VG Frequency

By: David Lloyd, dlloyd@ocremix.org

“Whether I’m writing an original or remixing something from a video game, my inspirations never change. My music listening history is one big collage, and I try to pull on all of that.”

- Dain Olsen, OC ReMix Interview

June 21, 2008

Fairfax, VA — OverClocked ReMix today published an interview with OC ReMixer & Dance Dance Revolution musician Dain “Beatdrop” Olsen, in addition to posting a brand new ReMix of his from the soundtrack to Capcom’s Mega Man X3 for the SNES. Dain talks about the creation of his latest mix, his approach to mixing game music, and his involvement with Konami’s DDR competition, which landed him a spot on the soundtrack to Dance Dance Revolution SuperNOVA 2.

The interview is available online at:

http://www.ocremix.org/info/ReMixer_Interview:_Beatdrop_%28Dain_Olsen%29

Mega Man X3 ‘Revolutions’ is available for streaming and free download at:

http://www.ocremix.org/remix/OCR01727/

About OverClocked ReMix

Founded in 1999, OverClocked ReMix is an organization dedicated to the appreciation, preservation, and interpretation of video game music. Its primary focus is www.ocremix.org, a website featuring hundreds of free fan arrangements, information on game music and composers, resources for aspiring artists, and a thriving community of video game music fans.

By: Larry Oji, larryoji@ocremix.org

“A good tune is a good tune. That’s basically it! If a melody can stand the test of time when it’s being played with a one channel sine wave, then it can stand being a fully orchestrated piece of music. I guess really it’s substance over style.”

- Tim Wright, OC ReMix Interview

June 5, 2008

Fairfax, VA — OverClocked ReMix today published its first video game composer interview, with pioneering British VGM composer Tim “CoLD SToRAGE” Wright. Wright helped usher electronica into professional game scores with his work on the landmark racing title Wipeout, released in 1995 by Psygnosis for the then-emerging Sony PlayStation. The interview touches on other career highlights such as Wright’s days composing for the Commodore Amiga, his development of popular music creation programs eJay and MUSIC (a.k.a. MTV Music Generator), and his upcoming original album, CoLD SToRAGE HD, which functions as an unofficial soundtrack to Sony’s latest title in the Wipeout franchise, Wipeout HD for the PlayStation 3.

The interview is available online at http://www.ocremix.org/info/Composer_Interview:_CoLD_SToRAGE_%28Tim_Wright%29.

Conducted by site staff, OC ReMix interviews cover major aspects of a composer’s career, featuring targeted questions unique to each subject, as well a standard list of questions that specifically delve into a musician’s formative years, creative inspirations, and views on the current state of the game music industry. This unique format presents both a contemporary look at a composer’s recent activities as well as more comprehensive questions about the nature of video game music composition.

About OverClocked ReMix

Founded in 1999, OverClocked ReMix is an organization dedicated to the appreciation, preservation, and interpretation of video game music. Its primary focus is www.ocremix.org, a website featuring hundreds of free fan arrangements, information on game music and composers, resources for aspiring artists, and a thriving community of video game music fans.

Links

• Composer Interview: CoLD SToRAGE (Tim Wright)
• OC ReMix interviews
• Tim Wright Composer Profile at OC ReMix
• The Official CoLD SToRAGE Website
• Purchase the albums of CoLD SToRAGE
• Wright’s company, Tantrumedia Multimedia Solutions
• CoLD SToRAGE @ MySpace

We think you need to. For the past two years, we’ve been attending this event called MAGFest (that is, the Music and Gaming Festival). Short of knocking on djpretzel’s, zircon’s or my (Liontamer’s) door, this will be one of the best chances to not only meet us, the crew behind OC ReMix, but also to meet a whole ton of OC ReMixers. Not only that, but you’ll get to spend New Year’s weekend with us and party it up. This will be the seventh time they’ve thrown this shindig!

If you’re at all into video games and music, this will be the place to be this upcoming year. There’s so many fun things to do, you’ll wonder where your weekend went! Video game composers like Howard Drossin (with several Sonic titles to his credit) and Jake “virt” Kaufman (Contra 4 and TMNT on the DS) will be around. And Friday and Saturday nights are filled with concerts from video game bands! The Advantage, Minibosses, and NESkimos have all performed there in the past. This year’s lineup of bands will be out soon, including some familiar names from OCR.

The best part is that even after all of that, you haven’t even experienced half of the event! You can hit the video room and watch game movies and cartoons, buy stuff from the people in the marketplace, go to video game panels and discussions (including our own OC ReMix bash), or just play games the whole time. There’s over 10,000 square feet of just console, PC, and even arcade games, and it doesn’t close AT ALL during the entire duration of the event. If you want to play Rock Band on a stage for hours on end with José the Bronx Rican, you can! Or if you wanna challenge James Rolfe, the Angry Video Game Nerd, go ahead and call him OUT!

Here’s what me and some other folks had to say about last year’s MAGFest:
* http://www.vgfrequency.com/magfest-6-from-alexandria-va-13-day-1-report/
* http://www.destructoid.com/magfest-vi-highlights-65679.phtml
* http://revver.com/video/625357/magfest-vi/
* http://www.megatonik.com/2007/12/18/we-rock-hard-we-play-hard-magfest-cometh/
* http://gamemusic4all.blogspot.com/2008/01/magfest-vi-wrapup.html

Now that you want to go, lemme mention the important stuff:
- It’s in Alexandria, VA, in a 5-star Hilton, which is a quick ride from DC (Reagan National Airport).
- It’s Thursday-Sunday, Jan 1-4, 2009. If you’re not free on New Year’s Day, you can come Friday and not miss too much.
- Like many good things, it costs money. But $40 isn’t too bad for all weekend!

