Professional Game Composers and Amateurism

Originally Posted by Cellius

I'm much more willing to embrace informed amateurism; that is, fans who are sensitive to the original's context and keep it in mind, and even possess a healthy amount of musical knowledge. I think there's a line that shouldn't be crossed, in the case of, say, trance remixes of Zelda music. Taking the music out of its original genre is something I'm not too fond of, especially if it were a piece of mine that were redone in such a way.

Ugh.

No.

I'd like to appreciate arrangements done in ways I both expect and DON'T expect. Really hate people crapping on arrangements "that aren't repsectful to the spirit of the original" or whatever that's supposed to mean. There's not liking something for personal and subjective reasons, but it's annoying to read of people going "it's not allowed" to be approached a certain way as if it's an objective violation of some apparent rule of remixing.

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by Cellius

Thank you for that polite response.

That's all it deserved.

Originally Posted by Cellius

Don't play dumb. You know what it means. There's a reason appropriate music genres exist within different genres of games, why one style works where another doesn't, you should know that.

That's bullshit. That's what it means. Look where your argument is coming from. "There's a reason appropriate music genres exist within different genres of games..." At what point are we talking about within games? The genre of an arrangement isn't required to fit the mood of the game the original music is from.

In many cases, an arrangement is a standalone work, not "within a game" or requiring anything to do with "original context." In your close-minded way of thinking tied to the game, you just don't feel that certain genres are permissable. So when po! & The OneUps did a great jazz arrangement of Axelay, that wouldn't be "schmup-y" enough for you or some garbage. Of course I'm not gonna be polite about telling you how stupid that sounds.

Needing the preservation of original context is fine for personal taste but is a shitty MO to apply broadly, not even to the fan arrangement community but to many professional arrange albums as well. You can dislike something, but that's not to say it's not even a viable arrangement idea in the first place. There are many who can walk away with both nostalgia and genuine appreciation at an arrangement that's conceptually outside the box. Or in your words "for whatever reason."

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Thanks very much to surasshu for breaking down the real deal. Nearly any arrangement done by a fan is meant to be a tribute, even the poorly-created ones. In my opinion, and I spend too much time doing this stuff, I appreciate more when the arrangement is interpretive, and I laugh hearing comments from people that go "I can't recognize the original," because on the fan arrangement side we get it all the time. Any arrangement that primarilly put the focus on interpreting the source material rather than inserting original ideas honors the VGM material that inspired it. Honestly, the people making those complaints about lack of recognition, those people don't have the ear for it and end up missing out on a lot because they can't figure out what's what and don't put forth the effort, but that's their prerogative. There's nothing wrong with badass covers, and I love hearing 'em, but those are generally easier to make because the framework is the same, and if I wanted little to no interpretation melodically, I can also grab the original and listen to that.

Cellius's complaints about techno/trance/etc are just genre hate, noted by his offense to me implying he wouldn't like a jazz arrangement of Axelay. Hey, I'm just reading right into what you were saying about requiring the "spirit of the original game," and your negative reaction to me choosing a different genre and game instead of trance & Zelda and saying you'd automatically hate it just shows how your limiting theory of VG arrangements was too broad and doesn't hold any real weight. You don't even agree with yourself. That's why I reacted so aversely to it, because it's just a nonsense, blanket statement. It's pretty funny reading that I'd welcome every crappily done arrangement regardless of genre and skill though. :-D

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Sorry about being confrontational earlier regarding the discussion. There were a lot of assumptions of bad faith regarding arrangement intent in the fan community. As a very active participant as an evaluator, bad faith assumptions on what we do aren't something to be taken lightly, especially because most people accept them at face value without any real knowledge. Informed listenerism, if you will. :-P

I'm not saying you have to like anything that sounds too liberal to you. But one thing I always see are uninformed opinions about what level of liberalism is present. People's manner of phrasing their dislike is as if these arrangements involve 75% wholly original and unrelated material, and 25% glib or passing references to the actual video game music.

I don't think anyone that's trying to provide proper tribute to the original VGM would do such a thing, though it does happen. But even for a place like OverClocked ReMix where VGM interpretation integrated with original ideas is encouraged, the lopsided hypotheticals people are implying aren't common or even encouraged.

