ReMix:The Legend of the Mystical Ninja "From Ghosts Emerge Beasts" 4:39

By Eradicate

Arranging the music of one song...

"The Cat's Grudge (1st. Demo BGM)"

Primary Game: The Legend of the Mystical Ninja (Konami , 1992, SNES), music by Harumi Ueko

Posted 2004-05-01, evaluated by the judges panel


The first of May, 2004, will not be known as a day of subtlety for OCR :) Both this mix and the next that will be posted are in genres that aren't about subtlety; in fact, they eschew subtlety. They mock it. They'll have no part in it. Which can be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on the mood you're in. I've always found that any sort of speed metal/hard industrial works better when you've got a lot of energy and/or angst to release. That doesn't describe my own circumstances too often these days, I s'pose, but I can still dig something rudely aggressive every once in awhile. And rudely aggressive would, I would say, accurately describe this speed metal mix from newcomer Eradicate from Legend of the Mystical Ninja. The ReMixer writes:

"It is a thrash/black metal remix of the "Cat Kurobei" theme from Legend of the Mystical Ninja, on the Super Nintendo. I have titled it "From Ghosts Emerge Beasts." The thrash metal elements from the piece stem from how the guitar parts are executed, including the drumming. The soloing is also "thrashy," and the distortion used on the guitars (ran through a Laney amplifier) was created to mimic the sound of 80's metal thrash groups. The black metal parts of the piece come out in execution as well, with lots of tremelo picking, double-bass, keyboard parts, and also the way the melody is presented throughout the piece. The final, acoustic closing section is also based on black metal ideas (jazz guitar over acoustics, for example), though I took creative liberties in making it sound more Japanese-like at that part, for a little added texture."

First off, let me applaud the artist for a very strong mix title. If you spend time on a piece of music, visual art, writing, what have you, it seems to me effort should also be directed towards its christening. To paraphrase The Princess Bride: "We are men of action. Bad mix titles do not become us." Now, this mix won't be to everyone's liking. More specifically, if you're not a fan of thrash metal/death metal or things that are very loud, distorted, and fast in general, this may not be your cup of tea. BUT, but, there is definitely craft here. As with most any genre outside of "70's television theme covers using only kazoo and bongo," there is always room for creativity and talent to set certain works apart. To that end, Eradicate has taken the original melody and certainly turned it into breakneck, shredding metal, but there's some cool transitions, the mixing involves a calibrated chaos and never gets truly sloppy, timing is improved from the initial version the ReMixer sent us, and the rapid-fire drum blasts and grating, swift guitar arpeggios do have form and substance to them. As Israfel is leaving our judges panel due to time constraints and moving more into other arenas, I'll give him the last word:

"Nice Euro-speed metal thing going on here. Production is a bit lacking, but overall it's a fun mix in a style that we really don't see here often. Not perfect, but good enough - and besides, I'm partial to the genre."

djpretzel

Discussion

Latest 14 comments/reviews; view the complete thread or post your own.
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Rexy
on 2011-12-30 17:16:38

Goemon! Yeah, after checking out Mystical Ninja via the Wii Shop Channel a couple of years ago it's one tricky game to get into but the tunes themselves did indeed feel pretty. Very appropriate title too, given that you had to defeat a ghost boss to free Kurobei pretty early on in the game.

To be fair it took me a while to realise that the guitars were actually fake (o_O) but even with that knowledge on, it's actually a pretty swift thrash take on the source, with plenty of variation and additional sweeps to cater towards the genre. Sure, the weak samples and articulation behind them may rub off a heck of a lot now, but the amount of detail placed towards the writing shows Eradicate's musicianship quite well. And that is some intense drum programming in particular; the double bass kicking, fast strum programming and blast beats were very intensely developed and the amount of detail placed towards thickening that and the rest of the instruments were of pure class. And it even went up a level for me at 4:20 with what seems to be a very handy way of handling acoustic strumming in a mix, with those kinds of hammered chords being represented rather beautifully.

It's a shame this wasn't recorded with live guitars as it would've really kicked up this excellent writing tenfold, but for now it's pretty brutal and neat, and should be a great draw to fans of the genre. Nice work :)

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Level 99
on 2009-12-23 14:34:07

Why are there not tons (ie double digts) of Legend of the Mystical Ninja mixes on here?! Goemon and his crazy hair is more deserving than that. Obey or his spikey yo-yo of death will come and smite thee!

This was very cool. The distorted guitars were a good choice, if not a little unconvincing in the execution. If it's real, then it's a very synthetic distortion and very exact playing. To be fair, though, if they are sampled/synth guitars, then I give you kudos for such good execution that it made me question their authenticity a bit.

