Board 8 > [VGMC] Day 34! SecretCave/FinalSmile, 2DistntSky/Tenement, AngelRain/MagusCnfrnt

(+) Yeah! (+)

Welcome to Video Game Music Contest 16, an annual celebration of the best of the best video game music according to the voters!

Important Links:
Bracket: https://www.bracketmaker.com/tlist.cfm?tid=475935
Contest info sheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_IU5iCFTM_4WEx8ZWKwznMz5v2tarCKh1Ag0mxIgAes
Contest discussion thread: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/80027411
Main bracket playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLT3m7iohpL0xxfgkmGKvEyWfHvNZ53Kbn
Last years spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16XAaBMDuUnQ4c5AxQNL9ZhvD7VG5kQyrXWWZxnkrn-o
VGMC total stats sheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1K1XdLWiUKB2kX99qYBgnRbLU_sCz4dvZSByKKJHCT6o
Discord: https://discord.gg/WDvMS4a

Rules:
- Listen to both songs in a given match, at least through the loop time provided (to make sure you don't skip before you've heard the whole thing!)
- Please consider the loop point listed when judging the song; if a video loops one minute 5 times, don't treat it as if it's a repetitive 5 minute song
- If it's a match between your favorite song ever and a song you despise, still LISTEN TO BOTH! Votes can and will be disqualified if there is suspicion songs are not being listened to, and you may be discounted for the rest of the contest for repeat offenses.
- No alt accounts, no rallying or begging, etc., etc.... You only get one vote! Swapping votes is alright, just make clear that you've already made a vote and are swapping.
- Make clear what your voting options are! Please keep votes separate from any comments, and use the titles given in the topic post.
- Voting in all matches is not mandatory, feel free to skip matches you do not wish to vote in.
- Vote based on the links provided, and not other sources of audio. Links are specifically chosen for best quality and the like.
- Don't discuss vote tallies in this thread, or in other threads, as they may influence votes. Likewise, please refrain from looking at the running tally before voting.

Voting Period:
- Today's matches will last 24 hours from the time of posting, or 24 hours from 10pm Eastern, whichever is the later time.
- Please note this may mean that two topics will be active at the same time!
- If you anticipate being unable to vote in a given day, please send an absentee vote to @banshiryuu, or post your absentee vote in the discussion thread!

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Match 1

Raiden V - Secret Cave
Composer: Yoshimi Kudo
Loop Point: 5:00
Genre: PROGRESSIVE AEROSPACE
https://youtu.be/PKrwMiBKk0A

Subarashiki Hibi - The Final Smile
Composer: Fuminori Matsumoto (szak)
Loop Point: 5:28
Genre: KITTY CITY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amMlf1kmsC0

Match 2

SkyGunner - To The Distant Sky
Composer: Mayuko Kageshita, Tadashi Ohtsubo
Loop Point: 2:40
Genre: SOARING EMOTION
https://youtu.be/_Lgj

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

Subarashiki Hibi - The Final Smile
SkyGunner - To The Distant Sky
Chrono Trigger - Magus Confronted

KITTY CITY
SOARING EMOTION
CAF AFFECTION

cruel match 1
cruel match 2
cruel match 3

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

The Final Smile > Angel Rain > To The Distant Sky > Tenement of the Blue Spirit > Secret Cave > Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

I wouldn't say this day is big quality, but these first two matches are close votes.
Also MATCH 3 IS PAIN. This is the second match with a favorite against a favorite, so sad :(
Although I think Angel Rain is better, but just a bit better. I need any of them to sweep the bracket.
(Actually, maybe the reason why I love Southern Twilight it's because it has the same structure as Angel Rain. Haha)

Cave
Spirit
Confronted

Raiden V - Secret Cave
SkyGunner - To The Distant Sky
Chrono Trigger - Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

Raiden V - Secret Cave
SkyGunner - To The Distant Sky
Chrono Trigger - Magus Confronted

meh

Subarashiki Hibi - The Final Smile
SkyGunner - To The Distant Sky
Chrono Trigger - Magus Confronted

In the Secret Cave
Dwelled the once-kind Spirits that
Magus corrupted.

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

Solid vocals day.

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

Not the best Raiden V track in this contest but still good, and to think I'd never heard of the game/series before! I prefer the first half with the guitar, but the last 30-40 seconds cooldown is nice too.
I like that Smile is pleasantly lowkey, but it doesn't have all that much going for it.

Distant Sky is pretty great, the yearning sound of the vocals complement the main melody nicely and then the sharp left turn in the middle still manages to not feel out of place.
But Blue Spirit is good too! Unfortunately I feel like it sets things up well then it loops instead of progressing into something special. Still, a good match.

'Oh no' is the first thing that crosses my mind when the vocals start in Angel Rain, but as it goes on I do actually get into them. Then I go out of it again when the generic backing beat starts 5 mins in. Then I get back into it when the other layers return! I like this more than I did on first listen, it's a pretty cohesive entertaining journey.
I've always found Magus a bit overrated (do I just not like CT music?? I don't think that's the case...), but the main melody is still killer and I love the whistling. Man this is actually a tough match. I think I'll go against my bracket on this one!

