Overclocked Remix

John Romero introduced me to this site quite some time ago and it is a crying shame that I never gave it serious props until now.

OCR. Bask in its glory.

For years composers have felt inspired to rewrite (or more accurately remix) their favorite game music. I never thought much of the idea since all I ever wanted to do was take 8 bit tunes such as Metroid and make them fuller. Little did I know this in and of itself is a form of remixing.

But what was really cool about this? Well, possibly most of you have heard a song done in a different way that makes you say "huh, interesting", such as "Enter Sandman" by Metallica (the original being a heavy metal song) sung in the style of Frank Sinatra. It actually makes a good song in both genres oddly enough.

So take that and turn it on its ear for game music. Final Fantasy tracks turned into smooth jazz. The great Jake Kaufman "Virt" wrote one of his famous Contra remixes here, and that remix was so popular Konami asked him to score Contra 4.

Yeah, my stuff is on there, and there'll be at least a couple of tunes to follow. But what is REALLY cool about it is that there is a TON of music available for free. Not to mention detailed reviews of most of the songs that really are well written.

Just peruse it. Even if it takes an hour to find a piece of music you really like, wouldn't it be that way listening to the radio? Yep. Enjoy it. It is a gift.

Comments

[Jimmy Hinson]

Thanks for the plug, very cool of you to do! :)

[asker]

OCRemix is amazing. Too bad there aren't that many Brandon-remixes. I was meaning to ask - How's work progressing on your next album, Alex?

[Torley]

I've enjoyed various remixes from OCR over the years, some of which I've found offsite but traced back to the series source. Always up for a stylistically disparate version of a tune classic. I've done a few like a piano+lite orchestration version of Kingdom Hearts: http://torley.com/files/mp3/kingdom-hearts-piano.mp3 and the sprawling metroplex of a video game medley on piano that keeps getting passed around, "The Games We Played": http://torley.com/the-games-we-played-on-flash-flash-revolution

And what I'd really like to hear are more albums influenced by your melodic-but-edgy Deus Ex work! I was looking around on iTunes and the Robot Dreams compilation, at parts, bears some similarities with contemporary synthesis.

[Adam Michaels]

Been an ocremix fan for a while. They really do a nice job with their compilations. Their street fighter hd remix was a far better direction for street fighter than the official street fighter 4 soundtrack. Too bad there aren't any jazz jackrabbit remix albums. Alex, thought about doing some remixes of your old work?

[Kev]

There certainly isn't enough of your stuff on there Alex! I've been meaning to submit the Long Night Deus Ex remix album (http://www.last.fm/music/Auteur+Theory/The+Long+Night+(Deus+Ex+Remixes) ) on there for quite a while, but haven't got round to it yet.

But it's great to see such a dedicated community around this sort of thing.

[suneel]

unatco & DuClare are nice kev

[Zoe]

they're total gearwhores though, they care more about production quality than arrangment. You could take an amateur-made General MIDI and add a crapload of reverb and it will probably pass.

Likewise, make an EXTREMELY intricate chiptune, and they'll boot your butt out the door.

Not to mention they were in charge of the soundtrack of the X360 Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD, and made it royally suck.

[Jimmy Hinson]

Absolutely incorrect, Zoe. There are TONS of remixes that have been posted where the artist used free soundware, loops, or samples and the remix was still top-notch. Also, you contradict yourself if you say OCR is more concerned with production quality, and then presume that someone can "take an amateur-made General MIDI and add a crapload of reverb and it will probably pass".

As far as chiptunes go, that's another issue altogether. We're not a chiptune site, simple as that. Do you get upset that you can't get a Big Mac at an Italian restaurant? That's just how it is, I'm not sure why it offends you so much.

Actually, judging by your overall bitterness toward the site, I might wager that you've either had submissions rejected, or else have a friend who has. Why else would you be so defensive about the standards of submissions that OCR has? Regardless, I'm sorry to hear you hate it so badly.

As far as your dislike for the HD Remix soundtrack, that's entirely subjective. Nobody's going to force you to like it, and you're entitled to your (quite cynical) opinion, but it seems that a majority of listeners disagree with you. I might also point out that were it not for OCR's consistent quality, Capcom probably wouldn't have been as interested in using us. Also, we were not "in charge" of the music, rather, we worked under the creative direction of Capcom, so if you complain about the music, you're essentially complaining about the good folks there as well.

At any rate, if you have any further questions/comments/concerns related to OCR, feel free to email me. Back to you, Alex! ;)

Peace,
-Big Giant Circles (judge, OC Remix)

[Alex]

A lot of subjectivity for me to properly comment. Since I'm not as familiar with the OCR process as most or even with a bulk of the stuff on the site, I couldn't say what the submission issues are, only that chip tunes can be just as badass as any other tune. Some of Virt's (Jake Kaufman) original "hits" so to speak were definitely 8 bit (his Contra piece for example).

