KingGordo: Noki Depths Remix (Super Mario Sunshine)

This is one of those very cool cases with video game OSTs where an incredibly unique and impressionable song only plays ONCE in the entire game. So it is with the "Noki Depths" theme (also known as "Deep Sea of Mare")…the gorgeous track plays in only one level, and to make matters worse that one level has to be one of the worst levels (from a gameplay perspective) in the game. It's almost fitting how on the level featuring one of the most clunky and frustrating mechanics in the game (underwater FLUDD maneuvering) they also gave us by far the most tranquil and relaxing background music in the game.

In full transparency, there wasn't really much of a plan going into this project; I just kinda figured out what I wanted to do with it along the way. One thing was for certain, though: I was gonna bust out my recorder for this. Recorder is famously one of the easiest instruments to play; a lot of schools use it as an introductory instrument for music programs. While it's easy to play, it's not so easy to find a context in which it doesn't sound stupid. Recorder features what I can best describe as a "cheap clarinet" timbre, which, conveniently enough, fits very well with the sound-fonts used in the original Deep Sea of Mare track. A lot of late-90s/early-2000s video game OSTs utilized this kind of ambient "pan flute" sound (an example that I always think back to is Mario Golf 64:    • Toad Highlands   Mario Golf Nintendo ...  ), and I feel like I sort of incorporated that general sound into the recorder parts of this remix.

As for the arrangement aspect, I took a ton of liberties. The length of the original track loop is less than 2 minutes, so turning that into a 4 and a half minute arrangement required some changes. First off, I slowed everything down. As I was trying to transcribe the wonky arpeggio parts (what the piano plays in my version), I had the song slowed down to 75%...after while, I had listened to it that way for so long that the original tempo just didn't feel right anymore. The slower tempo eventually gave way to a sort of trap beat (which wasn't an idea I had original thought of) that served as the rhythmic foundation for the bulk of the remix. One of the other main creatively liberties I took was how I treated the melody at 3:37....normally, this part of the song is featured after each "verse" (for example, it's what the song should go into after 2:07) and is for me at least the most memorable part of the track. However, I instead chose to "tease" the theme at 1:29 and during the solo (2:38), only delivering the theme in full at the end of the remix as a conclusion. Any other transitions I left to the motif at 2:10 to handle.

The build-up to the main section was a bit tricky to figure out at first, but then I just used Hans Zimmer's strategy for Interstellar and threw together a bunch of rising chromatic tensions (0:33). I knew I wanted to provide some sort of ambient vocal harmonies to bridge the intro to the rest of the song, so I decided to just sing "no-ki" to the notes in the cadence heard at the beginning of the original track and add a ton of reverb to hide the fact that I don't really know what I'm doing.

I've been playing a lot of Donkey Kong Country lately, which probably contributed to why I so blatantly featured "Aquatic Ambience" at 1:45 and accordingly toyed around with visual aesthetics referencing the 16-bit graphic style of the DKC games for that part as well as the solo section. The solo section features one of my (intentionally) laziest piano solos...I had initially planned on trying to play the left-hand arpeggios along with the solo in one take, but eventually I realized that that would be too difficult and opted to just play a very rhythmically dissonant solo with one hand. The solo was built upon the "Delfino Plaza" theme reference at 2:32, the allusion to the aforementioned melody at 2:38, and a reiteration of the main melody at 2:46.

And that's that! This is definitely one of my weirder projects I've done, but hey; it's a weird song from a weird level in a weird game, so it works...I had fun.
That's all for now; until next time, goodbye!

0:00 Nothing beats underwater ambience...
0:33 Well except maybe space ambience (courtesy of Hans Zimmer)
1:02 I sing two syllables alongside my clones
1:21 Ok, now the actual song starts
1:29 French horns kinda look like conch shells...if you use your imagination enough
1:37 Recorder can actually be a pretty instrument in the right context!
1:45 The blatant Aquatic Ambience reference no one asked for
1:53 Back to recorder again
2:10 I like this part
2:29 Distorted piano solo
3:03 Hey, it's that part I like again
3:20 Recorder back at it!
3:37 Ah yes; the classic recorder and french horn ensemble
3:53 French horn takes us home...
4:19 End Cards

Original track:    • Видео  
Jellyfish background:    • Jellyfish Aquarium ~ Relaxing Music f...