ReMix:The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask "A Cursed Land" 4:05

We continue to n00bfl00d with another great newcomer debut as shieldeater (Chris McGee) drops a dingy, funky, jazzy rendition of an odd duck from Zelda: Majora's Mask, "Southern Swamp"! This one's a pretty weird Koji Kondo source tune, so Chris explains how we wound up in the muck:

"This is my take on the tune that plays in the troubled lands lying in the four cardinal directions from Clock Town. For me, this is the piece that best embodies the strange and desolate atmosphere that makes Majora's Mask one of the best games ever. I began with electric piano and gradually added instruments until it became something both sinister and funky. Hope you enjoy!"

Once judge Emunator compared Kondo's original track and shieldeater's expansive approach, a true believer was made:

"Oh, this is so delightfully weird and dissonant, I never would have thought about taking this source in a direction like this, but now that I've heard it, I can't imagine a more appropriate way to take on Southern Swamp. The rhodes performance invokes some of the more idiosyncratic tendencies of Kid A/Amnesiac-era Radiohead for me, and immediately sets the tone for the rest of things, but this arrangement really hits its stride when the saxophone enters the mix. The more tranquil, melodic outro is such an inspired touch, too!

Admittedly, some of the instruments here, on their own, are not perfect in terms of tone and expressiveness, and the drums and bass feel especially dry, so the more layers you bring in, the more it masks those imperfections and builds a fully-realized soundscape. I'd love to hear more gel and cohesion between the instruments, but this easily gets by on the strength of the arrangement and adaptation, in my opinion!"

Oh yeah, fitting mention of Radiohead here, as the drop at 3:03 and warbling winddown defintely had me flashing back to that style. All of us on the panel did note some instruments feeling exposed or rigid with the timing, yet agreed that shieldeater's textures were effectively built, constructing something that remains quirky yet flows more as a song than the original source tune. I even mentioned in my own vote that "If you had told me M Benson had submitted this, I would have believed you", and meant that in the best way possible; just fire up some of Mike's tracks and hear for yourself! shieldeater even just dropped some Italian horror film-inspired original music on his Bandcamp, so the dark journey down some peculiar roads doesn't have to end in Hyrule, it can just be a cursed pit stop on the way to who knows where...

A big welcome one more time to shieldeater, as well as all of the freshmen OC ReMixers introduced & spotlighted so far during our long stretch of newcomers! If you're one of those VGM fans that sticks to ReMixes of games you're nostalgic for or artists you're familiar with (I used to be one of you!), try the debuts of PrismaticBlack, AzureKevin, Nwgo, Torby Brand, LemonheadVGM, Joshua Taipale, Clément Planchout, Scott Semanski, sui, Techie Jessie, and Error 47 and let's see if we can broaden those horizons juuuuust a little bit! ;-)