Cave: 3.5/5
Smile: 2.5/5
Sky: 3.5/5
Spirit: 3/5
Rain: 3.5/5
Magus: 3.5/5

Raiden V - Secret Cave
SkyGunner - To The Distant Sky
Chrono Trigger - Magus Confronted

Subarashiki Hibi - The Final Smile
Caravan Stories - Tenement of the Blue Spirit
We Love Katamari - Angel Rain

Secret Cave
Tennement of the Blue Spirit
Angel Rain

Secret Cave [9]
Smile [7]
To the Distant Sky [7]
Blue Spirit [8.5]
Angel Rain [8.5]
Magus Confronted [8]

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

airplane
ghost
angel

9.5
7.5
9
9.5
8.5
8

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

Secret Cave
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

Secret Cave
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

1. PowerOne
2. You Were There
3. Scroll Stage
4. ???
5. Staff Roll (Super Mario 64)
6. Dreams in a Pie
7. Battle With Magus
8. Abstract Map
9. CHAMPION RITUAL
10. Passing Through the Forest
11. ???
12. The Final Smile
13. Frantic Aspic
14. Field (Late Night)
15. A CYBER'S WORLD?
16. ???
17. ???
18. Kusanagi Village
19. Tenement of the Blue Spirit
20. Calling
21. LIN NE KRO NE
22. Egg Reverie
23. Battle! (Arceus) ~ Phase 4
24. Angel's Rain
25. The Glittering City of Yusnaan
26. ???
27. ???
28. Sky Tower
29. Indignant Divinity
30. The Elephant's Foot of Obnoxious Music
31. Time Moves Slow
32. The Apex of the World (Rain)
33. Radical Dreamers ~Unstolen Jewel~
34. Interwoven Stories
35. ???
36. ???
37. Blue Orb
38. Home Sweet Home
39. The Wretched Automatons
40. It's Dangerous to Go Alone
41. Move Me
42. ???
43. xxxx/xx/xx (Remix)
44. Yggdrasil
45. stg_travel_2_3
46. ???
47. SaKuRa
48. The Rain Formerly Known as Purple
49. ???
50. Kaze no Ne

Pretty stacked day. This might be the strongest round 1 day for me in the whole bracket: four 9s, plus Secret Cave (8), and To the Distant Sky (7.5).

It's always fun when one of my genres get picked (hi KITTY CITY).

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

Raiden V has some real good music. Final Smile kinda all blurs into itself for me.

Two JP vocal songs in a row huh. This one's a bit better, but didn't we have it in a previous year? Not sure we needed it again... I wish Tenement went more places. It's very good in parts, but it feels like more climax would be nice.

Jeepers more JP vocals in match 3. Shame none of these connect with me. Magus always good stuff. Pretty short tho.

Secret Cave
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

Magus Confronted > Secret Cave > Tenement of the Blue Spirit > To The Distant Sky > The Final Smile > Angel Rain

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Angel Rain

Secret Cave
Tennement of the Blue Spirit
Angel Rain

I like Secret Cave more than Unknown Pollution. Probably a controversial opinion >>

Other two matches are reasonably close. Especially match 2.

Subarashiki Hibi - The Final Smile
SkyGunner - To The Distant Sky
Chrono Trigger - Magus Confronted

MATCH 1

Secret Cave is a pretty cool song overall, but by far the best part is that aggressive acoustic guitar. It's super cool to me. The dramatic strings are nice too. I don't like that last minute of the song as much though.

The Final Smile is one of my favorite SubaHibi songs and my favorite song in Bracket C! The #1 for me in this game goes handily to the OP (and it's probably one of my favorite video game songs period), but this song is my favorite out of all the vocal EDs in the game! And I love all of them except for Cursed Life/Blessed Life, so there's definitely competition there (as an aside, my rankings for the EDs would be The Final Smile > Aboard the Ship Naglfar > The Hill I Could Never Climb > Cursed Life/Blessed Life, with the top 3 all being 9+/10). The szak + Hana duo is such an amazing one! szak has made some of my favorite video game songs with the vocal songs he writes, and Hana is a wonderful singer too! With this song, it has a great shoegaze feel that carries some strong emotions with it. rwlh and I had a conversation once where we talked about how we both liked a quality of this song that he described other songs as being wistful and intense, and I think that's a great way of putting it! The song keeps these strengths throughout its entire duration, peaking with 4:33 until the end. Something about that extra guitar being added to the mix is just absolutely amazing. And finishing off with that softer reverberation of the guitar. Chef's kiss right there. Also, while I typically don't pay a whole lot of attention to lyrics, I like the lyrics in this song (though maybe "like" isn't the best word to use given the theme in the lyrics)! Especially the wordplay with (SubaHibi spoilers) the word "zakuro" meaning pomegranate being used as a double meaning with Zakuro Takashima, one of the characters in the game. I invite you to look at this lyrics video if you're curious! Though, again, keep in mind that it alludes to some spoilery events in the game. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL1B74qaN-c

MATCH 2

I've still gone back to listen to To the Distant Sky at times even after the contest was over. It's just such a great, pretty song, and I'm always happy to listen to it.

