VG Frequency

Fans of the arranger band Project X have long enjoyed their albums covering the Mega Man II and Mega Man III soundtracks, as well as the first radio show that gained traction with the US-based fan arrangement community, Super Radio X. And though Rawk and Rok haven’t pursued video game music arrangements in quite a while, they’ve kept the Project X spirit alive for years with their original band, Clawjob.

The Allston, Massachusetts-based duo of Mike Gintz and Nick Burgess are reaching out to their fanbase via MySpace bulletin to let them know about their new club, the Society of Clawjob Aficionados. More than just a mailing list, if you sign up for free, the guys promise to mail members something before the holiday season is upon us. The band gives you the info:

Lovers of Clawjob have one great reason to give thanks this year as the beloved conceptual rock band unleashes a brilliant new idea upon the world! The twin geniuses describe their invention as a “club” for “fans,” or as they call it, an “international society of Clawjob aficionados, united by promotional freebies delivered via the postal service!”

Click here to join the Society of Clawjob Aficionados and get free delights in the mail!

From newsletters, exclusive artwork, and lyrics to stickers, music, and piles of cash*, you’ll get a little of everything! Join now, as the band has made a blood oath that they will send out the first mailing before the winter holidays.

*Piles of cash currently out of stock.

Who knows what you’ll get if you sign up? If you’re not convinced, swing by their homepage or MySpace, get a taste of their “Mid-90s indie rock + the vast emptiness of outer space + dying and staring into the blinding eyes of Zeus” flavor, including the debut album Space Crackers. I know what’s good. I’m already signed up. Don’t miss out!

YouTube member residentevilug had this to say on Street Fighter II Hyper Fighting:

This is proof that the new Xbox Live Arcade version is crap. I use to spend hours and hours at the arcade and won round after round. I was hysterical when I heard Street Fighter was coming to the XBOX LIVE ARCADE. Boy was I dissapointed…

Why do I love Street Fighter? Well, not only did the music of the series push me over the top in terms of seeking out VGM, but I also get gold like this video, courtesy of Big Giant Circles. The sarcasm from this guy could power 10 suns!

After pimping several of their newest tracks in anticipation, this afternoon Powerglove released their latest album, Metal Kombat for the Mortal Man:

On the Glorious Day of Halloween Day, Metal Kombat for the Mortal Man, the new album by The Powerglove Woodwind Quartet, has manifested itself.

There’s a button to order it on the main MySpace page.

It will be on CDBaby, iTunes and other places soon as well.

We’re tired and are fresh out of absurd hyperbole at the moment, so far now I’d just like to thank you guys for waiting for this CD and not forgetting about it.

So copying the band in the interest of brevity, lemme give you quick and dirty of the tracklist before we wrap up. I can do that because I also added the album to VGMdb in the very early hours this morning:

01 - So Sexy Robotnik (Sonic the Hedgehog 2)
02 - Mario Minor (Super Mario Bros., Super Mario World)
03 - Fight On (Killer Instinct)
04 - Vanquish the Horrible Night (Castlevania II, Castlevania III)
05 - Blasting the Hornet (Mega Man X3)
06 - The Duck Grinder (Duck Hunt)
07 - Power, Wisdom, Courage (The Legend of Zelda)
08 - Omnishred (We’re Going to Need a Bigger Sword) (Final Fantasy VII)
09 - Holy Orders (Be Quick and Just Shred) (Guilty Gear)
10 - Metal Kombat for the Mortal Man (Mortal Kombat, Mega Man II)
11 - Red Wings Over Baron (Final Fantasy IV)

Lastly, the band also announced today that the entirety of the album will be rotated through their MySpace page’s music player, providing those of you sitting on the edge of the pool the chance to get your feet wet before giving in and putting on the ‘Glove. Give in, boys and girls, give in. Wasn’t buying the Power Glove worth it back in the NES days?

Don’t answer that.

Well, it’s more like 35 hours if you’re reading right at the moment we’ve posted, but Powerglove’s done it before and, by Dracula’s heart, they’re doing it again.

Following up on the previous success of temporarily releasing material from their upcoming album Metal Kombat for the Mortal Man, Powerglove has followed up the online sneak peek release of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 “So Sexy Robotnik” with another medley exclusively available on their MySpace for 48 hours only.

This time, the Arlington, MA band has tackled Castlevania II with “Vanquish the Horrible Night.” Better crack that whip and check this one out before it’s too late.