And here are a few links for you:
* Their site: http://magfest.org/
* The info on the hotel and directions: http://magfest.org/info/
* The preregistration page: http://courtwright.org/magfest/preregistration

Preregister for MAGFest soon to make sure you’re there! Their hotel is already accepting room reservations, and they even got the rates down for us that aren’t so lucky in the money department. It’s only $99 a night to stay at the hotel MAGFest is in, and come on, it looks like the Citadel! Split it with a few friends and that price goes down VERY fast. If you’re already sold on it, call them up and reserve a room at 703-845-1010 any time of day (they’re a hotel, ya know).

Let them know MAGFest and OC ReMix sent you (and make sure to be at the OC ReMix panel), and we’ll see you there!

Larry “Liontamer” Oji
Head Submissions Evaluator, OverClocked ReMix
Creator, VG Frequency
http://www.ocremix.org
http://www.vgfrequency.com

Shawn Galway, the Nostalgiaholic (and I’ll guess Martin Galway’s lost lost cousin), conducted an interview with me at Nostalgiaholic.com! I really enjoyed it, so of course I’m gonna share it with you guys.

We discussed what game soundtracks roped me into video game music, my responsibilities at OverClocked ReMix, and how game music connects with its fans. There’s also a mention of how OC ReMixers are now bringing it to video games as professional musicians, including a pimp of the upcoming Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix. All that, AND I poop on Captain N!

Do me a favor a rate the article at the bottom of the page and/or throw Shawn a comment just to let him know you stopped by! Let’s get nostalgic, y’all.

• Interview
• ReMix

‘Nuff said.

For quite a long time, the most comprehensive database of VGM albums was Japan Game Music Library, or J.G.M.L. The Japanese-language resource catalogs a whopping 7,243 albums, and is most impressively maintained by a single person, Fumiaki Kosiro.

On March 16, album number 7,244 was added to VGMdb, a five-track Legend of Zelda series fan arrangement CD, The Legend of Zelda EP, arranged and performed by Echo Park group Batphone. With this addition, VGMdb is now the largest VGM album database on the internet. The milestone occurred, coincidentally, six months to the day after VGMdb opened for public beta.

And the person who submitted the album? None other than Larry Oji himself.

The comparison to J.G.M.L. is a bit unfair, since VGMdb’s scope is much wider; J.G.M.L.’s focus is mainly on official, Japanese-released soundtracks and arrangement albums, while VGMdb also has many Western albums, fan arrangement albums, original works by VGM composers, game-related anime soundtracks, and so on. As such, there are still quite a few albums listed on J.G.M.L. that VGMdb does not contain.

Still, it was an exciting milestone to break, and there is still a wealth of unlisted albums remaining to be added, as well as other features and site improvements. Here’s to 10,000!

Early this week, the regulars of SoundTempest were treated to a surprise when legendary Commodore composer and demoscene enthusiast Jeroen “WAVE” Tel showed up to participate in SoundTempest’s regular compo series, CompoST.

zircon, SoundTempest’s creator, hollered at me to come on over, and CHz and I joined in the discussion while OverCoat and other ST regulars got along famously with Tel as well as Peter “Skaven” Habja, who also stopped by briefly.

In the 1-hour time limit compo featuring a factory theme, Tel competed alongside OverCoat, madbrain, Nario and Coda, scoring the victory with his track “Industrial Factory”, available from the CompoST 72’s archive.

Anyone can join in future original music compos with CompoST by joining #soundtempest on the EsperNet network via IRC. Thanks to OverCoat, you never know who will show up!

OverClocked ReMix judge and director of the Final Fantasy VII tribute album Voices of the Lifestream (http://ff7.ocremix.org) Andrew “zircon” Aversa was recently voted the winner of SquareSound’s (www.squaresound.com) “A Tribute to Nobuo Uematsu” Arrangement Competition. The winning participant out of 53 entries with his Final Fantasy VI medley “Dirt Devil,” Aversa earned a combined score of 96.22%. zircon walked away with the grand prize of a limited edition promotional copy of Voices of the Lifestream, and two VIP tickets to the March 1, 2008 performance of Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy (www.ffdistantworlds.com), including the official concert program and limited edition CD, performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra. The tickets to the Chicago concert include entrance to the exclusive meet-and-greet with Final Fantasy series composer Nobuo Uematsu following the performance.

Emerging as runner-up was Kenley Kristofferson, who runs the Into the Score podcast (www.intothescore.com) dedicated to the academic study of video game music, with his own Final Fantasy VI medley, “Hundreds of Voices (Swinging in Unison!).” All of the entries are available for download on SquareSound’s website, and Aversa’s winning piece was recently posted to OverClocked ReMix (www.ocremix.org).

Larry “Liontamer” Oji, OC ReMix’s head submissions evaluator and among the competition’s four judges, noted the prestige of what was at stake: “It was definitely a privilege to judge such an important competition from SquareSound, with a very meaningful first prize on the line. Having the opportunity to meet any composer in person, let alone Nobuo Uematsu, and express one’s fandom and thanks is something a lot of musicians in the community don’t have the good fortune to experience.”

zircon will be attending Distant Worlds with girlfriend and fellow OC ReMix judge Jillian “pixietricks” Goldin. Having created Voices of the Lifestream, Aversa hopes to present his awarded copy of the album to Uematsu in person: “Both Jill and myself are really excited to see Distant Worlds and meet Mr. Uematsu, even if only briefly. We’re huge fans of his music; between the two of us, we’ve remixed over a dozen of his compositions. I personally consider him to be my all-time favorite video game music composer. It will be a dream come true if I can personally hand him a copy of Voices of the Lifestream.”

