The 10 Best-Selling Artists To Never Appear in a Music Game

What would a modern-day basement be without a pile of forgotten plastic instruments? Even Rock Band diehards like myself realize the band game fad is deader than your third grade Tamagotchi.

At its height, fake drums and guitars thrummed throughout the homes and bars of America, as would-be musicians strived for the slightest taste of rock glory. Artists and labels took note and made good money licensing their songs to Rock Band and Guitar Hero. A handful of bands were even exalted with their own dedicated titles. Not every music legend signed on, though

Phil Collins

Why he's on the list:

The once and future leader of Genesis (who would've been number eleven on our list) has never objected to marketing himself. His creepy classic "In The Air Tonight" unforgettably soundtracked the first episode of "Miami Vice" and later appeared in dozens of commercials.

And yet, his music has never appeared in a band game. The slick production and MOR songwriting of solo albums like “No Jacket Required” and “...But Seriously” made Collins one of the best selling artists of the 1980s, with total certified sales of over 80 million albums, singles, downloads and videos. If you believe Atlantic Records, Collins' total sales had already reached 150 million by the year 2000. Either way, that's a hell of a lot of people jamming out to "Sussudio".

Why he may not be in the games:

Guitar Hero's inclination towards metal and hard rock might have precluded a Collins track pack, but "Against All Odds" or "Easy Lover" would fit perfectly in a game with as many Billy Joel songs as Rock Band. 

U2

Why they're on the list:

Once upon a time U2 was almost considered edgy. The postpunk energy of early singles like "I Will Follow," combined with Edge's appropriation of Gang of Four's guitar sound and Bono's openly political lyrics made them sound tougher than many of their synth-loving "New Wave" colleagues in the early 1980s.

They quickly learned how to adapt their signature sound for arenas without entirely losing their souls, and then parodied the very notion of selling out with the intentionally overblown Zoo TV tour in the early 1990s. Eventually they settled into a nice, safe career as every world leader's favorite alternative rock band, racking up between 100 and 150 million in sales.

Why they may not be in the games:

U2 talked openly about wanting their own single-artist music game, but that hasn't happened and they still haven't wound up in Rock Band or Guitar Hero. Maybe Bono was too busy splitting birthday cake with Desmond Tutu to make that meeting.

Whitney Houston

Why she's on the list:

Whitney Houston's done it all, including music, movies, modeling, and [INSERT BLATANTLY OBVIOUS DRUG JOKE]. She's never been in a band game, though. Obviously she didn't make rock 'n' roll music, but there are a number of pop and R&B acts in Rock Band, from Otis Redding to Lady Gaga. Before her Hollywood digression and depressing downward spiral, Houston was the defining diva of the 1980s and early 1990s, selling over 100 million records.

Why she may not be in the games:

Whitney's fall was fast and hard, and today it's easy to forget how massively popular she once was, especially as her R&B crown was quickly seized by a near-contemporary who could oversing even worse than she could. Who could that be? We'll see when we get to #5 on our list.

Pink Floyd

Why they're on the list:

Unlike some of the other artists on this list, Pink Floyd's absence from both Guitar Hero and Rock Band is surely self-imposed. Say what you will about their particular form of overblown art rock, but Floyd remains one of the most beloved and influential rock bands of all time, with certified record sales surpassing 100 million (almost half of which are for Dark Side of the Moon alone).

Why they may not be in the games:

There's no way the makers of Guitar Hero and Rock Band didn't repeatedly back up a tour-bus or two of money for the rights to a Floyd song. This infamously fractious band can't even agree to make an obscene amount of money on a true reunion tour, though.

They also seem like a perfect cross-section of two distinct strands of close-minded anti-videogame absolutism, namely stodgy Baby Boomer narcissism and serious artiste pretension. Perhaps they would've been in line for their own stand-alone game if every single-artist music game hadn't seriously underperformed.

Celine Dion

Why she's on the list:

Yes, yes, laugh all you'd like. It makes perfect sense that Celine Dion has never come anywhere near Guitar Hero or Rock Band. But then, Rock Band especially has never shied away from straight-up pop, and recent Nickelback and Limp Bizkit DLC packs prove that quality isn't always a major concern.

