Music
Dirty Kirby
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Jun Ishikawa – SOURCE: Kirby’s Dream Land 3 (Sand Canyon 2) |
| ARRANGED BY: Tony Dickinson & Sam “Shnabubula” Ascher-Weiss PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson – Lead Guitars, Rhythm Guitars, Bass, Keyboards; Sam “Shnabubula” Ascher-Weiss – Keyboards; Alex “housethegrate” Liss – Lead Guitars, Travis Moberg – Drums | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitars, Bass, Drums, Percussion, Synths, Rhodes, Piano, CP-80, Gospel Choir | |
| GENRE: Dirty Jazz | |
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NOTES: This is the winning track from MAGfest X’s DoD. I’ve wanted to do this song in this style for a while, and finally got to it for that competition. This style is basically a shoutout to the band Dirty Loops (hence the name), that takes really terrible pop songs and makes them amazing. I’ve always wanted to do a full band remix, where each musician exclusively plays their own instrument, and this song started out that way but didn’t end up that way. Shnabubula was going to play all keys, but his recording schedule was pretty thick and then his MIDI/Recording computer died. In the end, he did the keys in the intro up until the main melody, and the piano solo. Sam also helped me come up with chord progressions and other stuff in a few sections in the song. Originally I was going to have Chris Feener do all the guitars, but he wasn’t able to record them, so I got housethegrate to do the solos at 1:56, 3:00, and 5:19. Travis Moberg does all the drums throughout the song.
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Grant Henry’s Flesh Crystal
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Kenji Yamamato & Minaka Hamano (arr. Jake “virt” Kaufman & Grant “Stemage” Henry) – SOURCE: Super Metroid’s Entire Soundtrack (Crystal Flash & various Metroid Metal arrangements) |
| REARRANGED AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitars, Bass, Drums, Nylon Acoustic Guitar, Steel Acoustic Guitar, Piano, Keyboards, Strings, Brass, Orchestral Percussion, Bongos, Shaker, Super Metroid Sound FX, Jesus Christ way too much to list | |
| GENRE: The Proggiest of Metal | |
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NOTES: Your ears aren’t deceiving you. Yes, this is a Crystal Flash cover and yes I transplanted Metroid Metal arrangements into the song. Since August 2011 was Recover Month, I had only one choice: Cover the one song that got me into remixing. This originally started off as just a straight Crystal Flash cover, but as I was working through the arrangement, I felt an urge to add a riff from one of the Metroid Metal arrangements in a certain section. It was originally supposed to be that one reference, but I decided to add more Metroid Metal arrangements to make this arrangement less of a straight cover. Metroid Metal was also one of the first remixing projects I ever listened to. I felt it only appropriate to do tribute to two of the best musicians I know, two of the best people on the planet, and two of the largest influences on my music.
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Disco Night, Baby!
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Kazuo Hanzawa – SOURCE: Gunstar Heroes (Goodnight, Baby!) |
| ARRANGED AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitar, Bass, Drums, Keyboards, Synths, Percussion | |
| PROJECT: Punchfest 15 “The Rip-offs”: September 11th, 2011 | |
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NOTES: Punchfest is the demon child of Dwelling of Duels and Punchfest, created by SnappleMan and named by virt (for all the punch-inseveryone will be doing through these competitions. The rules are everyone gets in an IRC room, and with a given theme, we make a real song (as opposed to strict MIDI in Punchfest). You are given 6 hours to make the song (as opposed to 1 hour in Kwakfest).
