What does awesome detection mode on rock band 2 do?

Answer 1

Nobody knows for sure.

When asked, Harmonix avoided answering, saying only that it "detects awesome", and that what it specifically does is "a closely-guarded secret". There's been a ton of speculation about it, but nobody knows what it does. Many people think it's merely a placeholder for unlocking the Jukebox Mode that was originally supposed to be included with the game.

The mode was supposed to let you create a playlist of songs and then simply play them for you with a full band, just as if you were playing the game. However, after being hyped for months, the feature was quietly and inexplicably removed late in development. Some have speculated that it was removed because it may have been a violation of their licensing agreement with the artists; the license to include artists' songs in the game probably only applied to game-playing only, and not for simple playback.

But we will probably never know for certain what the Awesome Detection cheat is really for.