The backing strings could have been used a little better, in either case. So call me a fan of the arrangement and the idea, not so much of how it ended up. I'll echo what Deia said about how the artificialness of this really bogged me down.

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DragonAvenger
on 2009-10-27 22:12:53

This is interesting. It's fast paced, in your face (whoo unintentional rhyme), but sounds...fake. I have to say the qualities of the sounds overall are really bringing the track down for me. This isn't a genre I'm really a fan of either, so that doesn't help, but the artificial feeling is really unfortunate. Would be nice to hear this live sometime.

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OA
on 2007-05-02 16:55:00

Some pretty cool parts, but the production hurts, and im not diggin the hihat sound. It's way to piercing and doesn't seem to be meshing with the rest of the mix. Arrangement is pretty insane,and very creative. This would have been awesome recorded with real guitars. Overall some issues, but in the end, the arrangement wins me over.

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Ceiling90
on 2006-08-12 14:39:28

To me its reminiscent of DragonForce and a bit of Slayer, which is a good thing. It's simply amazing, I almost wish it had some vocals go with the whole speed metal thing. Though like a others said, I wish the mastering were better, but the song itself is great.

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NeOmega
on 2005-03-04 01:26:20

Hi Eradicate,

Thanks man, that was great!

Only metal remix so far that I've heard that I thought kicked ass.

--NeOmega

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aimless nomad
on 2004-06-28 16:56:26

Well, I came across the mp3s of the various wips there were of this on my hard drive and wondered what ever became of this song.....oh, duh, it slipped onto ocremix without me even noticing...doh!

Sorry, I'm late. I'm glad your song made it on. Great stuff. Good luck on Incal...incan...that one I can neither spell nor pronounce :wink: . And good luck on that as yet unnamed project you spoke of on Soundclick :D

-----edit:

Incalescence :lol:

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Kamikaze Noodle
on 2004-05-12 17:16:59

Ha, this would be amazing if it was done by a real group. The musical ideas abound from this piece. I would really love this piece if it was higher quality. As it stands, it's awesome, but I probably wouldn't listen to it in the car.

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tgfoo
on 2004-05-03 20:09:58

This is interesting. Not exactly the style of music I normally listen to, but it definite is worth a listen. Like TCK said, this would be a lot nicer to listen to if it was higher quality, but all in all it's a solid piece ( a little weird though...but ain't nothin wrong with that).

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jwhyrock
on 2004-05-03 11:34:15

One word: Outstanding! Very well done. Keep up the excellent work. It rocks and I happen to own the game as well.

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whiteknight
on 2004-05-02 00:37:24

I'm so glad to finally see this peice on the main page. I always knew it would be there some day. Months ago, i heard this peice on the WIP board, and i've been in love with both this particular song, and Eradicate as well.

It was like a fairy tale of sorts, the original version of the song caught some criticism, but it was not defeated. Like the phoenix, it was reborn, and reborn again and again. This peice being accepted and posted is just the denoument to the fairy tale story.

I'm happy for you Eradicate, let me know when you have more peices in the work, i for one would be happy to hear them.

Good luck man.

-Whiteknight

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Paragon
on 2004-05-01 22:48:55

I expect this to get a lot of negative reviews because of the "poor" (read: not quite professional) mastering (and who the hell can consider production more important than arrangement/composition in the first place, anyway?) and the style in general, but as an avid fan of the crazier styles of metal out there I can say with confidence that this truly is a great song.

It's got a damned BLASTBEAT at 2:22. Tremolos from hell. Excessive (in a good way) cymbals and double bass work, using damn good samples. The only real flaw in this mix is the production, which as I noted isn't all that catastrophic of a flaw. Sure, it would be NICE if the guitars had a beefy, Nuclear Blast sound to them, but it would be NICE if I had a million dollars and a pony, too.

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TCK
on 2004-05-01 21:29:43

There are ideas in this, but to be honest lo-fi is an understatement for this mix. The drums rival Retentions Of Conflict. It'd be nice if Eradicate could resubmit this in higher quality, but I don't see that happening anytime soon.

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djpretzel
on 2004-05-01 19:10:42

What did you think? Post your opinion of this ReMix.

Sources Arranged (1 Song)


Primary Game:
The Legend of the Mystical Ninja (Konami , 1992, SNES)
Music by Harumi Ueko
Songs:
"The Cat's Grudge (1st. Demo BGM)"

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File Information


Name:
Legend_of_the_Mystical_Ninja_From_Ghosts_Emerge_Beasts_OC_ReMix.mp3
Size:
4,555,837 bytes
MD5:
410883244b865a493b1a03e1f1583349
Bitrate:
128Kbps
Duration:
4:39

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