The first Punchfest in a long time (8 months I believe). The theme was music from games that were designed to capitalize on already successful game formats (i.e. tons of games ripping off Mega Man gameplay). I didn’t come up with many original ideas, but per suggestion by Nick the Newbie I did “Goodnight, Baby!” from the soundtrack in a similar style to some techno type official soundtrack version I found elsewhere. Also I added quotes from Frost* songs “Hyperventilate” and “Milliontown.” |
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F*** YOU DR. MANHATTAN (aka “The Freak Winged Boy from Ipanema”)
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Yuzo Koshiro (arr. Hugo “Dr. Manhattan” Vinicius) – SOURCE: Ys I & II (PC-Engine) (The Freak Winged Boy) |
| REARRANGED AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Nylon Acoustic Guitar, Clean Electric Guitar, Rhodes, Acoustic Bass, Drums | |
| GENRE: Cheezz (Cheesy Jazz) | |
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NOTES: …Alright…so DoD August 2009′s theme was “Recover Month” where you arranged another remixer’s DoD song. I was already doing Grant Henry’s Flesh Crystal for my main entry, but I talked to fellow remixer and widely perceived rival of mine Dr. Manhattan (real name Hugo Vinicius) and said that he and I should do a pair of alts where we cover one of the other’s songs and turn them into really silly genres. But neither us would tell the other what we were doing. So I took Hugo’s “The Freak Winged Boy” which is originally a totally metal Ys 3 arrangement. But I took the main melody, changed the key to the relative major, found some jazz chords that fit around the melody…and profitted. And as a first, this is the first DoD song I ever made that DOESN’T feature live bass. I played acoustic bass on my keyboard because bass guitar would’ve been wildly inappropriate.
Click here for Dr. Manhattan’s original song. You’ll probably need some context. |
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Sand Crabs
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PROJECT: School Projects |
| WRITTEN AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitars, Bass, Drums, Ethnic Percussion, Strings, Zourna, Oud, Saz, Sitar | |
| GENRE: Action Movie Desert Chase | |
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NOTES: This is another I song I made for my Intro to Music Apps class from my Spring 2011 semester. This time the project was to use instruments from Logic to create a song. I said SCREW THAT and took a few loops and made something on Cubase on my own gear. This song was actually written with a storyline in mind. Imagine you are Liam Neeson, once again as a CIA Operative or assassin or other guy with a super vague background that knows martial arts and shit (like he is in every movie). You are in a cliche middle eastern setting. Now listen to the song.
0:00-The scene comes into focus and you’re in a persian market. There are people selling blankets and fruits, and a little kid trying to peddle you VHS duplicates of sitcoms shown on UPN in the 90′s. You’re amused by this and go on your way WHEN… It doesn’t even matter if you like Liam Neeson. Imagine yourself as Daniel Craig, Matt Damon, Jason Statham, Keanu Reeves circa 1999 (well, maybe that’s pushing it)…doesn’t make a difference. You’re a hollywood badass who kicks ass, takes names, and knows 47 different ways to kill a man with an ironing board. |
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Ysta La Vista, Baby
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Yuzo Koshiro/Brad Fiedel – SOURCE: Ys I & II (PC-Engine)/Terminator 2 (The Termination/Main Theme) |
| ARRANGED AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitars, Bass, Drums, Organ, Piano, Synths, Strings, Brass, Percussion, Big Loud Cinematic Drums, Arnold Schwarzenegger | |
| GENRE: METUHL | |
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NOTES: This was my first DoD entry since my last MAGfest entry. My laptop died and I had to get it repaired before I could do anything…and then the first repair didn’t actually work so I had to send it back…anyways I was itching to make music so the first thing I did was this song. It’s a song I had been thinking about for a while, first suggested by my friend Nick Marinelli. It’s the boss theme from Ys I & II. Since it’s called “The Termination” I decided to do some puns with The Terminator, including adding some clips of Arnold and covering the main theme right at the end.
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Funk in 60ish Seconds
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PROJECT: School Projects |
| WRITTEN AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Funky Synth, Piano, Rhodes, Bass, Drums | |
| GENRE: FAWNK | |
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NOTES: This may not be an official Punchfest track, but it sure feels like one, and it was made in much the same way. During the Spring 2011 semester at school I was enrolled in a “Intro to Music Apps” class where we learned how to operate Pro Tools and Logic Pro, and the projects included making various tunes. This is one of the songs I made. I made it during a single 75 minute class period while teaching myself Pro Tools at the same time…and not to mention teaching myself to hit all the right keys on the keyboard! I’ll probably make this into a full song with real instruments sometime.
