Activision has unveiled the February DLC lineup for Guitar Hero 5 and Band Hero, and it’s…full of songs. Songs with guitars. Honestly, it really does strike me as a very standard lineup — not that that’s a bad thing. At least we get some genuine Sabbath, and I guess the kids these days are into Breaking Benjamin? Only one of the four artists do I actually dislike, but that’s entirely for personal reasons, which I’ll get to presently.

First, next Thursday’s offering brings three tracks from Jared Leto’s 30 Seconds to Mars, two of which are already available for Rock Band.

30 Seconds to Mars	Attack
30 Seconds to Mars	From Yesterday
30 Seconds to Mars	Kings and Queens

Next comes Breaking Benjamin, on February 11, with three tracks from three different albums.

Breaking Benjamin	Give Me A Sign
Breaking Benjamin	Sooner or Later
Breaking Benjamin	Until The End

February 18 is the day to get excited for, because it’ll feature three Black Sabbath tunes, making the first time Sabbath master tracks have appeared in a music game. (Guitar Hero 1, II, and III each featured a song, and there are three songs in the Rock Band DLC library, but none of these are masters — they’re all covers.)

Black Sabbath	After Forever	N/A	N/A
Black Sabbath	Into The Void	N/A
Black Sabbath	Sweet Leaf

Wrapping out the month is Third Eye Blind, with a three-pack on February 25. Now, here’s why I don’t like Third Eye Blind. At my second E3 — Atlanta, 1998 — Third Eye Blind played at the Eidos party. The previous year, Luscious Jackson had played, and positively destroyed the place with energy and enthusiasm, in spite of the fact that it was a corporate gig for a bunch of videogame geeks. Third Eye Blind, on the other hand, phoned in their performance, thought they were far too cool for the room, and missed no opportunity to inform the audience that we were a bunch of stuffy suits and basement-dwelling geeks (ironic now, eh?) and that the band only took the gig for the money. As a once and future performing musician, I have a serious problem with this. If you don’t want to do a gig, don’t take the gig. But if you take the gig, play your friggin’ set the best you can, or you’re cheating whoever’s paying you. This is your job. And then, to actively deride your audience — it just showed a monumental lack of class, and made it impossible for me to continue to appreciate their relentlessly poppy music.

But of course, that’s just me. And I certainly won’t fault anyone else for thinking differently. Which is why I wouldn’t dream of telling you not to download these three tracks:

Third Eye Blind	Can You Take Me
Third Eye Blind	Losing A Whole Year
Third Eye Blind	Never Let You Go

These packs will hit on their respective Thursdays for the usual price: $1.99 / 160 Microsoft Points / 200 Wii Points apiece, or $5.49 / 440 MS / 500 Wii for each pack. And of course I’ll update throughout the month with playlists of the current week’s offerings. Deal? Deal.