Links:

*SquareSound: Andrew Aversa Wins Our Tribute to Nobuo Uematsu Arrangement Competition!
*SquareSound
*Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy
*Andrew “zircon” Aversa at OverClocked ReMix
*Kenley Kristofferson at Into the Score
*Larry “Liontamer” Oji at VG Frequency
*Jillian “pixietricks” Goldin at OverClocked ReMix
*Nobuo Uematsu (????) at OverClocked ReMix
*Voices of the Lifestream

Tim Maxwell of SquareSound has publicized the final set of prizes for the Tribute to Nobuo Uematsu Arrangement Competition, with the all-important tickets to Chicago’s upcoming performance of Distant Worlds hanging in the balance. Well, I’m helping to judge this bad boy, so let’s hope you’ve got what it takes:

The prize packages for the winners of the Tribute to Nobuo Uematsu Arrangement Competition have now been completely finalized. The grand prize isn’t changing obviously, but we finalized some other details. Here’s the rundown:

The grand prize winner will get:

• Two VIP tickets to the Distant Worlds concert in Chicago on March 1, 2008
• A free concert program
• A free Distant Worlds CD
• Entrance to the meet-and-greet with Nobuo Uematsu after the concert
• One copy of the OverClocked ReMix exclusive Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream CD set

The first runner-up will receive:

• A free Distant Worlds CD
• One copy of the OverClocked ReMix exclusive Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream CD set

The 3rd through 5th place finishers will receive:

• One copy of the OverClocked ReMix exclusive Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream CD set

In the event that the grand prize winner is unable to attend the concert, that person will receive a copy of the Distant Worlds CD hand-signed by Nobuo Uematsu. We will try to film the signing of this album for the winner, but we cannot guarantee this. In addition, this person will receive a $100 gift certificate from our store. The tickets will then be offered to runners-up in succession until we find a contestant that is able to attend the concert.

Once we determine who has won the tickets, we will arrange for them to be placed at the will-call window at the concert venue (the Rosemont Theater) for pickup prior to the show. Tickets may not be sold or transferred.

That about wraps things up! Today is the last day to submit arrangements for those who registered, and the winner should be announced within a week. Good luck everyone!

Ha, I’m in it, so clearly this is the best MAGFest 6-related video out there. If you haven’t heard of MAGFest, check out my highlights for some initial insight. Before you check out “MAGFest VI: The Montage”, let’s get the breakdown from PBC Productions (makers of The New Adventures of Captain S):

This week’s selection is a lovingly prepared memento of the greatness that was MAGFest VI. Chock full of peppy VG music, quick cuts, and hilarious footage captured by Devon Riley and Josh Kopstein, it’ll bring back all your greatest MAG moments in a torrent of radness that will have you counting the days until MAGFest VII.

I actually forgot to mention this since KyleJCrb took a while to get the archive posted up, but a few weeks ago I guest hosted Nitro Game Injection #110 alongside Kyle and Mae. We had a great selection of holiday-themed video game music, but not in the traditional sense of picking Xmas material. Kyle and I worked around that by picking lots of material with holiday/winter-themed names.

We three also reviewed 8bitpeople’s The 8bits of Christmas and the legendary Konami arrange album Kukeiha Club pro-fusion ~Salamander~. If you want to hear how some great stuff from Street Fighter EX2 Plus and D2 actually fits in with the wintery show format, definitely check it out.

Our friends over at SquareSound are holding an arrangement competition in tribute to Final Fantasy musical legend Nobuo Uematsu. The winner will receive two VIP tickets to the upcoming Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy concert in Chicago on March 1, 2008. The VIP tickets include prime seats at the concert, a free concert CD and program, and the ability to attend an exclusive meet-and-greet session with Mr. Uematsu himself following the performance.

OverClocked ReMix has donated copies of Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream as prizes, and head submissions evaluator Larry “Liontamer” Oji will be assisting with submissions evaluations.

In order to qualify, entrants must submit their own unique arrangement of any of Mr. Uematsu’s compositions. Registration for this competition is open until Tuesday, January 22nd and the finished arrangement must be submitted by February 8th.

For more details and to get registered, please visit SquareSound’s Competition Page.

The final day of MAGFest would seemingly be when things died down, but right after day 3’s concerts, the peoples were awake, and they were still busy. Immediately after the conclusion of the Smash Bros. set, Paragon conducted the annual tradition of announcing the results for this month’s Dwelling of Duels. SnappleMan did a great job in winning last year, but musicalman took it home this year with the gold trophy. Props to everyone who participated, good or bad. There were so many participants this go, it was impossible to keep track of them all, but I made sure to congratulate guys like Danimal Cannon, Hope Fails, and norg for being part of the reason the competition was both strong and interesting this year. Afterwards, Mustin did the honors of snapping the yearly photos of the Shizzies gathering for MAG this year.

Afterward, it was time to hang with some OC ReMix peeps as we watched the Hellgate: London trailer bustatunez scored before moving on to other flavors of the internet. You put a bunch of people in a room who’ve seen it all, and of course 2girls1cup and 2girls1finger are just two of the many new staples of grossout internet memes of the past year.

SnappleMan later joined the room and kept it real (as always) talking about the dramas of MAGFest, including police situations, helping run the audio for the concerts, dealing with the drummer of The Advantage, Spencer Seim, nearly walking out of their performance (twice), mig50 getting thrown out of the hotel for not paying, housethegrate also getting the boot, the audio crew watching hardcore porn on via laptop and mortifying Select Start’s Elaine Li when she discovered it, and his overall thoughts on all the performances. If you haven’t already befriended this man, you need to. Just talking with Andy for a hour, he makes MAG worth the entire trip.

D-Lux and I rolled over to the VGMix room to chat with tumult, Matt Pollard, Shawn Phase and Shnabubula about the chaos of the festival, as some of us were complaining about possibly losing the hotel for next year due to this year’s craziness. Just like SnappleMan, shooting the shit with Matt and tumult is great when you wanna talk with no bullshit. Shawn actually made a good point about how he didn’t get wasted at MAG so he could enjoy as much of the event as possible, but Matt had been drunk from the moment he got there!

