Rocksmith 2014 Championship Week 509

[jellisjenius]

Welcome to the CF Rocksmith 2014 Championship!

-= Week 509 =-

Fantastic New Music from Old Favorites

=> How and Why join the Championships?
=> Rocksmith 2014 Championships rules

Previous' week Winners are:

Lead:
- Beginner: @Tucky Fried Chkn (98.18)
- Intermediate: @kayteck (95.49)
- Advanced: @Mikson (94.08)
- Masterclass: @Razrshred (96.54)

Rhythm:
- Beginner: @lowender (94)
- Intermediate: @Daz40 (99.18)
- Advanced: @Mikson (95.78)
- Masterclass: @Razrshred (99)

Bass:
- Beginner: LOST TROPHY
- Intermediate: @Daz40 (98)
- Advanced: @genobadass (99.54)
- Masterclass: @coldrampage (99)

 

 

Congrats to all winners. Well done!

 

 

 

This week's songs are:

Lead Path:
Beginner: Nothing But Thieves - City Haunts (4^) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Intermediate: Foo Fighters - Rescued (4.5) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Advanced: Metallica - Shadows Follow (6.5) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Masterclass: King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard - Witchcraft (8) (C♯ standard) selected by jellisjenius
God of Guitar: Avenged Sevenfold - Life is But a Dream...(Full Album) (drop D) selected by jellisjenius [Week 1 of 4]

Rhythm Path:
Beginner: Nothing But Thieves - City Haunts (2.5) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Intermediate: Foo Fighters - Rescued (4.5) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Advanced: Metallica - Shadows Follow (6) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Masterclass: King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard - Witchcraft (7) (C♯ standard) selected by jellisjenius

Bass Path:
Beginner: Nothing But Thieves - City Haunts (4^) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Intermediate: Foo Fighters - Rescued (5.5^) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Advanced: Metallica - Shadows Follow (6.5) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
Masterclass: King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard - Witchcraft (8) (E standard) selected by jellisjenius
God of Bass: Avenged Sevenfold - Life is But a Dream...(Full Album) (drop D) selected by jellisjenius [Week 1 of 4]

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Share with us your opinion on this weeks songs difficulty scores (1-10).

Classless, Fearless FreeBird Members in their endless battle with the fb police: 2groggy

[jellisjenius]

First, a note on difficulty ratings: I've tested all of these songs on lead and rhythm. That said, I'm not really a guitarist and my guitar is...not great. In general, I found the beginner through advanced tracks to all be pretty manageable, aside from the solo in "Shadows Follow". I'm giving "Rescued" the bump up to Int because it's more varied than "City Haunts", but frankly I find the latter more difficult to score well on for some reason. "Witchcraft" is a clear MC with some extended tapping sections in the Lead track but I'm not convinced that the rhythm tracks for "Shadows Follow" and "Witchcraft" should be as high as 6 and 7. Please let me know your feedback, particularly if you feel any of the order Beg--Int---Adv---MC should be switched. 

 

On to my commentary: I feel like over the last year or two some longtime artists have put out stunningly good new stuff, so this week I decided to do a theme from a few albums that stand out so far in 2023:

Nothing But Thieves ("City Haunts" from Dead Club City) - Admittedly this one doesn't stand up to the other four as I haven't listened to the whole album yet and it's not received too much press...but I like the song and needed one for beginner level.

Foo Fighters ("Rescued" from But Here We Are) - This album is as raw and vulnerable as just about anything I've heard, including the likes of Sufjan Stevens' Carrie and Lowell, but the hard rock excellence of Dave and the Foo make it easy to overlook. Effectively the entire album is a tribute to Taylor Hawkins (RIP) and attempt to process his death. Very powerful and impressive.

Metallica ("Shadows Follow" from 72 Seasons) - This one really took me by surprise as I've generally been just okay with everything since ...And Justice for All. This album blew me away. It's got a pretty wide range of the styles they've employed over the years and it's tight with great production. I really like this particular track even though it's not very technical, the rhythm element of the song just slaps and the solo is pretty cool too.

King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard ("Witchcraft" from PetroDragonic Apocalypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation) - yes that's really the album name, and this doesn't surprise me at all from KGLW. They can literally take any genre of music and play the hell out of it. They've already made a thrash album (Infest the Rat's Nest) that many thrash metalheads consider one of the best in the genre. Now they've made a...I don't know, prog death metal? masterpiece. Honestly I don't care much for growling in general and don't find Stu Mackenzie to be any different. It's still a kickass album for me. This is my favorite track. There's just no other band that can crank out diverse awesome music like  KGLW. 

