Click above to listen or subscribe. Click below for a direct download.
| This episode was made possible by: | ||
| Game | Track Title | Composer(s) |
| OutRun 2 | Passing Breeze | Hiroshi Kawaguchi, Keisuke Tsukahara (arr.), Fumio Ito (arr.), Yasuhiro Takagi (arr.), Naoyuki Machida (arr.), Shinichi Goto (arr.), Tomoya Koga (arr.) |
| Darkstalkers: The Night Warriors | Demitri’s Theme (Romania) | Takayuki Iwai, Hideki Okugawa |
| Castlevania: Curse of Darkness | Machine Tower of Eneomaios | Michiru Yamane |
| The Incredible Crash Dummies | Level 2 | Geoff Follin, Tim Follin |
| Fatal Fury 3: Road to the Final Victory | Chi!! Chi!! Chi!! Chi!! (Hon Fu's Theme) | Masahiko Hataya |
| Spindizzy II | Eternal Move | Toshiya Yamanaka, Tetsuya Nakano |
...and listeners like YOU.
Shinsekai Gakkyoku Zatsugidan is the name of SNK's sound team.
ReplyDeleteThat Hon Fu track was composed by Masahiko Hataya (credited in the game as Papaya).
-Electricboogaloo
I came across that Spindizzy II track randomly on YouTube years ago, and I instantly loved it! It lead me to Toshiya Yamanaka's other X68000 songs and I wasn't disappointed! Thanks Carlos for picking that awesome track, as well as the other songs in this episode!
ReplyDelete-Electricboogaloo
Wow, great tracks, Carlos! Let's see here, where to begin.....
ReplyDeleteThey had(have?) a Dreamworks arcade in Seattle years ago. I planned a surprise trip up there with my brother, my mom, and a few of my brother's friends for his 21st birthday. It was a sunny-mildly overcast Saturday morning. On the way up, I drove everyone in my mom's ageing maroon Chrysler LeBaron, and fell asleep. At the wheel. Driving about 80. In the fast lane.
I woke up to hear my mom screaming, "Look out!" as I swerved into the median. I had just enough time to start to correct, minimizing the initial impact. Somehow the back of the car, still with its left-drifting momentum, also hit the median(but no other part of the car in between), and blew out the back tire. Thank God this happened while I was in a wide pocket of no cars, and I was able to manhandle the car across three empty lanes and into the right shoulder. About 20 seconds later, I noticed flashing lights as a police vehicle pulled up behind us.
Against all odds, the officer hadn't seen the insanity, and was only stopping to offer traffic assistance while we looked at the tire. I don't remember the details of the next hour or so, but the short version is we got a ride to the nearest tire shop, it was just a quick stem replacement which they didn't even charge for, and before we knew it, we were on back on our way to Seattle.
How does this relate? Well, at Dreamworks, they had at least an 8-player sit down version of Daytona(although I thought it was 12, but that might just be my fisherman's tendencies), complete with cameras and monitors that showed the leader. And, on that Saturday, they had a race announcer doing play-by-play.
I waited my turn, and despite my middling abilities as a video game driver, I WON THE RACE. The announcer came up for a 10-second interview after the race, and I started to explain how it was ironic as I had gotten into an accident on the way up, but as the words came out, I was aware of how implausible they sounded, and how nobody but me really cared.....it wouldn't wipe off the scratches on my mom's car, but it bandaged my bruised ego a bit.
Regarding the ticking at the top of the Castlevania track, the detective part of me figured that if it ticked at 60 bpm then we could be certain it's a clock. But if it were another tempo, it might just be a metronome/the mechanical nature of the tower.
ReplyDeleteSo I checked, and it ticks faster at 63.5 bpm, but then I looked up the locale and the Machine Tower of Eneomaios *is* a clocktower.
So I think it *is* a clock ticking, but it's clicking fast or...alternatively, it represents the sped-up way time feels when you're infiltrating an enemy tower (or playing a great game with rad music).
Oh man! This playlist was so... so... me! Michiru Yamane, Neo Geo, flippin' Darkstalkers!? Carlos and I must be on the same wavelength or something. All I can say is, you have excellent taste in vgm, my friend!
ReplyDeleteThis episode was just what I needed after finding out the local game place sold me a bootleg GBA game. (Though, I'm a little more upset with myself for not recognizing it as a bootleg in the first place.)
I am glad you won the quizxx, Carlos, so we could have this great mixx of tracks!
ReplyDeleteWow, thanks for all the great comments, everyone. Josh and Emily's recent remarks about cleaning up the comments on the site made me realize I never took a look at this episode to see if anyone had any feedback.
ReplyDeleteSuper happy to see that so many people enjoyed it! I had fun putting it together for sure.
Utopia Nemo, that's such a crazy story! Glad you were ok, and glad it added to your Daytona victory!
EB - Finding about Toshiya Yamanaka was like an epiphany. He's really become one of my favorite composers. Glad you had a similar experience.
ZaCH - I bet Dracula's clock follows its own beat, haha. Nice sleuthing! It's a great track either way, I <3 Michiru Yamane.
goemonsama - *fist bump Hell yeah, man. We are vgm bros! Sometimes bootleg stuff can be fun, too. Hope that panned out for you.
JT - High praise from the master. I absolutely LOVE your takeover. So glad you had a good time with my episode!
Thanks again, everyone. You rule!
I just realized Kung-Fu Carlito’s initials are KFC. What to do about that? Anyway.....
ReplyDeleteThat remake of Passing Breeze is so good. I especially love the drums.
Pianos and pipe organs are associated with vampires(or vice versa) because of the baroque connection. The reason certain instruments are “always” invoked to evoke certain feelings or vibes has to do with what I call the orbit of association. Every instrument orbits a certain association; by that I mean there is a certain cultural metadata that people collectively associate with that instrument. The instrument usually follows this orbit until some piece or music(or collection or style) comes along with a strong enough cultural impact to form a new orbit.
For example, the marimba was almost exclusively used to evoke an African or tribal sound, until Thomas Newman scored Unstrung Heroes, and then American Beauty. Newman’s a brilliant film composer, probably my favorite. He takes textures out of context to create complex, nuanced emotional tonalities. In so doing, he created a new orbit for the marimba. For a few years, the instrument was used all over the place, and became associated with understated quirkiness and ennui. Fittingly, the last time I remember hearing the marimba being featured prominently was in Ubisoft France’s Rayman 2 for the Dreamcast (nobody does quirky ennui like the French).
Wait, you guys were sending people banana candy? How did I forget that? That’s hilarious!