33 ⅓: Koji Kondo's Super Mario Bros. Soundtrack

Ultimately a letdown.

According to their website:

33 ⅓ is a series of short books about a wide variety of albums, by artists ranging from James Brown to the Beastie Boys. Launched in September 2003, the series now contains 100 titles and is acclaimed and loved by fans, musicians and scholars alike.

This volume is slightly different in that it covers Koji Kondo's work on the original Super Mario Bros. (NES). While I vehemently agree that this work deserves to be broken down to its components and analyzed, the author goes out of their way to unnecessarily lengthen the book, and it's quite tedious at points.

Schartmann definitely has the musical knowledge and know-how to effectively dissect this musical work, and it shows. His analysis is spot-on and quite engaging. I thoroughly enjoyed that part of the book. Unfortunately, it takes nearly 50 pages to reach that point. Out of the 150 page count, only a third is applicable to the title. The rest is tangents attempting to make connections to unrelated or irrelevant material. There's too much speculation and trivial guesswork going on that's not even related to the Super Mario Bros. soundtrack in the first place.

The author himself states that Kondo is tight-lipped about his process and influences, but Schartmann attempts to guess anyway, because why the hell not? This often leads to a bunch of material that is neither engaging nor important. Schartmann will even end long tangential thoughts with a statement like, "Unrelated, but interesting nonetheless." Sorry, but it really isn't.

Any factual information about Kondo is pulled from other sources, and if you're buying this book, you most likely already know the information.

I didn't pick this book up to read Schartmann's personal thoughts, philosophy, and assumptions. I picked it up for a detailed analysis of the Super Mario Bros. soundtrack. He delivers it beautifully, but the book easily could have been crunched down to a third of its current size.

Also, there's quite a bit of music theory thrown at you. If you do not understand basic score reading, chord progression/identification, form, and notated rhythm, you're best off passing on this one.

Here is the criteria for being able to fully enjoy this book:

1. Fan of the NES
2. Fan of Super Mario Bros.
3. Fan of the music from the game
4. Trained in essential basic music theory and analysis

That last point really destroys most of the potential audience, which is a shame. It really does a great job  of scrutinizing the game's music, and I truly enjoyed that part. I just didn't want a bunch of personal jargon to go with it.

Pass.

LSDj

Over the weekend, I decided to finally take some time to investigate the world of composing chiptunes. I know I'm a little late to the party, but it's never too late to investigate something that interests you. I listen almost exclusively to game music, and being able to compose in the actual format enticed me into action.

However, I ran into the issue of where the hell I was going to start. I did some research on basic terminology and how music trackers work in general. After much searching and experimenting with different software, I ultimately made the decision to start simple. I decided to use LSDj, which exclusively utilizes the Game Boy sound chip to create music. LSDj (which stands for Little Sound Dj) stood out to me for a number of reasons:

• I love the Game Boy sound, sound quality, and timbre

• Four channels mean it's not wholly overwhelming, and personally I find that limitations breed creativity (the tracker still has a ton of capabilities though)

• If I make the decision to purchase an actual Game Boy flash cartridge and put the software on it, I can take it with me

The included manual and online wiki provide a vast amount of information, both for beginning and advanced instruction. They are both extremely helpful. There are also a ton of features and capabilities in LSDj, making it a true powerhouse and full-fledged music workstation. The experimentation phase is never going to stop, which is great.

In less than an hour of messing around, I had already created a piece worthy of being on a crappy, third-rate Game Boy game. Success!

After experimenting with the free demo, I made the very easy decision to drop $5 for the full version (the actual minimum amount is only $0.01). I am using an emulator, but the more I play around with it, the more I want to buy an actual cartridge. A friend of mine already has one, so I might ask to borrow it and see how nice it really is to be able to carry it around with me.

I might eventually move to more advanced trackers in the future, but I'm just having too much fun right now. Being a music grad provided an easy window into the actual composition part. The only initial challenge I faced was how to input notes/effects and working with the more-complex-than-you-would-think interface (keep in mind the whole thing uses only four buttons and a D-Pad). Once I had the basics down, though, I was golden.

The next challenge is to familiarize myself with the more advanced features, tweaks, and shortcuts. But I feel like that won't be as much of a challenge. It'll be more messing around and mix-matching different combinations of things.

I also know my end goal is not to enter the whole chiptune scene. I know it would take more time and effort than I can expend, because there is so much you can do with LSDj, and I've got more stuff I want to do. I just want to familiarize myself with the software, and maybe create some music that I feel would fit right in with the early 90's Game Boy library. Just have fun with it, I guess.

Just what I need. Something else to suck away all my free time.