Avenged Sevenfold (Life Is But a Dream... full album) - If you think you know A7X, for good or ill, think again and give this album a listen. This is a wild ride both sonically and philosophically. It's an existential epic that goes to some dark places trying to understand death and our place in the universe. It doesn't always resonate with me but it's still an impressive work,  heavier and more complex than I think most people would ever expect from this band. From the AllMusic review, the album covers sonic ground ranging "from punishing thrash and hardcore to operatic, Pink Floyd-esque space rock peppered with Daft Punk-inspired vocoders and lush orchestral flourishes." Enjoy!

[jellisjenius]

From testing:

 

 

 

[cacahuate51]

Cool week!
i've heard of all the bands, just never played these songs from them.
Also didnt notice any missing notes/wrong ones so thats always nice!


fun, a bit unexpected with the fretting descisions. Just seems to be more movements across the fretboard than nessecary and then its not really consistant with that movement either (aka same sections are tabbed differently) but im guilty of doing that aswell when i find the song too repetitve hehe. 

good tab. Should probably check their new stuff out.

Thanks for not putting Mehtallica in masterclass..wouldnt mind it being intermediate.


Have a feeling this one is gonna get lots of 100s or 99s+

[coldrampage]

I still need to listen to some more gizz (and wrap my fingers round those time sigs)

Surprised I got over 90 with how badly I butchered that tapping section.

[lowender]

Love the song selection this week! My first bass scores for this week 

[jellisjenius]

@ cacahuate51  To me what bumps up the difficulty for "Witchcraft" and a lot of KGLW bass parts is the unusual strumming rhythm and time signatures. I think it's a clear MC by the Championship standards but I guess we'll see how the scores line up. Also charts with high note density tend to get higher scores...I still would be surprised to see a 100%. I hope someone proves me wrong

[Mikson]

Quick tests of the guitar paths, except for the MC, because I don't currently have a C# Std set and forgot to do pitch shift.

Lead first.

Regarding this song, I think 4 might be ok, but it's a very thankless chart for championships. Regular misses on the slides make it difficult to get a high score here. But I understand that it is difficult to find a good chart for beginner class in themed weeks.

Good song, Foo Fighters never go below a certain level. Diff 4.5 is ok.

I've played this before when I tested Metallica songs after releasing their new album. Unfortunately, I have to admit that none of the new songs really blew me away and the whole album is just ok for me. In general, apart from old releases (before 1990), I'm on the Iron Maiden side  

[Mikson]

Rhythm

Fewer slides than in the lead track, so it's easier to get high accuracy.

4.5

5.5-6

[BubbleWrapDragon]

Happy new week! 
Didn't play much last week, might play a bit more this week

[cacahuate51]

oof pitched slides one of my weaknesses . fun song to play though.


yea playing the guitar parts made me appreciate the song more. good intermediate song


 Imo the guitar paths can be int 5.  The solo is short and doable (since it stays in the 12 area almost all of it, most likely just pentatonics) and thats that i avoid solos like the plague/ cant play them usually. Also cause its just a lot of single notes..and because almost every kid learns metalica as one of their first songs. atleast they did when i was growing up..and this is just more simple than those songs were. But since you did put them lower advanced i wont rant that much hah.

[MaZtoR]

[Hyphema]

[cacahuate51]

damn over 98% on an album and almost 2k note streak! very impressive @ Hyphema !

[RaZrShReD]

[RaZrShReD]

[hellothere1]

Hello, first time posting here! This seems like a good way to motivate myself, and later I can see the progress I've made. I play mostly lead guitar, and advanced difficulty feels like the right amount of challenging.

[cacahuate51]

4 hours ago, hellothere1 said:

Hello, first time posting here! This seems like a good way to motivate myself, and later I can see the progress I've made. I play mostly lead guitar, and advanced difficulty feels like the right amount of challenging.

General Kenobi, Welcome to the championship!

[Rodman]

@ jellisjenius - thank you for that awesome week!

One of the best themes put up here so far, and so well selected. Just great!!

Pity i will again be only able to drop some sightreads or few tries from my holiday setup (strat mini which is great but my Rs on my win11 laptop so war won't run in audio exclusive mode so far and gives me good 250ms of delay, grrrrr)

At least i will be able to compete on the A7x for the next month - album of the year for me. Well competing against that Mars Volta masterpieces in my personal all time album charts. Insanity.

[coldrampage]

Was trying for the hundo but this'll do for now, my fingers need a break lol.

[RaZrShReD]

[RaZrShReD]

 

[RaZrShReD]

[RaZrShReD]

[RaZrShReD]