[RERUN] C2E8: ”Our Four Favorites” [Masters of VGM] - orig rel. 06/30/2022 (see 2025 show note addendum!)

[2025 Addendum….sorry for the ultra long-winded]

Normally, we only share one rerun a month at Nerd Noise Radio. But due to the confluence of a) our having missed the May rerun completely, b) our not getting a June rerun out until the very end of the month, and c) a very important thematic connection to an event currently happening in the VGM podcast scene this month, I’m releasing…..not one……not two……not four…..but THREE reruns in July!

From 2022 through 2024, the greater VGM podcast community participated in a glorious group experiment called “Masters of VGM” (or “MoVGM” for short - I think I might’ve even been the one to coin the shorthand…..maybe), where a master theme was decided upon by the community, and then every participating podcast would do an episode, or a handful of episodes in keeping with the crowdsourced theme. Nerd Noise Radio participated all three years - with a Channel 2 in 2022, a Channel 1 in 2024, and in 2023, with a whopping FOUR installments where we had a Channel 1, a Channel 2, and two Channel Fs. Channel F, for the new faces in the crowd is our mechanism for betas, and bonuses, and things which just don’t fit the mold for a regular episode. Channel F is “format agnostic” and does not have any sort of regular release cadence whatsoever. So, “F-isodes” as I call them (and am probably WAY too proud of myself for that), can be just whatever, and come out just whenever.

The people who devised and oversaw MoVGM have largely significantly reduced their presence in the podcast scene over the past couple years, and so had elected to not continue MoVGM into 2025. However, a handful of us, Alex “The Messenger” Messenger of “A VGM Journey” (https://terraplayer.com/shows/a-vgm-journey), Professor Tom from “Shujin Academy VGM Club” (https://terraplayer.com/shows/shujin-academy-vgm-club), and myself have decided that, while not formally reviving MoVGM, we were going to do something of our own, in that same spirit. While the name hasn’t been officially finalized as of this writing on July 2nd, and could still change, the “working title” (that will very likely become the final title), which was proposed by Professor Tom is “VGM Hall of Fame” I’ll go ahead and dub it “HoF” for short.

Naturally, we’re trying to also inspire other podcasters to join us so that it is not just we three, but at the very, very least, there will be an HoF episode from all of us on the theme of “a soundtrack that belongs in a theoretical “VGM Hall of Fame” (hence the name). Nerd Noise Radio’s contribution to this will be a Channel 1 featuring the Super Metroid soundtrack (C1E97). If I have the time, and the mental energy, I might also supplement this with an F-isode on a much more obscure soundtrack that begs to enjoy greater awareness and celebration (Lucid 9, if it ends up happening).

One other major difference between HoF and MoVGM is that MoVGM occurred in June (2023 was so big that it extended into July) where HoF will occur in July. We all wanted to do this in June, but we were all too deep into production of our respective June content at the time that we all agreed to just push it back to July instead.

Anyway, over the river and through the woods, to the point I *FINALLY* get: in a bid to not only help draw extra attention to HoF and hopefully drum up a little excitement for it, among both listeners as well as other podcasters, especially prospective participants, as well as to simply celebrate some of the glory that was this remarkable moment in time for a community, this month, I will rerun our 2022 MoVGM contribution, our 2023 Channel 2 contribution, which was a sort of “spiritual sequel” to our 2022 outing (with links to our other 2023 contributions in that rerun’s show notes), and finally, to our 2024 offering. And naturally, we’ll start with 2022.

The theme of 2022 was “which composers would you put on your ‘VGM Mount Rushmore’”? So everyone was to pick four composers. Since Ch 2 was Hugues and I, rather than picking just two, we each picked four for a grand total, of course, of eight, and then did a thing where we each picked one track from each of the eight composers (one each for our own composers, as well as one each for the other guys’ composers). With this being a 2022 production, all the usual caveats about production quality differences and deficiencies. Between a lesser mic and less fully developed production techniques, the sound quality will not be up to the standards of a 2025 episode (I also hadn’t started editing out the “umms” yet….apologies for that!). But it’s still pretty decent. Certainly decent enough that it doesn’t really feel like a barrier to enjoyment like, say, a 2018, or especially 2017 episode would be.