This past Sunday via MySpace, Armcannon shared their thoughts on performing at the Video Games Live Buffalo, NY show on October 14. The beneficiaries of a unique opportunity to play on the same stage as the Buffalo Philharmonic, Armcannon performed an arrangement of Final Fantasy VII’s “Fight On!” at the Kleinhans Music Hall. Let leave it to the band to give the rundown:

As some of you might know, we recently performed with Video Games Live, the traveling orchestral show complete with live action performance, synchronized lights and video, all to video game music. We were given a short slot in the middle of the show to appear as guest musicians.

Video Games Live is hosted and run by Tommy Tallarico who we had the chance to work with, and we don’t have enough nice things to say about the guy. He treated us like pros and was really a treat to work with. In fact the entire crew was very cool including conductor and composer for [the Myst series], Jack Wall. We also met the composer for Halo, Marty O’Donnell. We were pretty awestruck to share the stage with all these guys, including the Buffalo Philharmonic.

ANYWAYS what you’ve REALLY been looking for…. YOUTUBE videos of our performance.

OUR PERFORMANCE AT VIDEO GAMES LIVE

A fun video diary we made that DOESN’T include the performance

A few days before the MySpace blog went up, I messaged Armcannon guitarist Dan “Danimal Cannon” Behrens, who provided some additional comments:

Tommy, Conductor Jack Wall, and the composer from Halo Marty O’Donnell were all amazing to meet. They treated us like pros all the way, and were amazing to work with. We gave them all Armcannon T-shirts and Marty made us all autograph his and told us “don’t forget about me when we’re big and famous” hahahaha. A lot of people online hate Tommy, and while I can see that he’s kind of a weirdo and has that showman persona he has to put on, he was nothing but amazing to us the entire time. I only have nice things to say about the guy.

Congratulations to Dan and crew for such an exciting opportunity and truly a memorable experience. They’ll be sure to impress further when they perform once again at MAGFest this coming January, so close yet so far.

Kyle “KyleJCrb” Crouse has been busy with being a loyal Shizzy as well as project director of the upcoming Tales of Phantasia/Tales of Symphonia OC ReMix album Summoning of Spirits, but the one thing missing from his plate was his old webradio show Nitro Game Injection.

As of last Sunday however, Kyle and NGI has returned with 3 hours of VGM goodness. And now with twice the whiteness, with Norwegian firebrand Audun “AkumuHau” Sørlie joining the show as co-host. Akumu, who’s engaged to Dwelling of Duels/OC ReMix guitar god(ess) LuIzA and runs the authoritative Nintendo soundtrack destination Akumu’s NSF Archive, adds to the mix through his extensive knowledge of the Japanese doujin VGM arrangement scene as well as his own friendships throughout the VGM arrangement scene and demoscene.

One of the key features of the show remains the monthly Dwelling of Duels feature at the end of each month, as anonymous entries from the recently concluded creation phase of that month’s DoD are spotlighted. Fans and competition regulars frequently come by to listen to the show and get their point spreads ready to help determine the upcoming winners.

You can check out Nitro Game Injection every Sunday evening from 6-9PM EST by streaming http://kngi.servegame.com in your media player, and chat with the hosts and other listeners live via IRC at #ngi on the irc.esper.net server. Keep an eye on the Nitro Game Injection MySpace page for archived editions of each show as it makes its way to the masses.

Ever wanted to see a fiddler really get mad? Steal his work.

Composer & sound designer, Stuck In D’80s member, and electric violinist Mark “madfiddler” Knight recently caught a scam artist stealing his work and hosting as his own on MySpace. Today, after putting up a brief story about the incident at his own website, Mark put out a MySpace blog and bulletin to spread the word. From the bulletin:

Hi there, I’m sending this out just to prove how untrustworthy the internet can be, and I’m well p!$$ed off about it. Check out this profile of Jeremy Sharp…

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=97810588

It came to my attention recently, that Jeremy has included one of my electric violin tunes on his MySpace profile claiming that it is his.

The track in question he calls “Effects on Strings” and is in fact a track I wrote in 2005, simply called “Rock Improv” - which you can download the mp3 from http://www.madfiddler.co.uk/audio/madfiddler_rock_improv_01.mp3

If copyright comes into question, I can supply the Cubase SX3 project file, and details of the synthesizers used to create this track, and concise details on the effects used to create the violin sound.

Knowing what I know, in that Jeremy neither composed nor performed on this track, I would also question which other tracks on his MySpace profile are actually his.

Rather than confront Jeremy directly, I have chosen to embarrass him as much as I can through the internet. I own the Fiddle and Alternative Strings Forum which is the largest online community for electric violinists, and am also well known on the manufacturer’s sites that Jeremy claims to play instruments of.

I would ask of you that you pass this message around to any music professionals that you know, if just to prove that with the internet what you see isn’t necessarily what you get.

