Get Your Shop On in Rock Band 2 (Exclusive!) (XB360)

If you've spent any time playing Rock Band on Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3, you have almost certainly played with the character customization features, which allows you to pick faces, hairstyles, clothing and accessories for your virtual rockers. With Rock Band 2's September release on the 360, players will find a brand new wardrobe of items to wear.

A new shop called "Thrift Threads" offers clothes ranging from old sweaters to metal shoulder pads with sawblades mounted on them. Other new accessories include masks, piercings and bandanas.

Lead designer Dan Teasdale told us they've "ramped up the authenticity on all of the instruments," from the drums -- which will feature models from manufacturers like Ludwig, DW and Pearl -- to the guitars, which will feature the legendary Billy-Bo Jupider guitar designed by Bo Diddley.

But keeping in the spirit Rock Band 2's backwards-compatibility, all original Rock Band 1 items are available as well, so if you've gotten attached to Jimmy the Metalhead's trademark duds, you can keep them.

So out of all those options, what's the wildest item you can get your hands on?

"Definitely the live snake, which is a special reward for beating one of the Tour Challenges," said Teasdale. "Think Tia Carrere in Wayne's World."

Harmonix also gave us a few more details on the real-life merchandise players will be able to order through RockBand.com's Merch-o-Matic, which will launch shortly after the Rock Band 2 Xbox 360 release.

"It was an idea that our Creative Director, Josh Randall, came up with when we were thinking of cool things to do," said Teasdale. "He half-jokingly suggested a way that your Rock Band band could make real merch, and after joking about how awesome it would be, we realized that everything we needed for us to do it was available - so we did it!"

Players will be able to upload band logos and avatars to their RockBand.com profiles to order customized T-shirts, posters and stickers.

"I could totally even see bands that play during Rock Band nights printing out their own merch through the Merch-o-matic and selling them during the show. I mean, people are doing that already for some of the most legendary Rock Band celebrities, so it's not a stretch to take it a step further and show the character they're playing with on the shirt or poster."

To clarify, Rock Band 2 will not include an official spot for bands to sell their merchandise, but a company representative says, "Basically, when they purchase the merch they can do whatever they like with it; we won't provide them with a channel to sell it."

Gamers who really love their in-game rockers can also create Bandmates, custom figurines of their characters, similar to Spore's also soon-to-be launched figurine creation service.

"I personally can't wait to create my own rocker beast in Spore, print out my Rock Band 2 character, and battle them to the death when I'm in meetings," said Teasdale.

No word yet on how much the custom merchandise will cost, but considering that tempting $300 Ion drumset and CEO Alex Rigopulos' promise of 500+ songs by the holidays, not to mention the game itself, a dinky figurine will probably be the least of your wallet's worries.