Would anyone be surprised if a song from Final Fantasy or Chrono Trigger was the most remixed? I wasn’t. I checked OCReMix’s track listing. Surprisingly, it’s not emo-franchise FF7, it’s FF6. Even more surprising is that there’s a whopping 13 remixes of that one song, and the game features a handful of other over-remixed tracks, and a plethora of under-appreciated and under-remixed ones.

Yes, I mean it. More Final Fantasy remixes, please. But not of emo-fantasy. With Voices of the Lifestream, it’s gotten more attention, proportionally as well as otherwise, than it deserves. Loads of decent tracks worth a remix or two. Although I think I’d prefer remixes of games yet to be  touched by OCRers.

Anyway, Terra’s theme is in the lead with 13 remixes. Chrono Trigger’s Schala’s Theme and Corridor of Time, Mega Man 2’s Dr. Wily Stage 1, and Radical Dreamers: Nusumenai Houseki’s Far Promise ~ Dream Shore (Part 1) all have 10 remixes. Just look at it! Crazy!

The stats don’t really cover re-used themes such as the Mario or Zelda themes, which are also over-remixed. We’ve heard their Overworlds, thank you and remix something else now.

Interestingly, Final Fantasy 7 is represented by three tracks, each being remixed 6 times. Is it a coinkidink that it spells 666? Does it have anything to do with Square dominating the top tracks listing?

Anyway, I need a better lawyer. I hope Shnabubula won’t sue over the not so subtle reference to the name he picked for his take on the over-remixed track.

I’ve been busy with court, but thanks to my lawyer, I have internet access at the detention center. 

Despite occasional posters’ preferences of music without lyrics, it seems as if the favourite tracks are those with lyrics. A quick research in the Reviews forum revealed the three most reviewed tracks being ones with lyrics. The bottom three? None with lyrics. Despite the reviewing campaign dominated by DA and OA, there are tracks that don’t get the number of reviews they deserve – and some that get an unfair percentage of the total reviews.

Naturally, not all posts in the review forum counts as reviews. Still, the average for the1549 posts at the time of writing is about 25 posts per thread. It’s a little unfair that some get almost 200 posts (one way over 200) while others have a measly 5. I downloaded the top three and bottom three remixes recently in order to analyse them. I didn’t have to. The top 6 tracks all have lyrics, all having over 150 replies to their review thread.

The top three are: Sonic & Knuckles “Lover Reef” by a horde of remixers at 266 replies; Asterix “Niggaz 4 Life” with 199 replies; Chrono Trigger “TheIncredibleSingingRobot” with 189 replies.

The reason for their popularity has to be that there’s so much more to say about the lyrics than the music. The reviews are mixed, there’s irrelevant little replies about offtopic remarks, there’s posts about zyko’s ethnicity… All in all, it’s not an indicator of the most downloaded or people’s favourite tracks, it’s just a list of tracks that due to the lyrics cause a lot of people to want to express themselves (and their ignorance).

The bottom three at the time of downloading were Shinobi “Ninja Strut”, Shenmue “Ryo’s Renshuu”, and the creatively named Tinhead “Level 1 Theme (Brain Bucket Mix)”. Okay, Ninja Strut and Ryo’s Renshuu are drum-based pieces and the Tinhead remix was synthy and a bit caught between enjoyable stuff I associate with trackers, and trance. Still, when the average number of replies, these tracks do deserve something at least half way to average.

Ultimately, this is the recipe for getting loads of reviews: remix any game but add lyrics, collab with as many singers as possible, make sure you’re using racial language, and make sure the remix contains stuff some people hate.

How to make a good remix is a different question, but it probably involves John Williams… and the Cleveland Orchestra.

Just for posterity, let’s list the remixers whose tracks are in the top or bottom three, in no particular order:

Rayza, pixietricks, zircon, mutagene, Joe Redifer, D-Lux, GeoffreyTaucer, shonensamurai, The Sheriff, Ubik, Star Salzman, zyko.

Since my lawyer had advised me not to speculate in the dealings of humongous companies with prepostorous resources and lawyers enough to fill an oil tanker, I thought I’d get back to OCReMix, since my lawyer suggested I focus on a “non-profit organization” with less legal resources. I’ve come to believe OCR is responsible for a significant amount of “music” that is meant to be felt while high.

It goes without saying that video game music has evolved from bleeps and bips to quality electronica, but here lies the crux. Trance artists like Blind make their living on recruiting “agents” among people who “want to help out another remixer” in an attempt to buy themselves some higher status through association with celebrated remixers in the inbred community. The result is that the artist gains gigs and fame, while his “agents” remain insufferable sycophants pestering others on the OCR boards.

Let’s test this hypothesis by listening to three random remixes from OCR. The first one is a Chrono Trigger piano piece by Suzumebachi, called Forever. The second one is a Breath of Fire piece by Ghetto Lee Lewis. The third is a Mega Man X4 remix by the artist formerly known as DJ Terra.

The mixes speak for themselves.

OCR has previously been accused of being a techno site, and is often found favoring electronica over, say, viking metal. No doubt numerous remixers rely on electronica to produce their works, but when the focus goes from audible harmonic vibrations in the air to vibrations in the floor and in the spines and hearts of all junkies soon to suffer from arrhythmia and whatever the drugs themselves cause.

I’ll give OCR one more chance to redeem itself, one last random remix. What does that tell you?