Yoshihiro Kunimoto
Star Soldier (Arrange Version)
Championship Road Runner (Arrange Version)
Super Star Force (Arrange Version)
Mighty Bomb Jack (Arrange Version)
I stumbled into a riches of vintage game music this week, thanks to a soundtrack sale at HMV, walking away with two rare game music vinyl records.
The first was the single for the theme to Star Soldier, a 1986 schmup by Hudson. This version of the Star Soldier theme is different than the arrange version (Japanese game music English for “remix”) that appeared on the Hudson Game Music LP. The version from that LP was great, this version is RAD AS HELL. It’s so good, seriously it’s so good! It’s great! It’s like the theme music to V meets the theme music to Dallas meets the theme music to Knight Rider meets Tron. It’s bombastic and big, with massive power chords rocking those keyboards 80s style. The drums got that gated reverb to the nines, and whoever was playing them was smacking the everloving shit out of them. And the bassline (SYNTH BASS YES MORE SYNTH BASS) grooves and just keeps the whole thing moving until it builds to a fantastic crescendo that then fades away for that dope as all hell keyboard melody’s encore performance. THOSE DRUMS ARE SO GOOD.
The b-side is another arrange version, this one for Championship Road Runner. It’s very weird. Again, it’s still all synthesizers but the mood is 100% different. It starts out as a music box lullaby. Eventually more sounds are added to it, giving a robust and big sound, but still more low-key and relaxed and the theme to Star Soldier. It reminds me of the underwater music in a Mario stage, kind of ethereal or dreamy. It’s not as much of a HARDCORE BANGER as the Star Soldier music, but it’s a solid take nonetheless.
The other release I picked up was the Tecmo Game Music album, which also came out in 1986. Like the single, it was a GMO release. As I’ve mentioned before, GMO (Game Music Organization) was a sub-label of Alfa Records, set up by members of Yellow Magic Orchestra for the sole purpose of releasing game music albums. Almost all of their early album releases are compilations dedicated to single game companies. There’s Nintendo Game Music, Taito Game Music, Data East Game Music, and so on. Games didn’t get album-length soundtrack releases back then, I assume because no game had enough music to fill an entire LP. It wasn’t until Dragon Quest that we had proper video game soundtracks.
Like most of the GMO releases of the time, most of Tecmo Game Music focuses on straight rips of game audio. Sometimes they even had sound effects put over them, so it was more like you hearing someone actually playing the game than a proper recording of the game’s music. It’s honestly a little annoying.
But two tracks of Tecmo Game Music were arrange versions. The last track on side A is the remix of the music to Super Star Force, a strange-looking shooter that seems to be half Xevious and half The Legend of Zelda. It’s a space-themed game, but instead of going the over-the-top route of the Star Soldier arranged version, this one starts by playing up the “spacey” aspects of the music with more of a Close Encounters vibe. Very mysterious sounding. Then it picks up and goes full-on Giorgio Moroder in Electric Dreams. I dig it. Great keyboard melody.
Of the bunch, the Mighty Bomb Jack arranged version is the most video gamey. It’s very focused on the melody and sound effects from the game, and at times goes too minimal in my opinion, barely sounding like an arranged version at all. But the second half of the track picks things up with some great, light, upbeat synthesizer melodies and its saved. This sounds like the soundtrack to a children’s cartoon or something. It’s so damn happy. I needed that.
All of these remixes were by Yoshihiro Kunimoto, who was GMO’s in-house arranger for most of the mid-80s. I think he did the arrange versions on all their early releases. I wish it was possible for GMO (or whoever owns them now) to do a compilation of all his work, he was really good at this stuff. I assume legal rights to all of the music by all of the companies would make that an impossibility though.
Stay home and stay safe with arranged video game music everyone. And if you have to venture into the horrible, terrible, no-good world, for the love of dog wear a motherfucking mask.