And so, without further ado: our first of three reruns this month, the first of three to celebrate the memory of MoVGM as well as hopefully whet people’s appetites for HoF: C2E8: “Our Four Favorites” - originally released 06/30/2022.

 

Enjoy!

 

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Original Show Notes:

Today’s Broadcast is C2E8 for Theme Thursday, June 30th, 2022. Today’s episode will be Nerd Noise Radio’s contribution to the greater VGM podcast scene massive group project “Masters of VGM” (https://mastersofvgm.com) and like all “MoVGM” episodes from all the participating podcasts, will be a focus on our four favorite composers (with a surprise “East meets West” twist) - on a program that we’re quite simply calling “Our Four Favorites”

 

01) Earcatcher: 00:00:00

02) Hugues’ Composer #4: Yoko Shimomura!

1. Hugues’ Yoko track: Ken’s Theme - Street Fighter II - Arcade
   1. Music - 00:00:03
   2. Intro: 00:02:13
   3. Top of Show Business: 00:04:08
   4. Track (and composer) Discussion: 00:19:19
2. John’s Yoko Track: Kairi 1 - Kingdom Hearts - PS2
   1. Music - 00:24:26
   2. Discussion - 00:26:09

03) John’s Composer #4: Martin Iveson!

1. John’s Martin Track: Shop Theme - Jaguar XJ220 - Sega CD
   1. Music - 00:33:23
   2. Discussion - 00:34:48
2. Hugues’ Martin Track: Country Select - Jaguar XJ220 - Sega CD
   1. Music - 00:38:24
   2. Discussion - 00:39:44
   3. BEGIN: Bad Audio for voice (backup copy - see note after track list) - 00:40:15

04) Hugues’ Composer #3: Yuzo Koshiro!

1. Hugues’ Yuzo Track: Daiba Freezing Town - 7th Dragon 2020 - PSP
   1. Music - 00:42:38
   2. Discussion - 00:45:55
2. John’s Yuzo Track: Undiscovered Realm (in-game symphonic vers) - Actraiser Renaissance - multiplatform
   1. Music - 00:50:21
   2. Discussion - 00:52:39

05) John’s Composer #3: Spencer Nilsen!

1. John’s Spencer Track: Cathedral and Sewers - Batman Returns - Sega CD
   1. Music - 00:57:33
   2. Discussion - 01:00:44
   3. END: Bad Audio for voice (backup copy) - 01:06:09
2. Hugues’ Spencer [maybe] Track: The Vents - Ecco the Dolphin - Genesis (possibly composed by Andras Magyari and/or Brian Coburn instead - or as well)
   1. Music - 01:06:25
   2. Discussion - 01:08:38

06) Hugues’ Composer #2: Nobuo Uematsu!

1. Hugues’ Nobuo Track: The Oath - Final Fantasy VIII - PS1
   1. Music - 01:14:53
   2. Discussion - 01:18:09
2. John’s Nobuo Track: Esto Gaza - Final Fantasy IX - PS1
   1. Music - 01:25:26
   2. Discussion - 01:29:05

07) John’s Composer #2: Matt Furniss!

1. John’s Matt Track: The Red Woods - Puggsy - Genesis
   1. Music - 01:34:57
   2. Discussion - 01:37:59
2. Hugues’ Matt Track: Title - Sega Chess - Mastersystem
   1. Music - 01:42:39
   2. Discussion - 01:44:46

08) Hugues’ Composer [TEAM] #1: Hayato Sonoda and/or Takahiro Unisuga

[Falcom Sound Team JDK]!