If we're going to criticize this approach, let's at least do it with some degree of accuracy. Pretty much anything sent to OverClocked ReMix where the VGM usage is less that 50% of the track's content is going to be a no-go, and situations like that actually are pretty uncommon in the first place. That's why I'm trying to leave this "largely an original work disguised as an arrangement" stuff out of this discussion, where it belongs. No matter what some people insist, that's not what's happening in the fan arrangement community.

Having worked through situations where I've had to timestamp arrangements vs. the source VGM to verify connections (i.e. working to gain an objective point-of-view of source usage rather than subjective), OC ReMix isn't there to accept things that are largely original works. A to B connections are needed that show interpretation of the VGM material compared with the arrangement, and those should make up the majority of the arrangement always.

You don't have to like the music there based off that explanation. But it's a big leap in logic to say that fan arrangement sites are actively putting the VGM to the wayside and, in many (or most) cases, barely referencing it at all. With that said, if someone is at a loss because they can't make the connections, that's not to broadly state the track is a poor tribute. It's a just a tribute you cannot ascertain the connections to, and that's a personal thing, not "a line that shouldn't be crossed." That's where it treads into the ridiculous, on account of being such a broad edict.

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Some of y'all are implying that something like this is something that should be patently discouraged as a VGM arrangement. Because while the melody is indeed in play, the genre's not "sensitive to the original's context." And let's not forget the run-on of "why did he add these compositional cockwaving original passages, wtf, he's just glorifying himself and showing off and not tributing the game music enough." What's up with that? And while this doesn't play the arrangement straight or limit itself to genres that are close to the original, this is creative, well-executed stuff. What is inherently wrong with approaching it in this way? And that example's not doing anything that's substantially different from OC ReMix or VGMix or Dwelling of Duels or others.

While Cellius agreed with Arcubalis's statement ("should be able to interpret the music and take it somewhere different stylistically, and add their own voice to the piece"), he could conceiveably still shit on that linked Zelda II arrangement despite it using the exact same arrangement approach. He would claim that it doesn't use a viable arrangement approach, when really he needs to stick strictly to criticizing the genre and leave categorically wrong conclusions of arrangement intent out of the picture. Yes, that's an assumption on my part, but does it really seem far-fetched given what he said before about people crapping up Zelda with electronic arrangements?

I'm trying to understand where the real line is between thinking something should be discouraged because that's not playing "proper tribute" to the VGM, or because your personal opinion says you don't like that genre, but you extrapolate it as being tied to a general approach on arranging VGM. Honestly, everything I'm hearing sounds like "Well, I don't want someone to approach an arrangement "that way"...except if I like the artist and/or genre, and it sounds cool. Then it's ok." Basically what Goldfish was saying. But if you like this SMB arrangement, Goldfish, isn't that completely hypocritical? It's not even 45% Super Mario Bros. By your own reasoning re: Rockman X and Brink of Time, you would now have to dislike this as well. :-)

In practice, I'm really seeing more genre-hate than arrangement-approach-hate. And look, that's fine. But at the end of the day, y'all have to be honest enough to position your opinion as "I like what I like" rather than "this track doesn't tribute the VGM, because it's not context-sensitive and sounds ego-driven due to the original ideas added." That's clearly something that's being put aside given the right track that appeals to the ears, such as Goldfish's mention of S.S.H. But he's more upfront about it and acknowledging that it's listener preference. To me, it's nothing more than that, while Cellius asserts it's something broader and, IMO, fails.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

niki or anyone else who may know, I was interested in where you saw Uematsu criticizing doujin music; were there any interview links or anything of the sort in English?

Also, was he more critical of the arrangements being unlicensed and distributed, or was it more of a stance against people illegally profiting from the sale of doujin music?

I've heard Bobby Prince is very much against fan arrangements but haven't heard anything in any detail. I'm interested in who's gone on record specifically against fan arrangements and to what level they dislike them (again, stuff illegally being sold or disliking them even being made in the first place no matter what the distribution).

I was speaking idiomatically.