DAY 1829) 2048 Unleashed - Soilscraper
Composer: Zan-zan-zawa-veia
zzzv is one of my favorite composers! and somehow I haven’t posted anything from him until now. He’s recently been doing more music to his own games, but for a while most of the music he had in games was for Various Doom WADs.
His music for Doom WADs is some of my favorite music in the world EVER, atmospherically, composition-wise, and everything, all while being MIDI (or occasional tracker modules). unpredictable chord changes that keep me emotionally enthused by new interesting directions every corner, cool dark dungeon feeling that I really dig, and general subtle (or overt) intricacy and quirkiness all over the place! This is like....in my top 5 favorite pieces of music in a game ever lol. Some of the most nailed down “my favorite type of prog” any piece of music ever even has been
anyway this track I’d personally break down like this (despite the midi timesig data saying differently. counting at 124 rather than 248, etc):
(0:00 - 0:29) [3/4, 7/8, 4/4, 9/8]x3, 3/4, 7/8, 4/4, 11/8
(0:29 - 0:44) 3/4, 7/8, 4/4, 9/8, 3/4, 7/8, 4/4, 5/4
(0:44 - 1:01) 9 bars of 4/4
(1:01 - 1:30) [6/4]x3, 4/4, [6/4]x3, 2/4, [6/4]x3
(1:30 - 1:38) 4 bars of 4/4
(1:38 - 2:08) [3/4, 7/8, 4/4, 9/8, 3/4, 7/8, 4/4, 5/4]x2
(2:08 - 2:13) 3 bars of 4/4
(2:13 - 2:35) 6 bars of 6/4, 3/4, 5/4
(2:35 - end) 4/4 until the end (maybe counting the last bit as 3/4, 7/8 to be self-consistent with earlier)
ironically my favorite part of the song is all 4/4 stuff, like 3:06 to the end, just really addicted to the chord progression there
Anyway this is all more ‘complex’ than just the numbers show, lots of subtle odd phrasing. Stuff like the 6/4 parts adding overlapping layers with the ideas from the mixed meter section. Lots of portions (most notably the mixed meter parts) have portions like that high bell rhythm that isn’t in sync with the drums/piano or rhythms of any other layer, making it sorta polymetric in “feeling” (even if the bell rhythm is too free and ambiguous to really describe as being in a specific meter, more just a cool funky rhythm to convolute everything and ambiguify barlines, a sound i adore~!)
there’s lots more stuff I could say, it’s an amazingly intricate piece and there’s so much going on in it, but I think I’ve addressed most of the elements relevant to this blog. Summary: the odd time bits are mostly a [6+7+8+9]/8 rhythm feeling, sometimes extra beats at the end of each phrase in those sections. Lots of subtle odd phrasing and polymeter-esque stuff snuck in everywhere to make for beautiful flow~!
Sorry this post is all rambly and incoherent, in something where there’s so much to say about it. Hopefully it’s adequately comprehensible! Thank you for listening to one of my very favorite, very obscure vgm tracks!