ReMix:Mega Man X5 "Firefly" 4:11

Sir_NutS (Paul Michael Molina) collabs with Usa on this shiny, funky, glitch-hop extravaganza, electrifying the "Izzy Glow" theme from MMX5 & injecting some Sigma from MMX for good measure:

"Hello there, NutS here with another track. This is a remix of "Izzy Glow (Shining Hotaronicus) Stage" in Mega Man X5 and "Sigma's Fortress (Palace Ground) Stage" in Mega Man X. This remix was originally made for the Sigma Fortress Remix Gauntlet 2015.

So this is a glitch hop remix of these two themes. It's always a challenge to mix two themes in any sort of EDM genre, because not many are melody-oriented, and there's quite a lot of melody to implement when fusing two themes together. However, in glitch hop you have certain liberties with your arrangements that lend to songs with plenty of melodic content. This song is heavily influenced by the likes of Haywyre, who does a lot of funky/jazzy glitch stuff while adding tons of solos and structure variation.

For this remix, I used Bitwig and every sound is of my own making, except for the piano which is sampled. 90% of the sounds are made with a single synth, Serum. I created my own wavetables for some of these, a couple out of chopping up kick drums even. Usa (Daniel Lippert) helped me by performing the solo at 2:22, for which he used his A6 Andromeda hardware synth and his amazing talent. As far as the arrangement goes, it's mostly "Izzy Glow," but I managed to intertwine the main melody of "Sigma's Fortress" in the melodic parts, and the harmonies in some of the backing sections. I changed the focus of some of the instruments, for example, the original guitar riffs were translated and modified into the piano harmonies, then those were also translated, modified, and chopped into the various different synth bass sounds and... well, stuff, that make up the drop. The second section of the original received the same treatment later on. For Usa's solo, I had to modify and add some extra jazzing-up to the backing parts, bass, and the drums to keep up with his insanity."

I dig the glitch-hop vibe, and especially when NutS is at the helm - this is chock full o' syncopated zaps, growls, & attitude. Daniel's A6 (jealous) solo is icing on an already-delicious cake, and the whole thing is mixed clean & crisp and hits with impact. Judges were unanimous, but Chimpazilla was feeling it the most:

"Whoa that vocoded "rock it" is awesome. Very cool, chill, groovy groove. Man, I love Serum. These sounds are nice, care to send me over a preset pack? Please? Such tasty processing. Omg that drop. Excellent detailing. Dem growls. When one hears such sounds, what can one say. Holy hell, what a cool song. Going in my favorites folder."

Where it belongs! I love it when Mike does this genre, which we don't see all THAT much of, even though it tends to work really well for a lot of VGM sources. The sound design & craftwork on the various synth bits that make up the more aggressive sections is both impressive and effective, and a sweet synth solo breaks things up and adds melodic variation and exploration. This was released a while ago for the compo, but for me it's aged like a fine wine - awesome stuff!