Thanks for your time,

Mark Knight / www.madfiddler.co.uk

madfiddler’s gone as far as rehosting “Rock Improv” as his featured track on his MySpace page in order to drive the point home. We do our part at VG Frequency to help protect artists in the VGM arrangement community, so good luck to Mark as he works to clamp down further on the plagiarism of his music.

***Update from madfiddler later that day via MySpace:

Hi peeps,

Firstly, I’d like to thank everyone for their comments, pm’s of support, and spreading the word. Being one that doesn’t read bulletins much, I didn’t expect to wake up this morning spending a couple of hours reply to people regarding this matter. So thanks very much for that :)

It seems, that Jeremy did find out, that I had found out. Heck, I’m pretty stupid sometimes, he may have even been my myspace friend and read the bulletin.

So, all the music files on his profile disappeared, which makes me pretty certain that the other 3 tracks were actually owned by at least one other person. Then, the page was re-branded to “the devil” , all the friends deleted and comments regarding to the music on the page deleted.

I’ve also been tipped off that he’s started another myspace profile with this URL

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=189461694

Now, I think my job is done. There’s no need to start blasting the new profile with disapproving messages. However, keep an eye on it. Maybe he’s learnt his lesson, maybe he hasn’t and it’ll be YOUR music appearing on his page next time.

Funny really, a simply open apology from Jeremy on his page would have put a stop to all this straight away. Honesty prevails.

It’s likely that any further updates will just be posted on my blog.

Job done, thank you very much and goodnight :)

OC ReMix Announces Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream Music Video Competition

For Immediate Release
October 4, 2007
Contact: David W. Lloyd, dlloyd@ocremix.org

FAIRFAX, VA–OverClocked ReMix today announced a music video competition related to the recently released Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream project (http://ff7.ocremix.org). This is the first official competition held by OC ReMix. Partnering with Piano Squall (www.pianosquall.com), and eStarland (www.estarland.com), prizes include signed limited edition promotional copies of Voices of the Lifestream, signed copies of Piano Squall’s album GAME: Game & Anime Music Emotions, Final Fantasy VII merchandise, and OverClocked ReMix shirts & hoodies. Additional prizes may be announced during the course of the competition.

There are three different categories for music video submissions, and each category will have prizes for the winner and runner-up. Submissions will be evaluated by the OverClocked ReMix Judges Panel and djpretzel. Winners will be credited on the VotL website and have their submissions shown at Otakon and other anime and gaming conventions that OC ReMix attends. The deadline for all entries is December 14th, 2007; details and rules for each competition are below.

Prizes (as of 2007-10-03):

• Winners
  • Limited edition promotional copy of Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream
  • Signed copy of Piano Squall’s album GAME: Game & Anime Music Emotions
  • Choice of OverClocked ReMix shirt or hoodie
  • Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children action figure
  • Credit on http://ff7.ocremix.org and presentation of video on OC ReMix convention panels
• Runners-up
  • Limited edition promotional copy of Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream
  • OverClocked ReMix shirt
  • Credit on http://ff7.ocremix.org and presentation of video on OC ReMix convention panels

Final Fantasy VII Category

This contest involves creating a music video for any track from Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream using footage from Advent Children (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0385700/), Last Order (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0489134/), and/or the Final Fantasy VII, Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII, and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII video games.

Anime Category

This contest involves creating a music video for any track from Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream using footage from any anime. However, to distinguish from the FF7 category, please do not utilize footage from Advent Children or Last Order.

Original Category

This contest involves creating a music video for any track from Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream using only footage that you yourself create. It can be live-action, 2D or 3D animation, rendered from Flash, etc., but it needs to be your own creation, and cannot incorporate substantial outside sources.

Rules

1. The deadline for all entries is December 14th, 2007.
2. All submissions are made under the terms of the OverClocked ReMix Content Policy, available at http://www.ocremix.org/info/Content_Policy. Please read it before submitting.
3. You may only enter one submission for each category.
4. In the case of submissions that involved collaboration, you must designate a single point of contact for the prizes and coordinate amongst yourselves who receives what.
5. Only one song from Voices of the Lifestream should be used per video, no other music should be present, and the video should not exceed the length of the song selected.
6. Content should generally be “PG-13″, avoiding nudity, profanity, or extreme violence.
7. Video should be in HQ AVI DivX, XvID, H264, or MPEG2 formats, at a resolution of 720×480, with a 23.97 or 24 fps (progressive) or 29.97 fps (interlaced) framerate, with uncompressed 44.1khz stereo audio. Please utilize the WAV versions of VotL tracks (available via bittorent at http://bt.ocremix.org), not the MP3s, when creating your music video(s).
8. For the FFVII and anime categories, please try to follow common Anime Music Video contest guidelines, available on the websites of most major anime conventions. We want submissions in these categories to be submitted to as many different AMV contests as possible.
9. Do not utilize low-quality footage or footage with subtitles burned-in.
10. Do not include credits, bumpers, trailers, or other material in your video, only the actual submission content.
11. You may choose to post your video(s) on YouTube, etc., before/after submission, so long as the OverClocked ReMix Content Policy is followed.

