Globulous "Astral Projection" 3:55

timaeus222 returns with his fifth posted ReMix of game music originally composed by zircon! (Need a zircon-made game? Get Flowstone Saga!) Having already arranged Fittest, Dungeonmans, and Tangledeep, it's time to tribute another one-word indie title, as timaeus222 tackles two themes from zircon's soundtrack to Globulous! He even used loads of zircon-created Impact Soundworks samples, naturally:

"For years, I've been meaning to arrange something from Globulous, but I had never really gone through with it, not because the songs were iconic -- actually, it was because they are so hard to do justice! After watching a ton of Charles Cornell on YouTube about harmony and chord progressions (who is incredibly talented at jazz theory and analysis, by the way), I finally just decided to make a ReMix combining "Aurora Magnitude" and "Thicket Prism".

Generally, if I were to arrange something, I tend to keep the melody and change the chords around it, but, in this case, the "Aurora Magnitude" melody is so particular that I stayed mostly faithful with the implied chord progressions, while the rhythms of the melody and bass were changed instead. Later on, when I added "Thicket Prism" in here, it kind of just happened -- I didn't expect it to work so well, but it was something I could only see in the moment.

Some notable key players in the ReMix are the bass (Shreddage 3 Precision), bell arps (Zebra2 + Drops of Copper from Omnisphere), piano (Pearl Concert Grand), and plucky lead (Modern Harpejji), with most of the other instruments from Zebra2.

Overall, I didn't plan on blowing away the OST as far as sound design or layering goes, but the part-writing and harmonic clarity are definitely some of my personal best. I'm really happy with how this went and I hope you enjoy too! :-)

The inspiration for the title was to imitate the style from Globulous -- natural phenomenon/object + math term. In this case, it is a real term that means "intentional out-of-body experience", but also matches the naming scheme."

timaeus wasn't kidding about holding to the structure of the main source to start. He said he didn't aim to show up the original music, which makes perfect sense, though -- even holding back at 80% strength, per se -- timaeus is unquestionably bringing it. From pillar to post, judge prophetik music corroborated that dynamic of quality through his exclusively auspicious reactions:

"this is an exciting matchup of composer and remixer.

starts off with some smooth bass and lead work. actual drums come in at 0:27. there's some really delicate plucks going on here that i really liked. beat drops at 0:55 and there's a slow build back up with some funky chords to mix it up in there. doubletime beat at 1:22 feels really good under the more disparate melodic elements in this section. the track trucks through more Aurora Magnitude with some really fun synth work to a second break at 2:17.

this break serves as a nice shout chorus to transition to the second interlude of Thicket Prism, and also to transition back down from doubletime to the original tempo. 3:27 was really nice. 3:33 was the last big hit, and we get some more plectral bells over the AM chords before it's done.

looking at the overall mixing, as expected there's a lot of detail work that's highlighted throughout. i did notice that there's a lot of body in the low mid range, like around 100hz, for most of the track. this doesn't make it feel cluttered but it is certainly more dense than i'd have expected from some other tracks by timaeus.

this is an obvious pass to me. the two tracks mix together very well and the realization here is excellent. it's an enjoyable listen that doesn't do the mind-bending chord stuff that truong often does but still delivers on a high-quality product. excellent work."

Strong source tune choices with well-personalized instrumentation! The parts generally sound gorgeous and vibrant, and there's almost always an overall brightness and charm to timaeus's work. If I had to describe this in a Globulous-inspired turn of phrase, this one's gotta be the "Peak Product" among timaeus's handful of arrangements honoring zircon! ;-)