It’s been a prolific year for celebrating milestone anniversaries of classic video games. (1992 and 1997 truly were blessed years.) There’s also been no shortage of tribute albums dedicated to celebrating the music of said games either. Diddy Kong Racing is no exception to this treatment, as Materia Collective has released yet another in their already impressive video game library with Future Dance Land: An Electronic Tribute to Diddy Kong Racing.
Released in North America for the Nintendo 64 on November 24, 1997 and composed by the legendary David Wise, Diddy Kong Racing was Rare’s response to Nintendo’s Mario Kart. Album producer and arranger Nicholas Arden Day (aka Nikolyst) decided to pay homage to the game’s soundtrack by creating an electronic fusion album.
“Diddy Kong Racing contains some of my all-time favorite game music. I felt it was only fitting to combine these catchy tunes with EDM. Once I discovered the 20th anniversary of Diddy Kong Racing was approaching, the idea for this album was born.” – Nikolyst, Album Producer
The album includes contributions from several artists over the 20 tracks, including Viking Guitar, John Weible, Jay Kim, former OSV editor Michael Hoffman and more, all done in a energetic, electronic mashup.
Future Dance Land: An Electronic Tribute to Diddy Kong Racing is available for download on Bandcamp, iTunes and streaming on Spotify. You can find out the full album credits on the album’s page at Materia Collective.