Submitting

Include the name you want the video(s) credited to, your contact information (website, email), the name of your video(s), all sources (anime, games, movies, etc.) utilized in your video(s), and any additional information you feel is relevant with your submission, whether via email or physical mail.

Email (preferred):

Send an email titled “FF7 Music Video Competition Entry” with a link to your video(s) to submissions@ocremix.org. Do NOT attempt to attach the video itself, or any form of preview. Make sure that the link still functions on Dec. 14th and for as many days after as possible if you submit before the deadline.

Physical Mail

Send a CD-R or DVD-R only (no tapes!) to:

OverClocked ReMix
PO Box 223104
Chantilly, VA 20153

Postmarked on or before the Dec. 14th deadline. All physical materials submitted to OverClocked ReMix become the property of OverClocked ReMix and will not be returned.

Updates

Updated information and answers to questions regarding this competition will be available on an announcement thread at OverClocked ReMix (http://www.ocremix.org) - please check it often as prizes may be added or rules clarified. Winners will be announced before the end of the year, with the specific date dependent on the number of submissions received.

Good luck!

Announced merely a few hours ago via MySpace, the CEO of MAGFest, Brendan “Mr. MAGFest” Becker, confirmed that Gainesville, Florida-based Select Start will be making their way to the DC-Metro area to perform at the 6th annual MAGFest.

The exciting announcement comes one year after plans to bring the six-person ensemble to MAGFest 5 fell through. Much like the electronic, rapping and big beat stylings of PlanetSkill last year, Select Start’s classical repertoire will be quite a change of pace from the gaggle of (great) rock and metal bands that proliferate the MAGFest stage each year.

MAGFest will be emanating from Alexandria, VA’s luxurious (read: unbelievably tricked out) Hilton Mark Center, January 3-6, 2008. If you are any sort of follower of the video game music fan arrangement community and can feasibly make it down, you have to be there. It’s like attending an all-star game. That means microcelebrities as far as the eye can see! (WOW!) Seriously, it really means that there’s nowhere else that attracts so many VGM fan arrangement enthusiasts in one place. You should have reserved your spot yesterday.

Preregister.

GO!

Year 200X is getting close to wrapping up their latest album, We are Error. But none of them are artistically inclined in the visual sense. It means these bros needs help obtaining some suitable (read: incredible) artwork for the actual CD manufacturing. Guitarist Tim Lydon (pictured sporting This Place is Haunted gear for the cross-pimp) put out the call Wednesday afternoon via MySpace:

We’re in the CD artwork planning phase, and we’ve pretty much decided…none of us are very graphically enclined. Plus we’re lazy. SO, here’s the deal. We’re looking for someone/some people to either design the CD artwork, or give us some ideas for the artwork. Here’s the specifics:

The album is going to be called “We are Error.”

We need artwork for a 1-fold (4 panel) insert, printing under the CD, the CD itself, and back of the CD case.

We’re looking for something cool looking, maybe tongue-in-cheek (seemingly serious at first glance, but silly under the surface). Nothing too cartooney. There will probably be 1 band photo in there somewhere.

It will also include a thank you list inside the booklet, and a track list on the back (13 tracks).

Pretty much anything besides what’s listed above is up to you. We don’t have a lot of money to pay, as we’re pretty much spending everything on recording/pressing the album, but we can offer free merch, credits in the CD booklet, and whatever loot we can come up with.

For any more specific questions, or if you have any artwork ideas, just message us. We really appreciate everyone’s support…with your help, our debut album will be as rocking as possible!

Look at that. You’ve got more information than you need to get it going. You may not become a millionaire, but getting rewarded with Year 200X shirts, CDs and/or other ancillary swag should be right up your alley. Like Tim said, they need help. Are you a bad enough dude to rescue Year 200X?

Straight from the most reliable source, let’s hand it off to zircon, who gets mentioned way too many times around here (it’s a joke, don’t hurt!), with the latest news on pixietricks.

Late Monday night, Jill was recognized as contemporary web radio station radioMystic’s newest Featured Artist:

I’m proud to announce that pixietricks (Jill Goldin) is being featured on the front page of radioMystic, a popular streaming radio station that plays new age, world, chillout, and ambient music. Jill’s music has been added into their rotation with selections from her upcoming solo album. This is certainly an honor given radioMystic’s high-profile lineup of artists like Enya, Loreena McKennitt, David Arkenstone, and Enigma.