Dion's certified record sales top 111 million over her career, which makes her one of the best selling artists of all time. Sure, those sales are almost definitely driven by one single song, but you know that one song would be a stone-cold DLC hit, and wouldn't have been out of place on the kitschy and family friendly Lego Rock Band game.

Why she may not be in the games:

Somehow Dion is blander than Wii party games despite her shameless, over-the-top melodrama, and would only appeal to the most mainstream or ironic of Rock Band's audience. 

Mariah Carey

Why she's on the list:

Sorry, Whitney. Mariah trumps you once again. Carey would work better in Rock Band than Guitar Hero, with her earlier R&B hits a more natural fit for the game's instrumentation than her later, more hip-hop oriented work. Despite her well-publicized breakdown, Carey is scarily popular, with lifetime record sales certified at almost 120 million.

Why she may not be in the games:

Like some of the other pop stars on this list, she's not the most obvious choice for full-band games, and her laughably gratuitous melisma and extreme range probably make her the Mike Tyson of the karaoke games she appears in. Still, tell me you wouldn't love to play that Tom Tom Club bass hook sampled on "Fantasy," or slur out ODB's famous rap. 

Led Zeppelin

Why they're on the list:

They're every long-haired 16-year-old's favorite band, they've sold 200 to 300 records in their history, and almost as many joints have been rolled on their album covers.

Why they may not be in the games:

Led Zeppelin hates all technology that wasn't forged in the fires of Mount Doom. Jimmy Page might've been the original guitar hero, but he routinely shot down any possibility of the most classic of classic rock bands ever popping up in a video game.

Page is far from the only ossified rock elder to bash music games, but he's one of the few to stick by his principles and refuse to license his music to a game. Of course, Zeppelin's history is full of principled stands eventually undone by ungodly amounts of cash, which you'd think they'd have enough.

They stridently avoided iTunes until 2007, when the death of the CD was all but assured. They used to not license their music for film and television, but by 1998 "Communication Breakdown" was blasted in full in the long-forgotten film fiasco Small Soldiers. One day, Robert Plant will need a new lining for his pool and six months later we'll get the Rock Band DLC we deserve.

Madonna

Why she's on the list:

Madonna might have finally aged out of pop music relevance, but she's reportedly sold almost 300 million records in her career, and her best hits from the 1980s and 1990s are modern classics that surely would have made a good amount of money if licensed to Rock Band during the music game's peak. (And yes, again, Madonna makes way more sense for Rock Band than Guitar Hero.)

Why she may not be in the game:

In a way Madonna's already in Rock Band, as several Lady Gaga songs have been released as DLC. Madonna's nonexistent Rock Band presence might be due to the poor timing of the keyboard peripheral.

It'd be hard to nail the Madonna experience without keys, but by the time Rock Band's keyboard came out, the genre had already bottomed out. Unless the still raging stream of Rock Band DLC eventually includes a Madonna pack, we'll have to make due by singing the lyrics to "Express Yourself" over the Rock Band version of Gaga's "Born This Way".

Elvis Presley

Why he's on the list:

They call him the King for a reason. They also mock him mercilessly for a (big-bellied, spangled white jumpsuit) reason. Whether you think he's the progenitor of all rock music or just a racist Vegas sideshow attraction, Elvis's popularity can't be denied.

Depending on who's counting, Elvis has sold anywhere from 200 million to a billion records since 1954, making him the second best-selling artist of all time. (Number one on that list are the Beatles, who of course have a game of their own.) Elvis songs have appeared in karaoke games before, but none has ever graced a Guitar Hero or Rock Band tracklist.

Why he may not be in the games:

It might be the era in which he recorded his best-known music. It might be hard to track down master tapes from the 1950s, although you'd think if any tapes were kept in pristine condition it'd be Elvis's.

Also the rudimentary recording equipment of his time might complicate the process, although, again, Elvis was such a big deal that he got to work with multitrack recorders before almost any other artist. For whatever reason Elvis still hasn't even entered the damn building.