ReMix:Mach Rider "Road Rage" 3:14

After more than 10 hours on the road each way going to and from MAGFest this past weekend, you could forgive me for a bit of road rage. (I'm kidding, of course. :-P) I'm not even an angry driver to begin with; I was relaxing while listening to Austin Wintory-hosted episodes of The Game Maker's Notebook. :-) That said, once again MAGFest was an amazing experience and I saw fans and ReMixers aplenty! Beyond project directors and artists FoxxDragon, KyleJCrb, and rnn, I got to talk with Andrew Gossett, Anton Corazza, Arrow, Ben Briggs, BluuMonk of Moiré Effect, Children of the Monkey Machine, Cyril the Wolf, Digital Coma, donut, Gamer of the Winds, Geoffrey Taucer, Jillian Aversa, jmr, Joe Cam, JohnStacy, JSABlixer, Julia Henderson, Kyana, Lauren the Flute, Mattmatatt, Mazedude, Mel Decision, Pokérus Project, Prince uf Darkness, SgtRama, Xaleph, XPRTNovice, Yusef Kelliebrew, and zircon... I THINK that's all the contributors I met in person this go-around, my memory's not photographic! A ton more I didn't get to chat with were there, and it's a who's who of the VGM arrangement scene where faraway friends gather to celebrate game music, so be sure you're there for a future event! A big thanks to Arrow, CotMM, Digital Coma, KyleJCrb, Xaleph, and especially XPRTNovice for making OCR's 25th anniversary MAGFest panel possible, which included a nice shout-out to our community's most recent album, The Impact of Iwata!

Through Lucas M. Thomas's new Nintendo Force book about the late Nintendo president Satoru Iwata's career -- The Impact of Iwata -- we know Iwata made an everlasting industry impact learning how to program Pinball, mechanics which are still referenced four decades later in subsequent Nintendo pinball games. But we also learned that Iwata's deep level of talent also translated to coding the raster racing game Mach Rider, which catalyzed the eventual creation of the F-Zero and Mario Kart franchises for Nintendo! For our corresponding Impact of Iwata album, Siolfor the Jackal, alongside drummer Serrin's Toes, paid homage to Mach Rider with a scorching medley of the raster racer that started it all for Nintendo:

"I remember chatting with TSori about the album when it had started, and he convinced me that the racing section could really use some metal, so I did my best to oblige. I'd wanted to cover some Mach Rider already, so this was a rad opportunity. This is essentially a medley of the main tracks from the game. Progress was slow, and I ended up starting from scratch a few times, especially when I realised my arrangement was almost exactly the same as the one in Smash Bros.

At first, it was just going to be the "Stage" themes, but I kept adding other parts because it was fun. The bulk of the song was always going to be the main BGM themes, and I played it pretty straight because this is just always how I wanted to hear that main section. I kept most of it pretty true to the source, mostly changing bits to make the riffs feel heavier.

I ended up squeezing in and extending out the course menu theme, which is a pretty barebones track, but it was a lot of fun to expand on a bunch and a great excuse to practice my noodling and bass soloing as a little break before the metal comes back in full force. I really wanted to add a little bass solo in there because we don't get enough of them, and then the rest of that section was crying out for some guitar lead.

The two stage themes are mostly the same, but "Stage 2" has a variation in the second half that I incorporated. It felt like a good place to up the intensity a bit before finishing off with the cheeky little "Stage Clear" jingle. I played around a little more towards the end, but my goal overall was to make something messy and loud for a post-apocalyptic racing game, and I think I achieved it!

It was a real struggle to get this one finished in the end, and having my best friend, Serrin's Toes, smash out some hard-hitting drums at the very end of the project really brought it all together.

Special thanks to TSori, Hemophiliac, and ZackParrish for their patience and support. They got me over the line."

It takes a village sometimes, even if you're racing on a motorcycle! ;-) Judge prophetik music quickly waved the checkered flag for this effectively structured medley:

"nice wall of sound up front. the blues riff that forms the basis for the bassline of the course themes sounds really neat next to the really heavy background. there's a bass guitar transition right off the bat, and the vibe at 0:32 really felt like the Terran tracks from StarCraft 1 with how angular the drums and guitar are. i agree that going with Course Menu right away helps a lot. we get a big kick at 1:26 into the main part of the track, the Stage 1 and 2 tracks, and these are more straightforward. there's a much bigger section at 2:35 that's pretty intense, and it drops off right away into a half-time section for a bit to mix it up before hitting the short outro. [...]

overall this is a fun romp through several themes from a classic game. i was not initially expecting it to be as cohesive of a medley based on the number of tracks and the length, but it does a nice job outlining the music and adding some new flair to it."

As Siolfor indrectly alluded to, for those who aren't full-on 8-bit babies and don't remember a game like this that never had a sequel, there's another key frame of referenc for Mach Rider's music that thankfully makes it waaaaay more accessible to the youngins, like judge Emunator:

"This is really nifty - I know this source inside and out through Super Smash Bros, like most listeners likely will, and you latched onto the essence of the original in such a great way. This is incredibly satisfying as a listener."

The more reserved riffing/vamping on the "Course Menu" theme was a pleasant surprise, since it's rarer to hear it covered in the scene, and then it seamlessly transitioned into an intense take on the stage BGM that's the game's signature theme. For such a varied yet cohesive album as The Impact of Iwata, it's no surprise that even though Jackal and Toes were raging, they came through with "a very well put-together arrangement" according to judge Chimpazilla. Great performances from Ax and Smash, a.k.a. Siolfor and Serrin's Toes -- big riffs, big drums, big energy! \m/