You can check out her feature and listen to the radioMystic stream here:

http://radiomystic.com/index.asp

And don’t forget to check out her website at www.jilliangoldin.com.

Congratulations, Jill!

Yeah, props are in order. I’ve already heard one cut from Jill’s upcoming album entitled “Red July,” now available through Jill’s MySpace, which I thought was extra swanky. (The perks of having her as a colleague.) In all, five tracks are now available in regular rotation at radioMystic for your perusal, also including “Breathe and Dive,” “The Winds of Change,” “Hajime” and “Shadows.”

Be sure to use radioMystic’s e-mail request system on their sidebar in order to put your request forward and check out all of pixietrick’s new material. Fresh off of providing vocals to 2K Games‘ Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword, keep an eye out, as Jill’s got some good works brewing that haven’t seen the light of day yet!

Well, since the MySpace announcement was made today at 3:31 PM EST, you’ve got only about 46 1/2 hours to check out Powerglove’s Sonic the Hedgehog 2 medley “So Sexy Robotnik” over at their MySpace, fresh off their new album Metal Kombat for the Mortal Man.

And while you’re visiting the band, check out their latest FAQ released this past Friday and bone up on your Powerglove knowledge.

The “Mystic Cave Zone” portion of the arrangement is the definite winner all things considered. Check out “So Sexy Robotnik” free before you miss your opportunity!

The arrangement is sexy. Robotnik…ehhh, not so sexy.

Mustin had the following comments yesterday in The OneUps‘ latest MySpace bulletin:

Check out the new video on our page. We’re playing “Demon Seed” from Castlevania 3. It’s teh hotness.

Also, we want you to leave a comment, shoot over a message, or just generally make some noise if you’d like to see the rest of this 35 minute show, “Front Row” on DVD featuring interviews and recordings of “Mega Man II: Airman,” “Sonic the Hedgehog: Green Hill Zone,” “Chrono Trigger: Secret of the Forest” and more.

We’re also looking to combine this with a live performance recording of a show from July featuring Moose on Bass and Elaine Li of Select Start on Violin. That would be an additional 40 minutes or so.

How many of you would like a DVD? Let us know and we might make some for ya!

Let Mustin and crew know, and if there’s enough support, DVDs’ll be in the works via OneUp Studios. We stress this because if DVDs are out by January, you can snag one and get autographed all purty-like by the musty one at MAGFest 6 in Alexandria, VA.

Niels “DarkMessenger” van der Leest announced via MySpace bulletin that he was notified of his victory in Dutch magazine Interface’s latest competition, Sound Game Contest 2007 [note: in Dutch], with his entry receiving The Public’s Choice award garnering an impressive 46.4% of the votes.

Niels, along with other entrants, worked to rescore the cutscene “Ghost Story” from the 2004 Xbox release Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon 2, developed by Red Storm Entertainment.

The competition was co-sponsored by Streamline Studios and QANTM College, with voting for The Public’s Choice being featured in the upcoming Interface issue #112. We’ll keep you posted if and when DarkMessenger’s winning effort goes public, and congratulations to Niels on his popular victory, which will hopefully provide him some of the spotlight.

Courtesy of a MySpace bulletin this past Monday, Jason “Xoc” Cox hath decreed that he hath fashioned ringtones for thine cellular telephone.

Now me, I’ve gone my entire life without feeling the need for a cellphone. But much in the way I’d only want a car in order to play video game music in the CD player, so I would deign to obtain a cell phone for only the most incredible of ring-a-ling indicators.

Let’s get the low from Jason himself:

free xoc ringtones! …really!

Not spam, not viagra-mail, this guy started a site with Creative Commons audio. There’s some pretty cool stuff on there, and you will NOT find Throw Up Boy or My Chemical Squaredance or whatever the kids are listening to now.

And there are 3 XOC ones on there! two are from SMW, and the third is Samus’ fanfare from Metroid, an EXCLUSIVE RINGTONE ONLY TRACK!!!!!!!!! holy shit

Anyway, here’s where they are, specifically: http://jagamaga.mobi/?page_id=9

Wait, exclusive Samus fanfare ringtone by Xoc?!? Well, it was nice having you visit. Don’t forget about us over at VGF when your phone rings and it sounds awesome, because we know you’re gone.

Fellow evil judge Jon “JigginJonT” Titterington hasn’t decided whether to pursue this Chrono Trigger arrangement of “Courage and Pride” (a.k.a. “Guardia Castle”) with orchestral instrumentation alongside the piano, or just solo with the keys, but either way you can tell this’ll be solid from his track record of arrangements. You can check out a great practice run-through of the piece uploaded last night to YouTube. It even features a dog cameo at 1:38. You can’t go wrong with that!