As night turned into day, myself, D-Lux, Joe Cam, Wire and Maximo Lorenzo stopped by the MAGFest staff room (a sea of tired bodies) and made our way to the staff’s private jacuzzi. Isn’t Joe Cam getting married? Well, that didn’t stop him from climbing in the jacuzzi with Wire. They all had their clothes on. Let me never see Cam in white boxers ever again! Maximo drew pictures of Wire and myself for her as little mementos for the trip. It was definitely an honor being sketched by Max, who’s done some cool stuff with Tokyopop and constantly strives to up his game.

After I left the staff room, I walked around the hotel for a few minutes until I ran into virt, SnappleMan and OverCoat chilling in the lobby, with Shnabubula coming over later to shoot the shit. It was definitely great just getting to hang out with those guys further. With so many personalities around, and friends from across the world to hang with, it’s impossible to see everyone you want to, even in 4 days. You’ve really gotta be content with what time you do get.

Ironically enough, I tried staying awake all night in order to attend ThaSauce’s rescheduled panel. So of course, when I got there…I fell asleep. Across four chairs.

Attending Kroze’s machinima panel was quite the educational experience, including the debut of the trailer for Eden: The Zhang Chronicles, featuring bustatunez handling the score. Once that wrapped up, we amassed more signatures for the deadly OCR guitar in the lobby, where most of the people said their goodbyes and got their last time in socializing. Injury and Mustin snapped a photo in the lobby, always a great contrast with a short lady and a tall man!

Afterward, lots of the OCR crew headed over to Popeyes for the best friend chicken in the world. OA and AeroZ both got to sample Popeyes wares for the first time to some very satisfied results. (Love that chicken.) Most of the crew then said their goodbyes and headed off for parts unknown while those who remained headed back to the hotel for closing ceremonies. It was good being able to listen to Brendan (Mr. MAGFest) thanking everyone on staff who made the event such a huge success, as usual.

Shuttling back home from the hotel (I live close), I got to meet cacomistle for the first time. He’s done some nice chiptune material for Mega Twerp, and also participates in Dwelling of Duels, but I never had the pleasure of getting to chat with Brian until right at the end of MAG on the way home. What did I tell you about not having enough time to get to hang with everyone? Nonetheless, definitely a pleasant surprise.

Once I got back home to my sick lady, I bought her a big cheeseburger from Johnny Rockets and exhaled. You probably wouldn’t want MAGFest to be a week or your entire life (who could process it all?), but for any gamer and especially video game music fan, the 4 days of MAGFest are worth their weight in gold. It’s the right way to start off any year. Down the line, we’ll supplement the blog with pieces of MAGFest 6 nostalgia, but for now all I can say is you have to make it out to this yearly event no matter who you are. You’ll always be glad you went.

Ok, so while Day 1 of MAGFest 6 was awesome, I completely missed Day 2.

LOOK, HEAR ME OUT!

Ha! But yeah, the short of it was that my lady, THE Lady, the esteemed Paige came down with a virus and felt like…let’s say “poop” and be generous. I took her over to the urgent care clinic to get checked out, but waited until late in the evening. I tend to play things by ear, so I didn’t bother checking when the concerts would be. “6PM,” you say? Well, shit. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have left for the clinic at 5:50PM, now would I? Regardless, she felt bad enough where I stayed home afterwards and took care of her, so I missed out on all of day 2! If you’ve ever been in a position where you’ve regretted everything while regretting nothing, you know how I felt. (That’s love! Try it sometime!)

If you have MAGFest thoughts to share so far, please comment or send them in; we’d love to hear from you on this always amazing yearly event. But to give you a taste of what took place on Friday, let’s hook you up with something I missed myself as Thursday turned into Friday after the opening ceremonies: Shnabubula performing in MAG’s Jamspace room.

A new addition to the event, Jamspace is the only place where artists can plug in and do their thing nearly any time of day. Whether it’s turntabling or performing live, if you’ve got the goods, you’re ready to play. Some instruments were already provided to Jamspace for use during the festival, and Sam quickly showed off the potential of the idea, brought to you by ThaSauce.

Maybe you’ve already seen some of his previous performance videos. But they’re nothing like the Final Fantasy VI arrangement “Terra’s Got Her Groove Back.” Enjoy!

Gonna keep it (relatively) short and sweet with some personal comments on day 1 of MAGFest 6:

I managed to make it to the gorgeous Hilton Mark Center in Alexandria, VA with a few minutes to spare for the Opening Ceremonies, and was up on stage along with most of the other guests in order to pimp the many panel set for the convention, including OC ReMix involving myself. djpretzel wasn’t able to swing by due to still having to go into work the following day, but he should be at MAG through the rest of the weekend. When the opening ceremonies were over and everyone dispersed, I hung back and chatted with various community peeps; one highlight was having Nario of VGMix/DoD infamy believe I was djpretzel, which had me literally ROFLing with Mustin nearby.

Always glad to see tons of people who I’ve previously met, though nothing beats meeting new people as well, including CHz, ktriton, AeroZ, Shnabubula, Dhsu, Danimal Cannon, Species8472, jvincion, Suzumebachi, and several others who’ve made their impact in the scene. Danimal thanked me for the kind words I’ve said about Armcannon in the past, which encouraged him to take a chance and submit material to OC ReMix despite some members of The Shizz having a negative opinion of the site. Dan mentioned how some tensions between live musicians and desktop musicians have led to friction, and how it’s been good for both of us to see that lessening in favor of raising the profile of the entire scene.

Daniel “Kareshi” Brown was giving out promotional copies of Nintendo on Piano, including a bonus disc with additional material, including sheet music. Definitely a great score for any doujin fan. It was also good to see Dan add Battletoads to his repertoire this year! Look for a review of Nintendo on Piano down the line here, as I check out the goods.