All instruments played live (drums 50% live) using instruments found in Pro Tools. |
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Splatter Kill/Hell House
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Howard Drossin – SOURCE: Splatterhouse 2010 (Skirmish 7) |
| ARRANGED AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson – Lead & Rhythm Guitars, Bass, Keyboards, Programming; Chris Feener – Lead Guitar | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitars, Bass, Drums, Piano, Strings, Brass, Orchestral Percussion, Scary Sound Effects, Evil Music Box | |
| GENRE: Symphonic Metal | |
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NOTES: This song is actually from the OFFICIAL remix project for Howard Drossin’s Splatterhouse 2010 soundtrack. It was a private project organized by Howard (with help from Jeriaska of Gamasutra) that I go recruited to. Howard’s original soundtrack is a lot of metal and a lot of creepy 50′s style orchestral scoring, but not really the two together. I took one of his battle themes and added some orchestra stuff to it and got internet guitar hero and friend Chris Feener to do some insane shredding from 3:35 to 4:20. All other guitars are me.
I wanted to call the song “Splatter Kill” because it’s appropriately gruesome enough to fit the song. Howard decided to name it “Hell House.” Which is still cool, but I like Splatter Kill better |
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. My song is the opening track to the album.
Tower of the Shadow of the Winnebago of the Pastrami Sandwich of Death
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Yuzo Koshiro arr. Ryo Yonemitsu – SOURCE: Ys I & II (Turbografx 16) (Tower of the Shadow of Death) |
| ARRANGED AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitar, Bass, Drums, Keyboards | |
| PROJECT: Punchfest 14 “Turbografx 16″: January 22nd, 2011 | |
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NOTES: Punchfest is the demon child of Dwelling of Duels and Punchfest, created by SnappleMan and named by virt (for all the punch-inseveryone will be doing through these competitions. The rules are everyone gets in an IRC room, and with a given theme, we make a real song (as opposed to strict MIDI in Punchfest). You are given 6 hours to make the song (as opposed to 1 hour in Kwakfest).
housethegrate picked this theme, and I am painfully unfamiliar with Turbografx 16 soundtracks, but I knew about the TG16 version of the Ys I & II soundtrack from before, so I picked “The Tower of the Shadow of Death,” not only because it’s funky as hell, but because it has a hilariously wordy title. Which I, of course, made more ridiculous. |
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Hot For Rock Shuffles
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ORIGINAL ARTIST: Van Halen/Jun Senoue/Tom Hopkins, Lance Lenhart, Chuck E. Meyes/Colin Anderson – SOURCE: Hot For Teacher/Sonic Adventure/Twisted Metal/Uniracers (Be Cool, Be Wild and Be Groovy! (Ice Cap)/Freeway Free-For-All/4th Race) |
| ARRANGED AND PERFORMED BY: Tony Dickinson | |
| INSTRUMENTATION: Guitars, Bass, Drums, Organ, Horns | |
| GENRE: Shuffle Hard Rock | |
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NOTES: I was actually intending on doing this song for last September’s DoD, and “I Need Scissors! 61″ would be the MAGfest song, but I decided against that, because this song would probably go over better with a MAGfest audience. The idea stemmed from a suggestion Nate “FoxxDragon” Horsfall gave to me to remix the 4th Race theme from a slightly obscure SNES game called Uniracers. When I listened to the song it had that fast shuffle feel made famous by Van Halen in “Hot For Teacher.” Then I was reminded of the songs from Sonic Adventure and Twisted Metal which I was already very familiar with, so I decided to mold those three songs together with “Hot For Teacher.” Hell, they’re all in the same keys and roughly the same tempo! Why the hell NOT!?
As for the sound clips, the first set of soundclips are real sound effects from Twisted Metal, the second set is real dialogue clips that Sonic says when you’re playing as Tails in the level the source song is from…and damn he is an annoying bastard. The last sound clips are an inside joke for fans of Frost* and Dream Theater.
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