Jiggy Jon asked for some ass-kissing in exchange for being allowed to pimp the video, so I’ll just say that the guy is a jack of all trades. He’ll tell you never to ask him about production (I concur, don’t!), but in terms of genres, he can nail solo piano just as soundly as a rock piece. Check out his OC ReMixes, and you’ll see for yourself. I’m certainly looking forward to when the finalized arrangement of this new idea is ready to drop. Be sure to holler at Big Giant Circles in order to obtain the sheet music once this is good to go. Tell him Larry sent you.

Powerglove guitarist Chris Marchiel released an 8-minute tutorial yesterday (cheekily entitled “Chris Marchiel Arts & Crafts Corner”), all about turning your Guitar Hero guitar controller into a synth controller.

Well, more like 1 1/2 minutes of introduction & messing around and 6 1/2 minutes of tutorial, but I definitely enjoyed the F-Zero “Mute City” noodling that was in the initial demonstration.

You’ve gotta be technically inclined enough to gather all the needed materials and assemble them to Marchiel’s specifications, but if you’re up for it, you’ll end up with a pretty badass instrument.

Chris also makes sure to walk you through the features he programmed into the unit, and it’s clear that the door’s wide open in terms of another enthusiast tailoring the same project to their own specs.

As he mentions within the video, Chris hasn’t spent much time working with his finished synth controller, so perhaps we can expect a follow-up video down the line from him and Powerglove showing off more of what he can do (and, perhaps more importantly, what can be done) with this excellent idea!

***Chris messaged me via MySpace after this went up: Thanks for blogging about us and thanks for the kind words! I’m going to refine the control and the programming as I learn it, and i’ll play a solo on it at our live shows, which i’m really looking forward to!

I coded a control scheme for the dual shock ps2 controller too, so i might play that as well, though it’s not as flashy. I’ve also thought of doing a double neck one, since you could more than an octave at a time in usable buttons and use an octave pedal to play higher notes.

A few days ago, Larry reported that The OneUps would be performing at this year’s Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle. Frank Caron, a writer for Opposable Thumbs, Ars Techinca’s “journal devoted to games and toys,” wrote a review on The OneUps’ performance.

For a band that neither Ben nor I had heard of before, The OneUps put on a rock-solid show that ignited the crowd on numerous occasions. They showcased music from a treasure trove of age old games using a full seven piece band and unvieled a two piece keyboard duet called “Final Fanboy.” Plowing through a strong hour-and-a-half long set, The OneUps won the favor of the Main Theater’s near-capacity crowd.

The full review can be read here.

Sean and Coop of Gamervision also attended The OneUps’ concert, and posted a video on YouTube of highlights of their performance:

The songs in the video are:

1. 0:23-0:44: “Sub Castle BGM” from Super Mario World (SNES)
2. 0:44-1:30: “Korobeiniki” from Tetris (Game Boy; originally a folk tune)
3. 1:30-2:10: “Match BGM” and “Get Up!” from Punch-Out!! (NES)
4. 2:10-2:50: “Green Hill Zone” from Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis)
5. 2:50-3:42: “Brinstar - Dense Vegetation Area” from Super Metroid (SNES)
6. 3:42-4:14: “Dark Mountain Forest” from The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)
7. 4:14-4:31: “BALROG [Spain]” from Street Fighter II: The World Warrior (SNES)
8. 4:38-5:52: “Mii Channel BGM” from the Wii system software

Enjoy the footage of Arkansas’s premier Celine Dion cover band.

We don’t have enough eccentrics in the game arrangement community, but truth be told John “The Wingless” Burnett could fill in for 10 of them. He’s his own improv troupe, although why he isn’t in The Second City is beyond me (he’s auditioned with them before).

Continuing in the vein of yesterday’s blog regarding Mazedude, it’s good to see individuals take their hobbies and successfully run with them into the professional world. Having already made his way into the gaming industry, The Wingless recently posted of an employment change via Facebook and MySpace, announcing a move from Chicago’s Midway Games as a user interface artist to Los Angeles’s Pandemic Studios as a senior user interface artist this past Monday.

So those of you in the know already caught wind of this, so if this is shocking news to you, please do not think ill of me for not telling you. Either there was no good way to tell (which happens) or I just flat-out don’t like you (which, while implausible, most certainly is possible).I accepted a job with Pandemic Studios in L.A.

So I’ll be moving out to Cali (Westwood, to be specific) by probably the 10th of September to start my new life between Santa Monica Beach and Hollywood. My last day at Midway Games will be August 31st, the very last trembling drop of Summer.