Changing the subject slightly, I do have a minor issue with Music4Games however in that it is definitely slanted towards a much more commercial "now" angle rather than a combination of historical as well as modern game music. When I asked awhile back to do a feature on "greatest hits", Greg politely told me that it wasn't something he was that interested in. Now I see press releases for Billboard events that mention nothing of games whatsoever.

I'll be the first to acknowledge that chiptunes by themselves are not for everyone. I'd say maybe 10% of gamers out there would have a tape of old game music from the C64 or NES lying around. But that isn't the point. Old game music is important because it represented a unique era of gaming that no longer exists, even in terms of how unique it was. Game music no longer has that unique quality. It is "music" in games that everyone "expects" for the most part. Good? Hell yeah looked at one way, it is what composers dreamed about for years. But now that we're here, we're scratching our heads... "okay, uh... this is cool but... what now?"

[Jimmy Hinson]

I agree, Alex. Also, as an OCR staff member, let me further clarify that in NO WAY do we mean to downplay the awesomeness of classic (or heck, even new) chiptunes. All I meant is that OCR does not accept chiptune submissions. Not because we don't like them, they're just something that site founder David "DJPretzel" Lloyd and past staff members decided against, mainly for management and consistency issues. This rubbed some people the wrong way (and still does, it seems) but I'm not sure how that could possibly count as a strike against OCR, especially when there are some great sites that are specifically designated to finding chiptunes, both classic and new.

The closest thing we've got to a chiptune is a Secret of Mana remix by Sam "Shnabubula" Ascher-Weiss, who is in my own humble opinion, one of the most briliant and talented musicians I've ever known. It's called "Dueling Consoles" and the premise is that it's a face off between the NES and the Genesis soundchips which ultimately end up combining into a "super soundchip" (more or less) and the result will absolutely blow you away. Grab it here - http://www.ocremix.org/remix/OCR01485/

I'd personally love to hear more things like that, and I also love purely chiptune remixes. I've had the privilige of not only meeting Jake/Virt, but seeing him do live chiptune concerts at MAGfest, and man, there's truly something special about them. Heh, you're also correct in that back in the day I had a cassette in which I recorded all my favorite game music straight from my Gameboy, and I wore that tape out!

Again, we love chiptunes, heck, we love all original game music whether it's bleeps and bloops or full blown scores. Chiptunes just happen to fall into the category of something the site doesn't host. This may seem unfortunate to some people, but hey, the good news is that there are still lots of places to find all those classic 8-bit tracks we all know and love :) Anyway, I hope this explanation helps. I feel a little obligated to try to smooth out any misconceptions since I'm more or less speaking on behalf of the site :)

[suneel]

hey Jimmy Hinson i submitted to ocr on feb 15, got an auto ack back....but nothing after that. wrote to a couple of judges, no response...wrote again....nothing. i think you guys need to be more transparent....not a one way street. i dont think i would want to submit again to ocr if your not willing to provide the artist the status of the submission. seriously no ones wants to waste 3 months waiting for a response, you guys are just too overrated. seriously. think about it from a submitters point of view, no one wants to waste 3 months in this technology of the internet.

[Jimmy Hinson]

Hi suneel, thanks for submitting, and thanks for your input. I need to ask what you mean by an "auto ack back"? Do you mean you received a form letter rejection, or do you mean you simply received a response that your submission had been received?

I do understand your frustration regarding the length of time it takes for you to see whether or not your track has made it to the panel or what the status in general may be, and trust me, we do "think about it from a submitters point of view" (after all, we submit tracks too), but I might also spin that around and ask that you think about it from our point of view as well. OCR has become a fairly large site, and as it's grown in popularity, so have the number of submissions increased. It's a not-for-profit site, and all of it's staff are volunteers. We have families, jobs, friends, hobbies, etc to balance in addition to taking time out of our days to provide constructive insight and complimentary reviews of the submissions we evaluate. I, too, wish that it didn't take so long, but again for now, that's just how it is. It's like standing in a long line at the grocery store. It's not fun, and it's be great if the line didn't exist, but most people understand that's just part of grocery shopping, especially as the number of customers per that store increases.

As for your not receiving a response, I'm sorry you haven't heard anything before now, and though there's not much excuse for that I'll admit, I would again ask you to consider that our inboxes tend to get a bit overwhelming from time to time. Feel free to email me directly with your initial question, and I'll be happy to look into it for you. Please send to biggiantcircles (at) gmail (dot) com.

Alex, sorry I'm taking over your comments page! :)

[suneel]

thanks Jimmy, done sent you an email!

[zoe]

also david lloyd is a pretentious asshole, but I wasn't going to mention that...

[Alex]

Please don't mention that then. For all my issues with various folk over the years, remarks like that are best kept private.

Thanks.

[zoe]

ok, sorry :(