1. Hugues’ Falcom Track: Blue Destination - Trails of Cold Steel II - Vita/PS3/PS4/PC
   1. Music - 01:51:41
   2. Discussion - 01:56:28
   3. BEGIN: More Backup voice audio - 02:01:07
   4. END: More Backup voice audio - 02:01:13
2. John’s Falcom Track: Crystal Valley - Zwei II - PC [EDITOR’S NOTE: I missed my chance to point out that Zwei (pronounced “TsvI”)is the German word for “two”. So this game is basically called “Two Two”. :-D - St. John]
   1. Music - 02:07:38
   2. Discussion - 02:10:10

09) John’s Composer [TEAM] #1: The Super Follin Bros [Tim and/or Geoff Follin]

1. John’s Follin Track: Gambit - Spider-Man / X-Men: Arcade’s Revenge - SNES
   1. Music - 02:13:51
   2. Discussion - 02:17:56
   3. End of Show Business (and FINALLY titling the episode!) - 02:23:47
   4. Our other Programs - 02:29:09
   5. Hugues’ Follin Track Discussion - 02:31:46
   6. Sign Off - 02:34:38
2. Hugues’ Follin Track: Parking Garage - Target Renegade - NES - 02:35:33

10) Blooper Reel (contains both high and low quality voice audio - AND OUR CENSOR SOUND!!!) - 02:38:48

11) Bonus 1: The Oath - Distant Worlds Symphonic Concert Version - 02:46:29

12) Bonus 2: Rain Angel - AtJazz (post-VGM non-VGM works by Martin Iveson) - Lab Results (album) - c 2002 - 02:51:47

 

Total Episode Runtime: 02:58:04

 

NOTE ON BACKUP [bad] AUDIO - SHORT[ISH] VERSION: when Hugues and I meet, we have our Google Meet output recording, as well as each having higher quality Audacity recordings of just our own sides of the conversation. We keep the Meet recording in case there is an emergency with the Audacity recording, but otherwise don't use it in the final episode, and I just align and combine our high quality Audacity recordings. On this episode, however, (a first for Ch 2) we lost a portion of Hugues' Audacity recording, so we did have to use our fallback a little bit. At the very bottom of the show notes, I'll include a LONG[ISH] VERSION which explains more. I did everything I could to minimize the impact of the Google Meet recording in the final episode. But it is noticeable at points.

 

You can find Brian and Kristen Peterson's GoFundMe here: https://gofund.me/1ef0f855. Again, absolutely zero pressure to contribute, but anything you do would certainly be most appreciated!

 

You can find our "Introduction to Nerd Noise Radio - 2022" blog here: https://nerdnoiseradio.blogspot.com/2022/06/nnr-blog-st-john-introduction-to-nerd.html

 

The Masters of VGM Website, once again, can be found at https://mastersofvgm.com/. You can also follow MoVGM on Twitter @MastersOfVGM! Please do check out some (or preferably, ALL) of the other shows’ episodes in the series!

 

Retro Game Club can be found here:

 

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/retro-game-club/id1453018680

 

You can also follow Retro Game Club on Facebook and Instagram @retrogameclubpodcast and on Twitter @rgcpodcast.

 

Hugues’ blog (and his Sega Genesis demo) can be found here: 

 

https://huguesjohnson.com/

 

You can find Nerd Noise Radio on Facebook and on Twitter each @NerdNoiseRadio. There are also two Facebook Groups: Nerd Noise Radio “Easy Mode” where we just have general video game and nerd fun, or for the gearheads among you, Nerd Noise Radio “Expert Mode” where we deep dive sound hardware, composer info, and music theory. 

 

You can find the blog at www.nerdnoiseradio.blogspot.com. Where we sometimes share additional show notes, and inside info. You can also find Nerd Noise Radio on Archive.org, where we have remixes and super bonuses only available there (such as a music-only alternative version of today’s show).

 

Nerd Noise Radio is also a member of the Retro Junkies community, which can be found at www.theretrojunkies.com. And we are a member of the VGM Podcast Fans community on Facebook. St. John is also the admin of the Podcasters of Des Moines Facebook group, which features a number of other podcasters and great programs from the greater Des Moines area.

 

Thanks for listening! Join us again in July on Channel 1 for two separate retrospective episodes: C1E65a: “The Best of 2020 / 2021 - St. John’s picks” and C1E65b: “The Best of 2020 / 2021 - Hugues’ picks”. Then join us again in August on Ch 2 for C2E9: “Just Deserts”. And wherever you are….Fly the N!