But in the meantime, I’ll be around for at least 3 weeks and I would *love* to spend as much of my time with all of you as possible. Send me a line if you’d like to do something, and I will try my best to be with you. Also, if you’ve had a crush on me, but were bereft of a charming way to ask me out, now’s as good a time as any :)

In any event, I will miss you all very much. Believe it or not, the hesitation to move was based largely on all the resplendent personalities I have met. I adore everything about you.

All my love and all my luck. I have more than enough to spare.

With the move, John’s now in the hub of American video game development. If you’ve followed his website over the years, through its many core design changes and plethora of side projects, his design skills are already mutil-faceted. Will he eventually make the transition to sound design or music composition? Well, he’s already got some mutual acquaintances with VGM professionals based in the area through friendships with members of OneUp Studios, so the future looks bright no matter what the angle is. We definitely wish The Wingless the best of luck as he valiantly attempts to trim the wings off of the City of Angels.

The members of the VGM fan arrangement community are a diverse bunch. But arguably no one stands further away from the mean than Chris “Mazedude” Getman. Not only are his sound programming and composition styles unique unto themselves, but he’s got some attention-grabbing hobbies.

He’s a stuntman. And he can dance while kicking your ass, because he’s a disciple of capoeira. A truly lucky individual is able to mesh his hobbies with his professional life, and Mazedude has done just that yet again by providing music and video production to a website promoting instructional videos on the art of capoeira, Capoeira Nation.

Chris says, via the OC ReMix forums:

I am very proud and excited to announce the launching of a new website. It is the first of its kind - to teach the martial art of Capoeira via Instructional Videos on the Internet.

I am even more delighted to share the kickass news that I am the composer for the website, and all of their video productions. For those who are not aware, Capoeira is from Brazil, and the music that accompanies the martial art is very unique and ethnic. The vocals are in Portuguese, and the beats are performed by such instruments as the berimbau, atabaque, and pandeiro. I play each of these instruments, and am fluent in the various traditional beats and songs. However, for this project I have been given the freedom to fuse the traditional style with that of my own, and I’ve had just oodles of fun putting it together. :)

I invite everyone to check it out: http://www.capoeiranation.com

Even better examples can be heard in the Promo videos […] although the timing is off slightly due to YouTube’s conversion.

Enjoy the music, but furthermore, enjoy the site. If you’re at all interested in learning Capoeira, but don’t have any teachers near you, well, that’s what this website solves!

Bryan “Sefiros” Henderson announced the release of his new original album Under the Roots this past Friday via MySpace bulletin.

The album is free to download, so there’s no cost besides time. Why should you check it out despite the cost of time? Well, Bryan’s been on my radar for a while due to his material at VGMix. He later scored an successful submission to OC ReMix with a Final Fantasy VIII arrangement entitled “Everything = Nothing” which featured some of the most beautiful and emotive string sequencing I’ve ever heard in my time in the community.

With that said, Bryan constantly keeps himself busy with periodic album releases, never allowing himself to get stagnant. On the production side, some of the levels should be toned down, but my favorite tracks on the album have to be the opening track “Dependence”, the high-powered “Warfare”, as well as well-textured”Degeneracy” and the unassumingly titled “Oh”. Swing by Sefiros’s space and grab ‘em all.

During my periodic search for the word “Dhsu” on Google and YouTube (for reasons completely unrelated to stroking my own ego), I came across this vid by YouTuber Dekreme:

To say that I’m flattered would be an understatement. To say I’m impressed would also not be enough…even though it isn’t my most complicated arrangement, learning the whole thing by ear takes a special kind of dedication. Mad props, my man!As surprised I was by this though, I’d be lying if I said this sort of thing hasn’t happened before…

Though my name isn’t specifically mentioned in the description, the source of the arrangement is obvious. Kazamajin1, the performer in the video, asked me directly for the sheet music to “A Clockwork Vampire” and kept me personally updated on his progress in learning this piece. The culmination of his efforts was the video you now see here.

As for the implication by certain smellyjdgfgts that I might be jealous of or threatened by these rising talents, I can assure you such claims are preposterous. I am in fact quite glad that “Nayru’s Love” is fulfilling its purpose of getting people to give the Zelda Oracle games more, well…love.

A month ago, I blogged about two composer chronology videos, looking at works by two Namco composers, Shinji Hosoe and Nobuyoshi “sanodg” Sano.

The creator of those two videos, TYKUN, now has a third video about a third Namco composer, Ayako Saso:

Lots of love for the Ridge Racer series.

Although Helen Trevillion hasn’t been around the OCR community for a while now, she has always been highly regarded for the Enya-quality vocal and instrumental work in her submissions to the site under the ReMixer name Destiny.

