Indie Music
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Indie Music, Miscellaneous
Hiroki Kikuta Releases ANGELICFORTRESS Original Albums
February 1, 2017 | Brenna Wilkes | Comments Off on Hiroki Kikuta Releases ANGELICFORTRESS Original Albums Share this
Secret of Mana composer Hiroki Kikuta has released two original albums to fans in the form of ANGELICFORTRESS and ANGELICFORTRESS DOUBLE HELIX. ANGELICFORTRESS is an album series created to combine Kikuta’s love for progressive rock, jazz fusion, and game music as well as to say thank you to patrons of music in general.
“I was exposed to an endless catalog of awesome progressive rock and jazz fusion albums throughout high school. It had the biggest impact on the formulation of my view of the musical world. Now I want to mix up these genres with modern day videogame music.” – Hiroki Kikuta
Both five-track albums are currently available on Bandcamp: ANGELICFORTRESS and ANGELICFORTRESS DOUBLE HELIX
You can also keep on top of Kikuta’s other upcoming works and news by following him on his official Twitter.
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Game Music, Indie Music
OCRemix to release “Super Mario RPG: Window to the Stars” a digital 3CD Tribute Album!
January 31, 2017 | Ryan Paquet | Comments Off on OCRemix to release “Super Mario RPG: Window to the Stars” a digital 3CD Tribute Album! Share this
Coming soon from OCRemix: Super Mario RPG: Window to the Stars, a digital 3CD described by them as a tribute album to the music of one of the greatest RPG’s ever created. OC Remix has released a trailer for the album which you can watch below.
Although the release date has only been listed as 2017, you can view the full track listing on the video game music database here. Keep your eyes on OCremix’s site for this upcoming release.
Do you think Super Mario RPG is one of the greatest RPG’s ever created? How about it’s soundtrack?
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Chip Music, Game Music, Indie Music
Watch Niamh Houston’s AKA Chipzel’s TEDtalk on Chiptunes!
January 30, 2017 | Ryan Paquet | Comments Off on Watch Niamh Houston’s AKA Chipzel’s TEDtalk on Chiptunes! Share this
Niamh Houston, also known as Chipzel gave an excellent TEDtalk on chip tunes this past November 5, 2016. If you’ve ever wanted an explanation on how she creates her music, she gives a full demonstration as part of the talk. She also talks about the overall idea that we are all hackers, and the importance of being authentic in any creative pursuit.
The ‘hacker ethic’ is central to Niamh’s musical creativity as she takes us on a journey into the Chiptune genre, a subculture creating music from augmented hardware and software, and why such expression resonates with Millennials and others who are seeking to create raw and unfiltered music for an online generation.
She is a BAFTA nominated and award winning independent composer from Northern Ireland. In 2015, Houston received the Best Music award in XBLA Fans’ Game of the Year awards, as well as being named VGMO’s best independent composer.
She has scored the original sound tracks for six video games, including the critically acclaimed Super Hexagon. Houston continues to compose music for forthcoming video game projects while working on her next studio album and touring the world. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community.
TEDx
The TEDtalk runs around 17 minutes, and it definitely worth your time. If you’ve had something on the creative back burner for a while, this might be the pep talk you need to hear. You can learn more about the TEDx event here, and check out chipzel’s music on her website.
What did you think of Chipzel’s TEDtalk?
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Indie Music, Japanese
Brave Wave brings Original Work from Takahiro Izutani on January 27th
January 23, 2017 | Shawn Sackenheim | Comments Off on Brave Wave brings Original Work from Takahiro Izutani on January 27th Share this
Brave Wave’s first release in 2017 continues their goal to give the freedom to game music composers to create their dream projects. Lingua Franca is the life’s work of Dugo, the alias of composer Takahiro Izutani who has composed for the Metal Gear Solid and Bayonetta series since 2006.
After a decade in design, Lingua Franca is now available to pre-order for $10 on digital or $16 on CD through Bandcamp and will be released on January 27th. While we wait you can check out two tracks from the album and read a message from Izutani below.