I had a good time handing out our promotional DVD copies of Voices of the Lifestream to the many, many contributors who are attending MAGFest this year and had my personal copy of the album signed by Big Giant Circles, zircon, pixietricks, bustatunez, Geoffrey Taucer, Shnabubula, Mustin, Dhsu, SnappleMan, norg and Suzumebachi. I also had virt sign my copy of Nintendo Power #218, featuring the Contra 4 developers, WayForward Technologies, revealing Jake’s scoring of the soundtrack to the newly-released Nintendo DS hit.

Dwelling of Duels capped off my night, as I hung around with the most die-hard of die-hards for the over 6-hour listening party voting on entries of this month DoD Free Month. The 11+ minute Secret of Mana arrangement “Let Me Tell You a Secret” had everyone laughing hard after a long night of listening. Hopefully my personal favorite, Splatterhouse “TERRORMASK”, has an impressive showing; I gave it all the support I could with my only 6 point vote of the night, the most points that can be given to any track as part of a voter’s 50 point spread.

Day 2’s only gonna be bigger and better as more people arrive in Northern Virginia for the convention and we enter our first night of concerts. Along with the aforementioned Arm Cannon, there are gonna be some other great live performances over this weekend, including the supergroup of The Smash Bros. as well as Temp Sound Solutions, The Advantage, Select Start, PlanetSkill and This Place is Haunted. Really looking forward to providing more thoughts in the coming days.

I was pretty bummed when djpretzel & I realized that we had completely missed out on the T-MODE Anime & Gaming convention this past October in the Crystal City area of Arlington, Virginia. Not only was the con really close for both of us, but djp had already been planning to go to Anime USA, also in Crystal City as soon as he had heard of it. What were the odds that there would be TWO conventions in Arlington in as many months? So yeah, we missed out on that (we missed Armcannon perform, dammit) Of course, if we had known, we would have definitely attended that as well and spread the OC ReMix gospel.

Having missed T-MODE, we had to be content with Anime USA as our one local con this year. After several months of djp attempting to establish contact with the Anime USA staff, we actually ran into some miscommunication with the staff days before the convention. With only a few days left before the con and still no reply to 3 emails, desperate times called for desperate measures. djp inquired about our panel time confirmation and how to get guest status down the line by mailing the entire staff list and someone on staff assumed he was demanding guest status for this year’s convention on very short notice. All that said, a learning experience with the risks of encountering unresponsive staff as well as signals getting crossed. Luckily, AUSA Chairman Mark Pope took some time to write back, handling himself like a genuine professional and easily clearing up the situation.

On the day of, our panel was filled to about 75% capacity, a good turnout considering the one major drawback of the convention: the Hyatt Regency Crystal City’s layout and jam-packed capacity made it very difficult for attendees to actually make it to the third floor, where many of the panels were taking place. Despite having at least six elevators, the atmosphere couldn’t have been any busier (a good thing, depending on your POV), making the elevators practically inaccessible. And as much as I don’t mind walking up a flight of stairs or taking the much longer route to the third floor, just try to convince large groups of people to do the same and you can see why we ran into a problem. Ease of access (well, the lackthereof) turned out to be pretty critical. Even after the panel, when I helped bring instruments out of the hotel, the wait for an elevator car that wasn’t packed (much less arrive) dragged on for over 15 minutes before we gave up and very slowly and gingerly walked the equipment downstairs.

The panel itself went very well, the AUSA staff was helpful making sure we were set up OK, and we had a solid turnout of very knowledgeable fans. The panelists were made up of us Virginia locals, djpretzel, Palpable and myself. Besides discussing the basics about OCR (how it started, the creativity factor, the selection process and judges, the albums, the meetups, etc.), we all talked about how we got into game music ourselves, and offered some ReMix Name That Tune action in order to giveaway OCR T-shirts and limited edition promo copies of Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream. Brendan “Mr. MAGFest” Becker was also there to plug January’s upcoming MAGFest 6 convention & concert series in neighboring Alexandria, VA (be there).

One of the great things we rolled out, new for our panels and apropos for an anime convention, was a spotlight on fan-made AMVs using OC ReMixes. You can check some out at the OC ReMix YouTube group. Among others, we had some examples of Final Fantasy VII videos underscoring our pending Voices of the Lifestream AMV contest, as well a Chrono Trigger video with game footage synched up to Star Salzman’s “The Incredible Singing Robot,” and the very well-received AMV based on José the Bronx Rican’s “Spittin’ Narcissism.”

The highlight of the event was the live performance from the band Flickerfall, comprised of OCR Judge Vinnie “Palpable” Prabhu and Amy “diotrans” Hsieh, with their take on Nobuo Uematsu’s “Eyes on Me” from Final Fantasy VIII. James “Teknoboy” Winfield captured footage of the performance, now available on YouTube:

All in all, we had a lot of fun at Anime USA mingling with fans and pimping OCR as only we can do. A few within our group commented that AUSA’s Artists Alley was arguably stronger than Otakon’s, which was quite impressive to say the least. Whether it’s Anime USA, T-MODE, or Katsucon, conventions in the DC Metro area are always a great, accessible opportunity to support local events and spread the word on the greatness of video game music.

With Anime USA under our belt, we’re always looking to expand our con appearances. Keep an eye out in 2008, as we already have two exciting dates coming up. Obviously, VGF will be there to let you know the plans once we’re ready to announce the specific dates.

