Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake "The Darkening Sky" 3:43

We just celebrated Anti-Syne sending in some old gold, and now we have about:blank revisiting an older, incomplete piece and sprucing it up to finally finish it and send it our way! We're happy to have about:blank tributing one of the MSX's greatest soundtracks, Metal Gear 2!

"This was 99% finished in 2022. But I wasn't happy with the mix and decided to come back to it later. Two years went by as I totally forgot about it. Thankfully, I stumbled on the project file a couple days ago, spent a few more hours on it, and I'm pretty happy with it now. [...]

I can definitely say that I was trying to do an homage to the arpeggio at the beginning of the Stranger Things theme, but in this song's key. I spent way too long on that part.

Structurally, the first part of the song is primarily based on the arpeggio in the first part of the original. The lead melody is brought in later during the ending sections. I riff on the "chorus" section, which starts at 0:35 in the original and at around 1:00 in this remix, quite a bit.

I'm pretty sure I made the decision to approach the arrangement more conservatively from 2:16-onward to make up for the bigger liberties taken during the earlier sections.

This was made shortly after I purchased a flute and started relearning the instrument. My original intent was for this to heavily incorporate the flute, but I ended up just using it in the ending."

I loved being introduced to this source because it definitely sounds like something about:blank would take on. He wastes no time drawing your attention, with lots o' pumpin' at the start of the track.

The subtle SFX from 1:56-2:12, as one example, were small details that added so much character to the presentation; same for the quiet electric-esque sounds introduced at :20, where the SFX as an additive element really first started.

The keyboard line from 1:00-1:15 & 1:55-2:15's one of the track's brighter, more serene elements, with the technique nicely used again with about:blank's performed flute from 3:19-3:35 as an optomistic-sounding close. You don't have to skulk around like Solid Snake to enjoy this in the way that judge Hemophiliac did, but it helps:

"Holy bejesus dynamic contrast. I love the huge swings between loud and soft on this. Huge textural contrasts between huge and wide vibrato on the fat bass synth with massive percussion and then beautiful and serene electric piano lines and airy flute.

I'm feeling the source and the melodic interpretations, plenty of it go by and plenty of your own spices to go along. [...]

Uneasy just like other moments in this song through great use of chromaticism (2:12 in the piano) as well as strange and unique synth choices and processing.

YES, loved this."

It's a spirited, dynamic fleshing out of the "Night Fall" theme, and I too really dig the subtle yet persistently uneasy feeling to all of the warbly synths. With about:blank, the devil's in the sonic details, so it's always a pleasure to hear what he's got cooking. :-) Fingers crossed that others in the scene also sift through the MG2: Solid Snake soundtrack, which is full of gems just waiting to be musically mined!