Helen’s first album is a 2-CD endeavor via her personal label Faefly Records, with a total of 22 tracks. The first disc is called Inside Myself and contains the bulk of the songs on the album, while the second disc is entitled Once Upon a Time, having a fairy tale theme. You can buy the whole shebang at her CD shop. Google Checkout only works for orders within the UK at the moment, unfortunately.

The price is a bit hefty at 8.49 GBP (~$17 USD), especially with international shipping if you’re in the US (another 2.00 GBP, for a total of about $21 USD), but most people who have heard her work will agree that it’s worth it for 2 CDs of Destiny goodness. In addition, each copy will be personally signed by Helen, with an optional message of your choice. Here are a couple previews from her site in case you’re still not convinced:

Inside Myself

Once Upon a Time

There are also additional full-length samples available on Helen’s MySpace. Better grab a copy while you can though: there are only 100 in print.

You may have heard of The Black Mages. Formed in 2003 with, among other people, three Square Enix composers (including Nobuo Uematsu), TBM is the closest thing Square Enix has to an official band. Other game companies (especially during the 90’s) have had bands featuring one or more in-house composer, like Konami’s Kukeiha Club and Taito’s Zuntata, but TBM is probably the most prominent modern example.

Live performances of VGM have been not necessarily commonplace in Japan, but certainly more frequent than in the United States and elsewhere. However, in the past few years, there have been an increasing number of video game concerts like PLAY! A Video Game Symphony and Video Games Live. So, I figured it might be kind of cool to look at other, earlier VGM performances, including those by in-house bands and those like VGL. I mentioned the S.S.T. Band in “Composer Spotlight #3: Koichi Namiki,” so that’s as good a place to start as any.

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The S.S.T. Band was one of the first, possibly the first, official developer band, starting way back in 1988. “S.S.T.” stood for “Sega Sound Team,” befitting the fact that, of the six original members, three were Sega composers (Hiroshi Miyauchi, Jouji Iijima, and Koichi Namiki). A fourth member, Kimitaka Matsumae, would later become a Sega composer, as well as would two future band members who were not part of the original lineup, Hisanori Kumamaru and Takenobu Mitsuyoshi.

I was going to make an info file about the S.S.T. Band’s members, discography, etc., but their Wikipedia article is very thorough, probably more thorough than anything I would have written, so I’ll pimp that out instead. The only full arrangement albums are MEGA SELECTION I & II and BACK IN THE S.S.T. BAND!!; all of the others contain both arrangements by the S.S.T. Band and original soundtracks.

An interesting thing to note is that every single S.S.T. Band member had a stage name, most of which were taken from Sega arcade games:

Jouji Iijima: GALAXY (Galaxy Force)
Shingo Komori: BURNER (After Burner)
Hisanori Kumamaru: SPLASH Wave (”Splash Wave” is the name of a track from OutRun)
Kimitaka Matsumae: HARRIER (Space Harrier)
Takenobu Mitsuyoshi: R360 (refers to the R360 arcade cabinet)
Hiroshi Miyauchi: Hiro
Koichi Namiki: Mickey or Pretty K.N.
Masato Saito: TURBO-kun (Turbo OutRun)
Takehiko Tanabe: THUNDER (Thunder Blade)

But the best part of the S.S.T. Band, even moreso than their rockin’ arrangements, is their appearance. Remember when sleeveless vests, ponytails, bandannas, and sunglasses used to be cool on musicians?

“After Burner” (arrangement of the track of the same name from the game of the same name)
video from the S.S.T. Band Live! DVD (1990 concert)
Jouji “GALAXY” Iijima: Guitar (red)
Kimitaka “HARRIER” Matsumae: Keyboards (right)
Hiroshi “Hiro” Miyauchi: Keyboards (left)
Koichi “Mickey” Namiki: Guitar (yellow)
Masato “TURBO-kun” Saito: Bass
Takehiko “THUNDER” Tanabe: Drums

The band’s arrangements always stayed close to the original, usually being covers with the occasional solo thrown in to retain the feel of the originals, all of which were from Sega arcade, Master System, or Genesis games. Since the band’s instruments were guitars, keyboard, and drums, they usually picked upbeat songs that could easily be converted to synthrock, like the title theme from After Burner seen above. However, as the material dictated, they were not above slower, jazzier pieces like their medley of Galaxy Force tracks and ballads like their cover of “Last Wave,” the high scores theme from OutRun.

Other videos from their 1990 concert on YouTube are “Magical Sound Shower” from OutRun and an After Burner medley featuring other tracks from the game other than the title track. One last video, from no concert I can identify, is a cover of “Like the Wind” from Power Drift. Soak up the retro.