To get better at vocals, you’ll need to do the same thing you do on drums and guitar — practice, practice, practice.

Of course, it helps to know the lyrics to the songs by heart. Here are handy links to web lyrics for the built in Rock Band tracks, in alphabetical order:

• Are You Gonna Be My Girl (Jet)
• Ballroom Blitz (Sweet)
• Black Hole Sun (Soundgarden)
• Blitzkrieg Bop (The Ramones)
• Celebrity Skin (Hole)
• Cherub Rock (The Smashing Pumpkins)
• Creep (Radiohead)
• Dani California (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
• Dead on Arrival (Fall Out Boy)
• Detroit Rock City (Kiss)
• Don’t Fear the Reaper (Blue Oyster Cult)
• Electric Version (The New Pornographers)
• Enter Sandman (Metallica)
• Epic (Faith No More)
• Flirtin’ With Disaster (Molly Hatchet)
• Foreplay/Long Time (Boston)
• Gimme Shelter (Rolling Stones)
• Go with the Flow (Queens of the Stone Age)
• Green Grass and High Tides (The Outlaws)
• Here It Goes Again (Ok Go)
• Highway Star (Deep Purple)
• I Think I’m Paranoid (Garbage)
• I’m So Sick (Flyleaf)
• In Bloom (Nirvana)
• Learn to Fly (Foo Fighters)
• Main Offender (The Hives)
• Maps (Yeah Yeah Yeahs)
• Mississippi Queen (Mountain)
• Next To You (The Police)
• Orange Crush (R. E. M.)
• Paranoid (Black Sabbath)
• Reptilia (The Strokes)
• Run To The Hills (Iron Maiden)
• Sabotage (Beastie Boys)
• Say It Ain’t So (Weezer)
• Should I Stay or Should I Go (The Clash)
• Suffragette City (David Bowie)
• The Hand That Feeds (Nine Inch Nails)
• Tom Sawyer (Rush)
• Train Kept A-Rollin’ (Aerosmith)
• Vasoline (Stone Temple Pilots)
• Wanted Dead or Alive (Bon Jovi)
• Wave of Mutilation (Pixies)
• Welcome Home (Coheed and Cambria)
• When You Were Young (The Killers)
• Won’t Get Fooled Again (The Who)

Here’s a brief video with some vocal tips directly from one of the game’s producers.

I completely suck at vocals, and even I was able to muddle my way through the solo vocal tour on hard difficulty… but it wasn’t always pretty to hear. If you’re hoping to complete the solo vocal tour on Expert for that Virtuoso achievement, you’ll need to really practice. I’ve sung enough, and watched other people sing enough, to offer some advice:

• Listen to the songs outside of the game, perhaps on your digital music player or while you’re working on the computer. Knowing the instrumentation and the melody definitely helps. The better you know the song, the better your vocal performance will be. There’s no substitute for knowing the song.
• Start singing phrases somewhat early, so you can quickly tell if your pitch is off at the very beginning of the phrase, and make adjustments. Remember, there’s absolutely no penalty on vocals for singing whenever and wherever you want — take advantage of that!
• There are three important qualities for a vocalist: pitch, pitch, and pitch. The game doesn’t care what you actually sing, but you have to be able to hit the right pitch — and keep that pitch consistent! I have a terrible problem staying consistent in pitch. One way to improve pitch consistency is to practice humming rising and falling scales, for example.
• I’ve noticed that vocalists sometimes try to match the particular voice of the singer in the original song when they don’t have to — pitch is judged relative, not absolute. If you’re having trouble with a particular song, don’t try singing it in a “high” or “low” voice. Just sing in your “normal” voice.
• The talk/rap sections are tough for everyone. Pitch doesn’t matter for these; timing seems to be the key here.

Finally, I’ll refer you to the Scorehero Rock Band vocals forum FAQ.

My wife is far better at vocals than I am. I just wish I could sound better when I sing, but I’m afraid that’s something a FAQ won’t help me with.