30 Days of Video Game Music: Day 24 -- Music I Constantly Have Stuck in My Head

Check out the Day 1 post for the full challenge list.

UPDATE 5/30/23:

I am hereby correcting a long-standing mistake on this blog. If you read the original post, you’ll notice that I was not enthusiastic about my answer at the time. Mere days later, I decided that the correct answer was another track that is dear to my heart and that I do in fact think about all the time. Now, 1,009 days later, I’ve actually updated the post to reflect that.

“Gourmet Race” - Jun Ishikawa

Game: Kirby Super Star (1996, SNES)
Original version: YouTube
Super Smash Bros. (64) version: arr. Hirokazu Ando (YouTube)
Super Smash Bros. Melee version: arr. Tadashi Ikegami (YouTube)
Smashing… Live! version: cond. Taizo Takemoto, arr Tadashi Ikegami (YouTube)
Video that claims to have “pretty much” every version through Sept. 2022: YouTube
Cover: 8-Bit Big Band (YouTube)
Cover: Ska Tune Network (YouTube)
Cover: Sam Griffin (YouTube)

Man, I fucking love this piece of music. How I whiffed on it on the first pass at this prompt I’ll never know. Anyway, that doesn’t matter.

I was first exposed to this piece by way of the original Super Smash Bros., which sort of makes it the canonical version in my mind. Certainly it helps that I’ve also spent so much of my ensuing life playing it and subsequent Super Smash Bros. series entries. The original 64 stage has returned to all but one, and the tune has been in every game in some form or another. To me, the 64 Dream Land stage has always been iconic, but I think its place in the hearts of the community was cemented by its status as one of the few legal stages in competitive Melee. With is comically high upper blast zone, it’s a classic counterpick and home to many of the game’s best moments throughout the years. Most importantly, competitors love it when audiences clap along to the music as it plays.

The track’s inclusion in Smash is also fully 50% of the reason I bought Kirby Super Star Ultra on the DS back in the day. It was therein that I discovered that game mode by the name of Gourmet Race is honestly pretty forgettable, making the pervasiveness of this tune all the more improbable. Someone must’ve seen promise in it, though, as it returned for Kirby’s Dream Land 3 not long after and then Super Smash Bros., which is even more puzzling because of the relevant stage’s Whispy Woods theme. I suppose Sakurai and Co. favored the upbeat “Gourmet Race” to the less exciting “Green Greens” as a fighting melody.

According to what I hope is an accurate translation of a Jun Ishikawa interview, the piece was supposed to evoke the feeling of an “athletic meet,” a demand which gave him some trouble. When it occurred to him that he could approach it with a ska rhythm, he said the rest of the piece flowed out naturally in one moment of inspiration. Good for him. I suppose that’s also why the Ska Tune Network cover above feels like such a natural fit.

A year or so ago, the impossible fingerstyle arrangement by Sam Griffin linked above became the first piece of video game music I took to my guitar instructor. I absolutely ate shit and could not play it without reducing its tempo to the point of absurdity, but I did enjoy picking up at least small bits. More importantly, I felt very validated by the fact that my instructor thought it was a great piece of music. Multiple times working through it he was like “oh that’s cool” or “that’s pretty.” Yeah it is.

The event, though, that finally got me to write this blog post amendment is that I recently attended my first Smash 64 tournament. The thing about 64 is that Dream Land is the only legal stage when following traditional/community rulesets. When you have like 12 CRTs plus main stage speakers blasting this track, you will enter Gourmet Race Psychosis. You will begin to believe that maybe it’s the only piece of VGM that really matters.

And maybe it is.

(btw I finished 5th out of 27 entrants and 64 is still so sick after all these years lol)

---

Below is the post as originally (and erroneously) written.

“Fever” - Hirokazu Tanaka

Game: Dr. Mario (1990, NES/Game Boy)
Original (NES): YouTube
Original (Game Boy): YouTube
Super Smash Bros. Melee version: arr. Shogo Sakai (YouTube)
Cover: Ska Tune Network (YouTube)
Cover: Thwomp (Bandcamp)

I didn’t love this prompt because I don’t really get any music constantly stuck in my head. But “Fever” is the first thing that came to mind in that regard. It does have a way of sneaking its way back into my mind. It’s a nice little tune, and it has returned again and again through the series for good reason. Like I said, I wasn’t super inspired by this prompt, so I don’t have much else to say, but give those covers a listen if you’d like. They’re neat.