OC ReMix judge and all-around swell coffee-and-cream stallion Larry “Liontamer” Oji (Editor’s note: When you write about yourself, you can make the description colorful too) interviewed on this past Sunday’s broadcast of Nitro Game Injection, episode #103, now available for download. Let’s drop the 3rd-person pretense so I can overview my appearance. Myself and the NGI duo, KyleJCrb & AkumuHau discussed:

*KyleJCrb: Did the vikings even know of Africa? I don’t think so. [laughs]
*Akumu’s English (!)
*My background in the community
*What I look for in a good VGM arrangement
*The stupidity of artists who react poorly to criticisms
*Criticisms of the VGMix review system
*How Akumu got involved in the VGM fan arrangement scene
*The burden of provide content to readers or listeners
*The origin of Akumu’s NSF Archive
*The Cheetahmen
*Criticisms of Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream
*Akumu hanging with Chris Hülsbeck and Arnie Roth at PLAY!
*The VG Frequency blog
*The worldwide depth of the VGM fan arrangement scene
*Criticisms of Dwelling of Duels
*Artists who refuse to arrange from game soundtrack they’re not nostalgic for
*Our own video game nostalgia; and
*What I want to see from the fan arrangement community in the future including pimpage for The OneUps, Minibosses and zircon

My appearance also features 4 tracks personally chosen for airplay by me, selections from ktriton & Christian Pacaud, Israfel, Tim Follin and S.S.H. Random: At the 136-minute mark, the word we were looking for was “refugee”. Also, you’re put on notice not to listen to the show at work. It’s not work-safe in the slightest. Tune into the recently resurrected show Sunday nights, 6PM EST.

For a hater like myself, I rarely, if ever, gush about the talents of an OC ReMixer. There are definitely a lot of talented people out there, and I plan to profile a few more when I get a chance, but as a wanna-be I hold a special place in my musical heart for Jillian Goldin, a.k.a. pixietricks. Not only is she a classically trained vocalist at one of the best music schools in the country, AND a great arrangement artist, but she’s also a cool person who’s got a tremendous career ahead of her be it belting out Mozart or Nobuo Uematsu. Heck, she’s already been featured in Firaxis Games‘ Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword expansion pack.

And this wouldn’t be my column if I didn’t also say that Jill’s work is some of the most accessible to mainstream listeners, especially those who like new age artists like Enya or Loreena McKennitt. And I’m not the only one who thinks so…ask radioMystic, an online New Age radio station that made Jill artist of the month.

I can also appreciate a woman making it in a man’s world, or, in this case the OCR Judges Panel–of which she is the first “feminines” as Larry would say and one of the few female ReMixers on the site overall. I remember when Jill was asked to be on the judges panel and Larry, ever the gentleman, was telling the judges that they were going to have to seriously curtail their language/nasty chat on their IRC channel when she joined. And let’s not talk about how many OCR message board members have pervy animated GIFs of bouncing, barely clothed breasts in their signatures.

But back to the music. Jill has a pretty distinctive style for her ReMixes–on occasion she’s been known to even bust out a bit of opera here and there. But for the most part, they are sweeping, cinematic (don’t those two words always go together?) and relaxing. For all the drama of the arrangement, many of Jill’s songs, in my mind are lullabies that you can easily put on repeat and go on about your Net surfing, romancing, or meditating business.The song I’ve highlighted for this column, “Journey’s End”, a ReMix of a Final Fantasy X theme, is actually a collaboration between Jill, GrayLightning (Gray Alexander), and Sephfire (Daniel Floyd). And what a collab it was!

I do feel compelled to note that GrayLightning sort of disappeared from the ReMixing scene with some cryptic note about moving on with his life or something. We’ll never know what happened to him, but I wish him well, and it’s certainly a great loss to the community that he’s not around to see it grow and develop as it has.

As a concept, this song could probably be it’s own track in a Final Fantasy game. Imagine Yuna sitting outside on as the summer’s evening as the stars shine and she dreams about Tidus. Maybe there is such a scene in the game, with sparkles falling and Yuna and Tidus floating up into the air. Oh wait…there is.

The structure of this song really sweetens the deal. You’ve got Jill’s voice as the focus, with a “pulsing boosh-ah” techno beat running at the bottom driving the song forward, and an airy piano/synthy bit floating up top. It’d be a great driving song for a late night ride home while the city sleeps, if you know what I mean. And when you get to your, ahem, “Journey’s End” you may have the recurring theme stuck in your head for a while–in a nice way, that is.

In an almost ironic follow-up to the madfiddler plagiarism situation a few days ago, OverClocked ReMix’s latest album, the Final Fantasy VII tribute Voices of the Lifestream, was plagiarized on October 9 by 22-year-old Tijuana, Baja California resident Israel Alcántar González, otherwise known as DjNeTisra.

In an October 10 blog post (in Spanish, and has since been deleted), González claimed 13 of Voices‘ tracks as a new album called Materia 2007, complete with new album cover. In an audacious facade, González fabricated reasons for creating the songs, attributing bLiNd & Leifo’s track “Fading Entity” as being inspired by the “plight of the planet” in the face of pollution and global warming. González also claimed that other remixes would follow “with a lot of dedication,” implying plans to gradually use other arrangements stolen from the 45-track album as new releases.

A fan from the Tijuana area who personally knew González had heard of the release of Materia 2007 and passed along the news to another friend, who instantly recognized the album as being stolen from OC ReMix and immediately notified site creator David “djpretzel” Lloyd, who then threw out a forum message condemning the artistic theft.

González was confronted that night via MSN chat by album contributor Juan “Sixto Sounds” Medrano, a Texan, a Spanish speaker and one of the victims of the plagiarism. After questioning González on whether he made the tracks himself and subsequently confronting him about the theft, González quickly closed the chat session.

OC ReMix Judge and Voices contributor Larry “Liontamer” Oji then flooded DjNeTisra’s blogs and art galleries with information about the plagiarism, resulting in access to those areas promptly being removed by González. Liontamer and Sixto then registered at a local website for LAN gaming, LAN Party Tijuana (where González is an administrator) and proceeded to post information of the theft on every forum where González did not have administrative access.

Within minutes, González, who is bilingual, acknowledged his theft of Voices of the Lifestream and apologized profusely for the plagiarism, hoping to stop the confrontation:

About the Album, i feel very very sry about that. I mean, Really sry making all those fake credits about me and my music.

i will put those tracks with his orignal composers in my blog so people can see that is your own work, not mine.

