Go baby go go, (yeah we’re right behind you)
Go baby go go, (yeah we’re lookin’ at you)
Go baby go go, (oh, we’re right behind you)
Go baby, go baby, Yeah we’re right behind you!
Microsoft’s recent ad for the Surface Go has surfaced feelings of nostalgia in many people who heard the song featured in the ad, Garbage’s “Cherry Lips.” For me personally, I first heard the song on the Playstation 2 music game, Amplitude.
From the makers of Dance Central, the unconventional music game had you piloting a space ship that coasted along “tracks” of music. Each track had notes that you would blast and after getting through a “section” or “verse” with no misses the track would blast away and disappear and it’s element would continue to play for awhile. Each track was broken down into vocals, bass, drums, synths and FX, and basically the better you play the game the better the song would sound, you could also choose to completely ignore the vocals track to make an instrumental version, or only play the drums and bass for an acoustic/percussive “remix.”
It wasn’t until it resurfaced in the Microsoft ad that I found out more about Garbage and that the lead singer actually wasn’t Gwen Stefani (it sure sounded like it to me). Enjoy the ad and it’s original music video above and below take a look at what it was like playing the song in Amplitude.
(Original production for PS2 game Harmonix’s FreQuency) Science Genius Girl
DJ Hero 2’s deadmau5 Megamix feat. Kaskade
Second Feature, DJ Tiesto’s Megamix in DJ Hero 2:
Freezepop’s popular music video for TENISU NO BOIFURENDO
As a gamer (when time permits) I can’t not highlight music inspired by, from and featured in video games. In fact, there are several games of days past that I can solely attribute to accentuating my love of EDM (electronic dance music) [for a list of good music video games check below].
SSX Tricky and more notably SSX 3 on GameCubefeatured a wide variety of artists including many British EDM acts as well as hip-hop. This game was the first to introduce me to artists such as, The X-Ecutioners, LCD SoundSystem, Audio Bullys and Jason Nevins’ remix of N.E.R.D.’s “Rockstar” with a soundtrack that featured a lot of electronic and UK house music.
Underground sleeper-favorite, blur, a racing game released by the makers of Geometry Wars on PS3 and Xbox 360, had an incredible EDM-filled soundtrack as well. The game sadly went under, probably due to a lack of a good marketing, but its concept was revolutionary, combining the weapon firing elements of Mario Kart with the sports-car inner-city racing thrills of Need For Speed Underground or Midnight Club, blur was way ahead of its time. Check out the blur soundtrack starting with Spank Rock’s “Bump (Best Fwends Remix)
Notables: Shades of Blue, Everyone Says Hi, Cherry Lips] For this feature I am highlighting a song out of the Playstation 2 series of music games, “FreQuency” and “Amplitude“. Revolutionary for their time, these games combined elements of rail shooters with music production, where the player would control tracks (such as bass, drums, vocals, FX, etc.) and by successfully tapping the notes the actual tracks would play and be added (or skip or get silenced if you mess up) as you successfully clear the stage. Someone playing S.C.G. by Freezepop in Rock Band
Freezepop was a well-known band through the games alone where they contributed some original music productions that could be called sci-fi techno, trance or just early EDM music. They also created another song called Super Sprode for Harmonix’s sequel to FreQuency, Amplitude, a fan/cult favorite music game that was way ahead of its time. With the song-creating elements of the first game and online interactivity Amplitude is known as one of the greatest music games of all time. There is currectly a KickStarter campain to create a sequel to Amplitude for PS4.
EDM giant deadmau5’s Megamix featuring House legend Kaskade
Next, from another popular, but also sadly defunct music game series, comes a stunningly-good megamix of songs by DJ Tiesto featured in the game DJ Hero 2, also produced by Activision. This game was very similar to their other music series, Guitar Hero but featured an actual turntable peripheral used to play the game, scratch and cut-up audio tracks. Though the game was immense fun, it’s very mainstream songlist, huge jump of difficulty from Hard to Expert (much harder than in GH) and lack of support for online play and DLC (though there was a lot of DLC upon first release) led to its eventual demise. DJ Hero by far however was not the first game to use a turntable peripheral, neither was Guitar Hero the first to use guitar add-ons. These medals below to Konami, Japanese video game publisher who’s BEMANI music video game series (started back in 1998) and the obsession of my life from about age 10-19 with their breakout series beatmania, it’s follower beatmania IIDX, and their most popular series to date, Dance Dance Revolution. Video Games with Popular or Prominent Soundtracks: The entire Dance Dance Revolution series Final Fantasy series (notably VII, IX, X, XI and XIII) Audition (Korean PC free-to-play music series) The entire beatmania IIDX series Guitar Hero (3, World Tour, 4) Pump It Up SSX Tricky, and SSX 3 Grand Theft Auto Series & Sleeping Dogs FIFA games and many other EA titles
LUMiNOUS Musings 