other rhythm gaming titles, and upgrades to existing content. Following the below descriptions are images detailing the track particulars, including instruments, difficulties, and audio distribution.

Packs

The first of three packs coming this week is a triple shot of Aretha Franklin songs, faithfully charted by farottone, and representing an intense vocals challenge. Starting us off is the timeless Respect, the amazing Otis Redding cover featured on her 1967 album I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You, which reached the top spot of the Billboard Hot 100. Joining this single are two tracks from 1968: (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman, off her album Lady Soul, which managed to slide into #8 on the Hot 100; and, Think, an iconic single off her 1968 album Aretha Now that peaked at #7 on the Billboard Pop Singles Chart.
Next up are a group already well represented in the franchise, though completely unavailable in the core game: please give a warm welcome to a three-pack of fantastic singles by The Beatles, contributed by TrojanNemo. This pack opens with the title song for both the 1965 film Help! and its soundtrack, the appropriately titled Help!, which unsurprisingly topped the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. Also included are two tracks off 1963’s With The Beatles: All My Loving, which interestingly enough was never released as a single in the U.S. or U.K. (but was in Canada), and Hold Me Tight, released here in two forms: a regular version and one featuring rhythm guitar authored to keys. The latter two tracks featuring separated vocals, as denoted by the karaoke icon.
The final pack, and one that is decidedly in the opposite music direction of the aforementioned Fab Four, is another release from farottone, featuring four fantastic tracks from legendary metal band Pantera’s seminal 1992 album Vulgar Display of Power. All four of these songs feature multitrack audio recordings and have 2x Bass Versions available for download. The pack includes Fucking Hostile, Hollow, and A New Level, as well as the Pantera’s first Top 100 charting song: the ballad This Love (featuring Pro Guitar/Bass authored by PikminGuts92).

Singles

Nyxyxylyth brings us two more fantastic singles joining an impressive collection of quality full band charts. The first of these tracks is the one featured in our teaser video — off of ELO’s 1976 album A New World Record comes Do Ya, with its infectious vocals and iconic chorus riff. Joining it is an artist long sought for everyone’s favourite rhythm game, as Pink Floyd’s 1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon enters the catalogue by gracing us with Time, the longest custom track in this release at over seven minutes in length. Both of these tracks also feature pro guitar and bass authored by Columbo777.
Joining these singles are two from authors with other projects that will also be a part of C3. Pony Rock Project author LyokoFreaks takes a step away from the electronic world of MLP-themed tunes to bring us a sure-fire party favourite from the soundtrack of 1984’s The Karate Kid with Joe Esposito’s famous You’re The Best, a track originally intended for the Rocky III soundtrack (useless trivia time). The lead author for the Rock Band: Harmonies Project, espher, gives us another modern dance/pop contribution with She Wolf (Falling to Pieces), a track by David Guetta (featuring Sia) off his 2012 album Nothing but the Beat 2.0.
Finally, the folks from the Guitar Hero to Rock Band 3 project (GHtoRB3) take a slight break from the world of conversions to bring us three new custom songs. The first among them was authored with the help of Pearlized Pistol, and is the fourth single off Linkin Park’s 2007 album Minutes to Midnight, Given Up. Next up, Cobra Starship sees another song make their way to the franchise through The City is at War, off their 2007 album ¡Viva la Cobra!. Finally, British alternative rock band Placebo is also represented by the title track off their 2009 album Battle for the Sun.
Of course, that’s not all.

Conversions

In addition to their custom song contributions, the GHtoRB3 team kicks off our large collection of chart conversions with three releases from their ongoing project, finishing them off with keys, harmonies, and other great improvements. We start off with an offering from British rockers Muse, satisfying your MOAR MUSE itch with the amazing opening guitar riff from Plug In Baby off 2001’s Origin of Symmetry. We also get a much needed ‘70s rock infusion with Bob Seger’s Old Time Rock and Roll off 1978’s Stranger in Town, while a dose of ‘80s hard rock comes to us via Van Halen, with Unchained from 1981’s Fair Warning.
Joining these conversions are three additional conversions contributed by TrojanNemo. Harmonies Project and party favourite My Chemical Romance kicks things off with the high energy of Na Na Na (Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na), the first single off their final studio album (they recently broke up, likely after finding out they could no longer put their songs in Rock Band), 2010’s Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys. Joining it is the Billboard Rock chart-topping Psycho off Puddle of Mudd’s 2007 album Famous, which features multitrack audio. Finally, rounding out these conversions is our second Linkin Park song, The Messenger, off 2010’s A Thousand Suns, another one of our releases featuring multitrack audio.
Upgrades
Finally, in addition to these full songs, we have an assortment of chart upgrades for existing content. Most prominent of these is the pending Rock Band: Harmonies Project relaunch, which will take place on Friday, April 12th, featuring an abundance of new harmony and pro drum upgrades, as well as support for other upgrades and fixes, and our first keys upgrade: Europe‘s The Final Countdown. In addition to these, we’ll be seeing periodic pro guitar upgrades released for both custom and legacy content, provided by Columbo77 and PikminGuts92, both of whom have released upgrades for The Rapture. Stay tuned for posts detailing specific offerings for both of these upgrade projects.

Where Do We Go From Here?

Thus ends (and starts) a new beginning in the life of our favourite rhythm gaming franchise. We hope you’ll stick with us as we strive to deliver new content on a regular basis; who knows, maybe you’ll even get the itch to do some authoring of your own and join the team! With that, we’ll see you on Tuesday, and we’d like to close with something we here at the Customs Creators Collective hope we’ll get to say for a very long time:

See You Next Friday.