So far, no acknowledgment of these actions or proper credit for the album has actually shown up on González’s blog. 60 minutes after the initial confrontation by Sixto, González finally deleted the stolen tracks, along with several folders worth of other tracks he had stolen credit for since mid-2006, including tracks from OC ReMix, VGMix and Anime Remix. Among many other artists, González had also been plagiarizing the work of Chris “goat” Gates, attempting to pass off most of goat’s discography as an album called “GOAT” in order to justify the music’s identification tags, even going so far as saying he would submit the works to both OC ReMix and VGMix in the future.

Based on further information from the Tijuana source, González claims he is a DJ and would hand out mix CDs of music he claimed as his own to girls in order to impress them, as well as frequenting Spanish anime fan forums under the DjNeTisra name to promote his stolen music. As early as 2005 González linked to OC ReMix and OCR webradio station Ormgas.com on his old blog.

***Editor’s note: We’re so tempted…

After spending a week island hopping in the Mediterranean Sea, I’m now in overcast, coastal Ireland and missing the sun. The water outside my window is a pale grey and the weatherman said we’d be lucky to get up to 70°F today. But my earphones are transporting me back to coastal France and Italy thanks to Adrian Holovaty’s Super Mario Bros. 2 ‘Gypsy Jazz.’

I’m a huge jazz fan, more typically into classic crooners like Old Blue Eyes, Edith Piaf, or Billie Holiday and thinking man’s jazz like Thelonius Monk and Duke Ellington…but every once in a while, I pull out my only Western Swing album (a dime-a-dozen TIME music collection kind of dealie that I’m embarrassed to admit I own) or flip on the Internets Radio [sic] and listen to West Coast Jazz. For an hour or two, everything’s chill and I’m content. But after a while, the soothing, enthusiastic lullabye of guitar jazz starts to wear on my nerves.

I hate to say it but so much guitar-based jazz (especially gypsy jazz) sounds the same to me—too happy, too simple, too…unashamedly temperate. Unless of course, I was riding a bike around Provençal France, making crepes, or filming a Yoplait commercial.

Which is why I had to give Holovaty credit for his ‘Gypsy Jazz.’ I’m pretty sure I recognize the source tune from this song as well, and although it doesn’t diverge overmuch from the original, it’s still a lovely little ditty that’ll get your feet tapping and certainly send a little sunny weather your way.

I think what makes this song so great for mainstream listeners is that, like good French food, Holovaty knows where to use restraint. He doesn’t go crazy with instrumentation or production. The sound, although it could be richer in parts, is like a well-worn record. While this may be frustrating for the more active listener, especially for guitar enthusiasts, I think it captures well the ambiance during which gypsy jazz evolved some 80-odd years ago.

I’m also always a little surprised jazz this good can be coaxed out of a Mario Bros. game. Hate me if you must, but I just don’t think the source material offers much to experiment with…classical, sure; techno/trance/electronica, bien sur, but jazz? Mes non.

This is probably also why there aren’t many other SMB jazz ReMixes available…and I’ve heard only one other that I think successfully transcended the VGM-mainstream music barrier. This may be because the main theme itself is already sort of jazzy.

But I am more than happy to be proven wrong again and again if there are any young derring dos out there willing to try. Or not so young…like this brave soul…

Working alongside zircon and JigginJonT, I’ve just finished my work/suggestions on trying nail down the track order for OverClocked ReMix’s latest album project arranging Final Fantasy VII, Voices of the Lifestream. So while I had already heard maybe 1/3rd of the album by being on the judges panel and giving feedback to colleagues, tonight is the first time I’ve actually heard everything.

…

…

…

THIS ALBUM IS AMAZING!

Straight up, it is a fucking amazing album, and I don’t even like Final Fantasy VII like that. Having never played it, I’ve just got no nostalgia for it. For the people that DO though, this is hopefully going to be greater than great. Forget the hyperbole of “best ever” or whatever. I’m just saying, this is a hell of a job.

A lot of us on staff are absolutely exhausted while we’re in the last stages of finalizing the album. As the project lead, zircon’s got the worst of it by far. Myself, I’m on my third day of no sleep.

But a lot of people are going to be impressed. I can’t wait for this one to drop.

Twas a good day in Reading this past Saturday spreading the OCR gospel at TooManyGames. Along with helping Carlson Stevens of Mad-Gear with his merchandise, djpretzel and I spent the day introducing many people to the concept of OverClocked ReMix as well as selling our own t-shirts and hoodies and catching up on our game nostalgia.

Founded and orgazined by Chuck Whitby (pictured at left), TooManyGames is retrogamer heaven. Sure, there were current games there as well, with Chuck himself rocking the hell out of Guitar Hero II with five buttons, along with tournaments for the hard-hitting Super Smash Bros. Melee and the not-as-hard-hitting but always fun Wii Sports: Bowling. But the soup of the day was old-school, with tons of classic gaming systems, games and peripherals.

Until TooManyGames, I had no conception of a Dreamcast fishing pole peripheral. But indeed, there it was. Neo-Geo MVS arcade game catridges bigger than VCR cassettes? You got it! Super Famicom and Mega-CD games? The imports flow like wine! Ataris, Commodore 64s, Intellivisions? You already know the answer! With no exaggeration, TooManyGames truly lives up to its name.

On the work side as it were, Carlson brought along a PA system that we were able to use to play OC ReMixes throughout the entire day, providing a great ambiance for the event. And with 93 hours of music to choose from, we had fun picking tracks to keep things moving as well as fielding a lot of game requests for attendees! Part of the fun was djpretzel hearing some of the older mixes and commenting on how kickass they were. With so many OC ReMixes out there today, sometimes we all need the reminder. Of note, po! & Joshua Morse’s Breath of Fire III collab “Watermelon Flava” and DHS’s Human Race mix “Bando alle Seghe.”

