237: Pokémon: The Missingno Tracks, by Various Artists

Various Artists
Pokémon: The Missingno Tracks (2011)
28 tracks, 98 minutes
Download in full from OverClocked ReMix ∙ Soundcloud

When I started to set out writing about this album, my first thought was ‘this is probably the most embarrassing album on the whole list.’ But really, that's bullshit. You should never be embarrassed to like any music at all – unless it is music that oppresses others by its existence, in which case it belongs in the sea. But as a general rule, the whole concept of ‘guilty pleasures’ in music just shouldn’t be a thing. If you derive enjoyment, pleasure or meaning from it, in whatever form that may take, and it doesn’t hurt anyone, then it does its job as art, and is therefore good. And if I derive enjoyment, pleasure or meaning from it, then it is Good, and warrants its place on this blog. So bearing that in mind, I’m going to resolutely try to be entirely unashamed of this pick, while secretly hoping that no-one is laughing at how much of a nerd I am.

What is it then? It’s music from the Pokémon games for the various Nintendo handheld systems from the Gameboy to the DS. The tracks featured here are mostly from the first two generations of Pokémon games, whose music was based on sounds that we now think of as chiptune. You know the sort – bleepy and bloopy but with a surprising range of timbre, percussion that was just different types of white noise, and very short compositions that looped around and around depending on which in-game area you found yourself in at the time. The music of the Pokémon series was really good considering its limited resources, and could sound idyllic like a small rural village, ancient like a traditional Japanese temple, funky and action-packed for fight sequences or just one of the creepiest pieces of music ever composed.

BUT that isn’t what we’re listening to today. Not quite. Pokémon: The Missingno Tracks is an album made by the OverClocked ReMix community. OverClocked ReMix is a fun little corner of the internet where people work with video game music of all kinds and put their own spin on things. This includes remixing, remaking and reorchestrating video game music in every conceivable style, as well as making music inspired by certain games or pieces. Everything on OC ReMix is vetted before it gets posted – so the quality is usually very good – and everything is available for streaming and downloading entirely for free. Occasionally they release ‘albums’ of music based on a specific theme or game, and that’s where Pokémon: The Missingno Tracks comes from.

The way the OC ReMix project works means that the music on Pokémon: The Missingno Tracks is incredibly varied. Some tracks are obviously better than others, but the project’s vetting and compilation process means there’s very few duds in this whole set, and when the tracks are good, they’re really good. Super inventive too. There’s standard chiptune-y type remixes, but there’s also full metal rescores, piano covers, even R’n’B sort of things and original songs. But my absolute favourite has to be the remix of ‘Team Rocket Hideout’ from the original games, Pokémon Red, Blue & Yellow. This is what the original track sounds like. And this is what the remix, ‘TEEM.ROKIT’ by producer Tweex, sounds like:

How great is that?! That’s some proper industrial techno and psytrance vibes right there. I would not be embarrassed to drop it during a DJ set as long as the mood felt right. There’s dirty dub bits in there too. And I love that it still stays remarkably true to its source material – it has a lot of the same bleep-bloop atmosphere and obviously bases itself almost completely around the same melodies and countermelodies of the original, but it just ramps it up and up to the next level. It sounds (appropriately) like an evolved version of the 1996 original, and the vibe it creates is so perfect for the in-game context that I wouldn’t be surprised if something like this is exactly what composer Junichi Masuda would have had in mind if the system at the time would have allowed.

It just brings me back to a thing I seem to say way too often and that you’re probably bored of: video game music is a really untapped source of brilliant compositions, programming and ideas that are very rarely heard out of context, but that really do deserve a wider listener base than just the people that happen to play those specific games. So here’s me doing my own bit to get a wider audience, this time through the great work of the OC ReMix project. Maybe I’m still slightly embarrassed to be writing about Pokémon music on my (mostly) serious blog about the wonders of music from every bit of the world…but it’s good music, so who am I to argue?