Sunday, April 10, 2011

Blog #10: Remix and RO

The remix I've chosen is not one that has any penetration into pop culture whatsoever. In a pretty popular and influential video game from 1998 that has probably garnered more top spots on "best video game ever" lists than any other, there's a little musical ditty based off of a little three-note musical theme called "Song of Storms." In the game, the player has the option of using it to cause the weather to change. It's identifiable as one of the playable songs, but its penetration into any culture, be it video gaming, music, remix, or otherwise is pretty minimal. The song is one of the uncountable themes originally composed and arranged by the prolific game-musician Koji Kondo. Though I've been away from the gaming culture for a very long time, the legacy of that man's music still resonates strongly with me today.
This remix is more of a sentimental, mindless jam session by a dude with a screen name than it is an actual remix, but hey the definition of remix is loosely defined anyway and doesn't really matter for the scope of this assignment. It's got a simple chord progression played on acoustic guitar to open, and continuously backing it throughout. The main theme recognized as the "Song of Storms" is then introduced, played on an additional guitar. He repeats the theme until no longer necessary, then throws on an electric guitar overlay for variety. Then he continues to break down with a long, multi-part solo that goes in a completely different direction.

What I like about this remix is that it still feels very loyal to the Song of Storms. An unfortunate reality of the original material is that it's roughly eight bars of music, and it's really hard to make a fully realized song out of only eight bars of music. He repeats as necessary, because the body of work it comes from is by its very nature repetitive. But you can only repeat an eight-bar theme a couple of times in a musical work. He lengthens it by adding a long instrumental session in the same key, pretty artificial and obviously unrelated to the original work but it sounds good and adds character. I love that. Anyway, before I get too deep into discussing musical merits of song remixing, I'll just go straight into lessig.

This ties into the notions of RW culture Lessig discusses. In his section RW, Revived he mentions how the internet and other technologies are changing our culture's access to tools that allow us to remix media. He uses the example of throwing Beatles' works over Cronkite broadcasts and distributing the result to tens of thousands. That would be difficult before the internet and other technologies allowed us to do such things on an amateur level with almost no budget. I feel like SAiNT 420's remix of Song of Storms is a great example of this as well. Using digital recording technology that's pretty available, he can record himself play some acoustic guitar, and using an established online community (OCRemix), he can distribute it to anyone in the world that wants to hear it.

Lessig discusses many things in RW, Revived and a lot of them are relevant to the presence of this remix. The idea that remix promotes community and education is true of SoS. OCRemix, the website, project, and internet community dedicated to the remixing of video game music, is the vessel that SAiNT420 used to project this remix. It is the very epitome of a strong, benevolent community. Further, the OCRemix project has made me, and I'm sure thousands before and after me, a lot more informed as to the ways of musical theory, transcription, editing, producing, creating. That's not to mention the whole body of knowledge that is digital information sharing, copyright, file management, computer programs, compatibility, etc. As well as the "goods" of remix that Lessig describes, SoS and OCRemix represent the idea of alternative media taking precedence in popular thought. Video games and the internet represent huge amounts of RO consumption, and people playing video games then actively deciding to research gaming communities on the internet is representative of the beautiful romanticized notions of RW that Lessig lauds.

Conclusion: OCRemix is a project that could only be born of a culture that embraces the RW creativity Lessig describes, and SAiNT420's remix "SoS" is an example of a remix that shows people's active interest in RW culture.

3 comments:

  1. Cool example and great connections to Lessig. I like the way you describe how the remix connects to both the community and educational aspects Lessig speaks of. Also, I think you're right that there is a "whole body of knowledge that is digital information sharing, copyright, file management, computer programs, compatibility, etc." This is a great point.

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  2. I just heard the song of storms for the first time the other day.It seems funny that I should stumble across it here as well. I never played the game your talking about as I had a playstation in stead of a nintendo 64. Sometimes I am a little sad that I missed out on such a great game and many of the cultural references I have seen to it over the years. I always feel a little left out by these references. It makes me wonder what remixes in the future will pull from for material as the RO culture that dominated our youths slowly fades from the cultural consciousness and nothing rises to take its place.

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  3. RW culture is more than just making new content. It takes good ideas to make a remix. More to that, just a people actively make remixes people actively consume them. Even if someone creates something that is meant for RO culture as soon as it is made available to the public it is then available to be recreated into something different.

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