One great thing about selling merchandise for OCR is knowing that the goods aren’t poorly-made junk. One lucky new owner of a large hoodie was impressed by how soft the material was and how durable and comfortable the hoodie felt while wearing it. I’ve actually yet to snag mine, but I’ve already PayPal’ed the OCR account with my purchase, so I’m all set for next winter.

We definitely enjoyed the event and, besides being vendors, all three of us with Mad-Gear & OCR walked away from TooManyGames with some spirit-lifting swag for ourselves. Carlson scored a very rare NEC PC-FX for $100, while djpretzel saw a Sega Master System in good condition (with the original box, no less) and plunked down $45. Carlson hooked him up with a copy of Double Dragon for the Master System on the house, while djp also scored several additional titles including Hang-On/Safari Hunt, Great Basketball, Great Golf and Pro Wrestling.

Myself, I always regretted not buying a Sega Dreamcast back when the system was discontinued and they were priced at $50. So when I saw one on sale for $25, with two controllers even, my money was as good as gone. I can now get back to playing Capcom vs. SNK 2, Street Fighter Alpha 3 and Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike! If you’re looking for a fight in DC…

I definitely hope we at OCR can trek back up for next year. If you’re in the hunt for a good retrogaming experience, TooManyGames is a great spot for y’all in the Northeast US. Check them out, along with their list of vendors (especially Mad-Gear, the ONLY vendor inspired by Final Fight), and give them your support.

Along with our bro C of Mad-Gear LLC, djpretzel and I are literally minutes away from trucking up to Reading, PA for this year’s TooManyGames convention.

We’ll be helping C sell Mad-Gear’s eclectic game offerings, spanning many rare titles, as well as pimping out OCR t-shirts and hoodies, and spreading the good word about OverClocked ReMix. If you’re reading this and in the area, the event starts at 11AM and the admission is only $2. Hope to see you there.

Some of you might remember me from my days of guesting as Larry’s friend, and later Larry’s Lady, on his radio show. Back then, I was what people might call “a hater.”

Most of the video game music I had heard back then was stuff I didn’t like. It was too electronic, not very compelling melodically, and I wasn’t familiar with most of the games being referenced to appreciate VGM even from a nostalgic perspective.

Back then, Larry was diligent in his effort to bring me over to the dark side. We had always shared music we liked, and Larry refused to see VGM as a point of departure in taste like the Beastie Boys.

Why is it that every guy I know creams himself over that band? I’d much rather listen to “Lonely Swedish” than “Brass Monkey” if I had to make a terrible choice in hell or Abu Ghraib.

My esteem for VGM, well, more accurately, OCR, grew slowly, hesitantly. Perhaps, it was my pride, or my general tendency to be sparing with my praise, but upon hearing a track that wasn’t offensive, I would say something like “not terrible,” or shrug my shoulders non-committally.

Over the years, as the musical selection available at OCR grew more diverse, and the quality of musicians and production increased exponentially, I found there were more and more instances where I would begrudgingly say “I don’t hate it.”

And then, one fateful day, the sky fell in and I actually liked a song…in fact, I liked it so much, I unabashedly added it to my iPod.

Israfel (aka Michael Dover) gets full credit for the dastardly deed, with his most appealing “Cerebral Rose Jam” from the game, Shivers.

When djp wrote his write-up of the ReMix, he was on target when he said, “I’d imagine this ReMix will get more listeners from fans of Israfel than of the source material.”

What I loved about this mix was how atmospheric, exotic, and totally unexpected it was. Not to mention the fact that you can lull yourself into a gratifying stupor listening to CRJ on loop.

It’s a pretty moody mix, that alludes to summer evenings in Cairo, smoking a cheroot as you wait for your “man” on the dig to bring you a souvenir from King Tut’s Tomb.

It’s also damn sexy, and I wonder if Israfel didn’t spend his nights dreaming of someone special’s flat, sweaty tummy as he added in the darbuka (I think), finger cymbals (possibly tingsha), and jingle bells.

There’s lots of space in this track, which is what I think makes it so successful compared to other instrumental versions of “Middle Eastern-like” music, where usually the rhythm is so driving it’s hard to really immerse yourself in the theme.

In that respect, I think Israfel’s got a good vibe going on of what is very similar to maybe some Rabih Abou-Khalil’s Blue Camel and Sufi trance music.

WARNING! APPROACHING TANGENT:
Larry says, “Damn, that’s esoteric as fuck! Sufi trance music?”
I showed Larry a sample of what I was talking about. Larry thought I was talking about this.
That’s “trance” as in meditative music.

Now my suggestion to the haters, or, ahem, lovers as it were, is to pick this track up from OCR, put it your Winamp and turn off the lights. It will give you the “shivers.”

So, folks, if you like this, I’ll come back regularly with other songs I, the nay-saying mistress of mainstream (and mystical world music), actually like.

If I did quit the OC ReMix judges panel, I’d hope the aftermath was exactly like this:Who even made that? :-D I’ve seen the stock image before, but not with a black guy until now.

I’ve still got lots more work to do in terms of judging submissions. As of press time, we’ve got 54 submissions still on the panel, and I’ve yet to evaluate 11 of ‘em. It was 12, but I just YESed one (t’was good).

In terms of my personal progress, where I’m at isn’t so bad, but it’s certainly time consuming going through the submissions, comparing them with the original tracks and formulating opinions. Guys like Vigilante and DarkeSword have the ability to crank out brief but accurate criticisms down to a science.

Hopefully by September 9th though (the end of The Lady’s vacation), I’ll be all caught up to present day, which will be the first time anyone’s ever done it since what I’m guessing would be the first year of the OCR’s existence. It’s like moving a mountain. And there’s nothing glamorous about moving a mountain.