ReMix:Final Fantasy VIII "Witches Be Witches" 3:39

A piece on the concluding 5th disc of the epic, 80-track Final Fantasy VIII: SeeDs of Pandora album is a sinister tour de force from the whirlwind himself, ZackParrish, spurred on thanks to working with his musical partner-in-crime The Vodoú Queen (who added vocals). Wait... huh? Have I done this dance before? /checks notes... OHHHH, roles were REVERSED, OK... /reads more closely... Alright, I got it! :-) ZACK was the one feeling sizzled and unsure, only to persevere with some collaborative inspiration. See? I read good! Tell us more, Zack!

"Witches be hatin', bru.

This track... is the result of being burnt out. By this point, I had already hyped up the idea of doing a 13th hour bonus disc... I say 13th because the 11th hour had already passed and DFW and Jorito had graciously *half* agreed to do the bonus disc. Even convinced Jorito to submit one of his own bonus tracks somehow. And before this track, I had conjured up "Time Will Compress" but there was a lot of finesse to be done in a couple of days... anywho... I started this one... then hated where it was going from lack of desire to continue existing, so I switched focus to helping Angelique with her bonus tracks. Fast-forward a few days (we only had 10 days to get this disc done) and I see the finish line of having the album hit 80 tracks overall... so I forced myself to get this one done. Having just had miles-long conversations with Angelique and working with her on her own tracks, I decided to utilize her voice in this track, as simple as the part may be... but it added a layer to the track that helped round it out in the end. Was she singing a single note and just chanting "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec"? Yes. But... she did a great job at it."

Creatives, if you're feeling devoid of ideas, space and time apart can be helpful, but don't sleep on involving someone else in the process; you never know what'll percolate, even indirectly! For all the trudging Zack attested to, we dug this one on the evil judges panel, with Chimpazilla's ears perking up right from the jump:

"Intro is so simplistic, but when that beat comes in I'm hooked! I love how weird this sounds, and aggressive. The soundscape is varied and sounds harsh, in a wonderful way. I love the crushed lead that starts at 0:50. The saw lead that follows sounds great. I love how the vocals come in sounding soft and sparse, as the soundscape fills in around them. Great arrangement, interesting piece, lots of lovely detail, holds my attention all the way through. I love the distorted piano in the outro. Mixing and mastering sound appropriate."

Always love the pointilist melodic style used in the opening, so I was certainly ready to follow along. The way the piece brightened up with the SID-like line from 1:19-1:38 was awesome. Also love how vibrant these beats are until the dropoff at 1:38. VQ's vocals hop in at 1:47 and added a brief break section before even more textural trickery capped off the finish. Judge prophetik music had a deeper level of play-by-play, citing moment after moment of attention-piquing areas, both on the arrangement and production sides:

"lots of space in the intro. each layer, like MW said, is subsequently more distorted and mean, and the eventual melodic content's mostly clean sound is a real neat contrast to that. SoW has a very unique song structure in my mind due to how much space is in the original, so the heavily percussive drums and stuttering synths with tons of space in them really fit the song well. there's a break around 1:40 that features some really neat sound design.

2:08 brings back in some more sfx in a rising action only to hit a huge shift at 2:17, which was totally unexpected and a neat idea. there continues to be a variety of textural changes, until the original melodic lead and bass come back in at 2:55. we get one runthrough of the melodic material at 3:09, and then the track is over. the ending is abrupt certainly, but given the variety of abrupt changes throughout the track, not entirely unexpected.

this is a pretty neat idea for a track overall. the industrial elements pair really well with an original that demands silence in a retelling, and the abrupt changes and glitches that occur in the overall timbre in turn are influenced by the game's story which is neat. i think this is pretty good."

"Good's" the word, for real; good sounds, good grittiness in places that was totally intentional and added character, loads of good sound design that'll no doubt inspire others down the line. Very cohesive realization of the vision with a very interpretive rendition of "Succession of Witches". 79 more great tracks where that came from, too! Fun (and heartening) to see Zack say this was a burnout track; him dropping his defenses and not overthinking the process led to a heightened, speedier state of creativity and productivity! Is he sure he's not game to be a pro composer? If this is him sloggin' through...? PHEW... everybody else better watch out! :-)