“First of all, I appreciate the entire audience of Dugo for supporting me. Dugo is my life’s work. I think […] you can indeed find some affinity between my work for Dugo and my compositions for video games. I was always taking experimental approaches during the process of making Dugo’s songs, and then sophisticating, developing, and introducing them into video game work.
Actually, you can explore the headstream of all of the video game music that I have ever made through this album. I think it is fantastic that Brave Wave is contributing to the video game music industry and supporting composers in such a way.”
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Featured, Game Music, Indie Music, Interviews
INTERVIEW: Composer David Fenn on the Titan Souls Soundtrack & More
For some time now I have been meaning to write about the soundtrack to Titan Souls. The music was composed by David Fenn, who has also composed the music for the mobile game Telepaint! and the platformer Leaf Me Alone. If you’re not familiar with Titan Souls, it is a challenging game where the player must battle numerous large bosses armed solely with a bow and arrow while trying to avoid a one hit sudden death.
Visually it reminded me of The Legend of Zelda and Shadow of the Colossus and what really makes the game special is David Fenn’s musical score. Its use of instrumentation creates at times a sense of awe and mystery as you traverse it’s ancient environments. The music also can be adrenaline inducing with it’s excellent use of percussion and electric guitar.
Read on for our interview with David Fenn where he talks about scoring Titan Souls, and gives some insight into his musical method.
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Events, Game Music, Indie Music
The Runaway Four Announce First Studio Album for January 20th
January 13, 2017 | Shawn Sackenheim | Comments Off on The Runaway Four Announce First Studio Album for January 20th Share this
Coming off of Patient Corgi’s mega collaboration, Tribute Album 64, Vancouver’s video game medley band, The Runaway Four, have announced the release of their first studio album on January 20th. Titled Chaos Theatre the 45 minute album offers five tracks of themed medleys with tunes from 31 different games mingling and mixing together.
In the opening track “This Game is Baroquen”, you’ll hear Final Fantasy, ActRaiser, Super Mario RPG, Columns and Katamari beautifully intertwined and played in a classical baroque style. The next three medleys are themed around the video game tropes of Ice Worlds, Fire Worlds and Battle Themes.
In “Borreal Bedlam” Earthbound flows into Donkey Kong Country into Kirby’s Dream Course among 8 other themes. On “Magma Mayhem” you’ll hear Diddy Kong Racing mingle into Super Mario RPG and charge into “Hot Damned” from Super Meat Boy. “Battle Royale” is a 17-minute track that melds 15 different battle themes from games including Chrono Cross, Bahamut Lagoon, Kirby Super Star, Pokemon R/B/Y and even Mega Man. Finally, there’s “Your Sanctuary”, a medley of themes from Earthbound which the band describes as “the warm hug at the end of the journey”.Chaos Theatre will be released January 20th on The Runaway Four’s Bandcamp page and kicked off with a live show and listening party at Seven Dining Lounge in Vancouver. For those not on the continent or in the area they’ll also be streaming the event live on their Twitch channel. In the meantime, check out some of The Runaway Four’s past performances on YouTube and their previous release Live at Columbia Theatre on Bandcamp.
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Chip Music, Indie Music
MAGFest MerchFest: GameChops USB Anthology
January 12, 2017 | Shawn Sackenheim | Comments Off on MAGFest MerchFest: GameChops USB Anthology Share this
If you didn’t get to attend MAGFest this year (or weren’t covertly handed one under a table at the show) there’s still time to grab one of these jampacked USB keys. Available from GameChops’ Bandcamp page for $50, the metal drives contain 4.1 gigs of GameChops music and include “every single, EP and album release from 2012 – 2016 with artwork, including exclusives”. That’s a ton of great music, 446 files in all, in 320bkps MP3 format.
It also includes streaming access to 2015’s Smooth McGroove Remixed album in anticipation of the upcoming follow up release. But act fast if you’re tempted, at the time of writing there were only about 40 USB keys available which were apparently hidden among GameChops’ luggage.
Unpacking from MAGFest and I’m finding USB Keys EVERYWHERE. It’s like an infestation of merch pic.twitter.com/xRfKeuCXYa
— Dj CUTMAN @ MAGFest! (@VideoGameDJ) January 9, 2017
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