Tenement of the Blue Spirit is really cool too! The repeating melody in the piano is cool, but I like this song the most at 1:05 when the other instruments come in. For me, it creates a more powerful emotion to the song.

MATCH 3

I like the strings and accordion in Angel Rain, but I'm really not a fan of the vocals. I think it's the breathiness of the vocals. The change in the beat at 4:13 is a bit jarring, and I'm not a big fan of how it sounds, but it feels more natural at 4:44.

I've always liked the Magus battle theme. I just think it has a strong melody overall. I especially like 0:49 with the backing trumpet adding to the lead one.

The Final Smile > To the Distant Sky > Secret Cave > Magus Confronted > Tenement of the Blue Spirit >> Angel Rain

Strong top 5 today!

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Magus Confronted

The Final Smile
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Angel Rain

re: Tenement of the Blue Spirit
b1

I've always imagined this to be the 'calm' theme of whatever area this plays in, while Raging Spirits is the 'battle' theme or something like that. And Raging Spirits is one of my absolute favourite tracks in this sprawling OST! But there are days where the calmer, more subtly tense feeling of Tenement is what I'm looking for. I love how front-and centre 'minimalist' this is, moreso than Raging Spirits-- the way the 6/8 and 5/8 layers overlap, the latter slowly becoming more prominent and almost invisibly bending the perception of what the meter of the track is, the little touches of percussion also playing at a different meter.

This specific volume of Caravan Stories holds special meaning to me-- I'd scanned through the first volume of Caravan Stories all the way back when I was thinking of things to nom for NFUN 1000, and kept loose tabs on the following volumes, but it didn't really hit me at the time. Vol. 5 came out just before Toxtricity opened nominations for his own ranking topic, and I checked it out on a whim to look for nominations-- and was completely blown away by it, the most mesmerizing VGM soundtrack I listened to in a while. It was during conversations about some of the tracks on this album-- Raging Spirits in particular-- when Toxtricity took me through a deeper conversation about Steve Reich and minimalism, and how specifically this seemed to reference them-- which I wasn't aware of at the time, but once I looked further it also struck me how much this form of music showed up in other music I enjoyed. This volume of music, and the conversation that ensued, materially affected what music I seek out and listen to, and how I listen to it, today! Thank you, Azusa Chiba, and thank you, Toxtricity. (also shoutouts to Steve Reich)

other notes:
-depending on what aspect of secret cave I'm focusing on, my enjoyment of the track fluctuates. it's tough to get a bead on how exactly I feel about it
-I enjoy the earlier section of angel rain more than the more beat-oriented one; maybe the first half conditions me to think this way, but the feel of the track as a whole seems to fit that vibe better

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain

Not into Secret Cave much at the start, but the middle is very exciting and the end has some cool piano and stuff. I can't say The Final Smile particularly stands out, but it is exactly the type of song that I love. Pretty, wistful, and echo-y vocals are 100% my jam, which I'm sure nobody could have guessed by looking at my votes today. This song never stood out to me much when I looked at it in passing, but actually listening to the whole thing it's really easy to get swept up in the song.

Tenement of the Blue Spirit has the same issue I have with a lot of Caravan Stories songs where any individual section sounds pleasant, but the song as a whole just feels like jamming tense chords one after the other without rhyme or reason or sense of progression. I've been vocally critical of this soundtrack before but I just don't like it, at least based on what's been in these contests. To the Distant Sky is one of my favorite songs of all time and I'm going to be very sad if it's robbed in round 1 yet again.

Angel Rain is very pretty overall, though it is actually held back a bit by the vocals. Overall I still like them, but I think I'd like the song a lot more if the vocals were a bit less breathy. Chrono Trigger generally has a good OST, but I've never been huge on Magus Battle in particular. I kind of like the one main melodic line but the song as a whole is just a bit underwhelming.

To the Distant Sky > The Final Smile > Angel Rain > Secret Cave > Magus Battle > Tenement of the Blue Spirit

The Final Smile
To The Distant Sky
Magus Confronted

Anime day (Chrono Trigger is just DBZ). To the Distant Sky is one of those songs I always like more than I remember. Magus is kind of the opposite though what I like about the track has sort of just shifted with time (which makes sense as it's one I've listened to for two decades at this point).

Secret Cave is pretty cool. Pretty neat instrumentation with the guitars and strings. The mix is still pretty subpar like Unknown Pollution though. However, I do like this composition marginally better. The ominous piano and percussion towards the end is pretty neat as well. Good song overall with a bad mix.

I like the vocalist in The Final Smile. The instrumental is kinda boring though. Decent song, but I think I'm gonna vote for Secret Cave here.

To the Distant Sky is a much better vocal song. Nice vocals, and the instrumental is intriguing as well. Good melody, and just an all-around good song.

Tenement of the Blue Spirit was a favorite of mine when I first heard it during noms. I love the piano in this and the minimalist/Steve Reich vibes it has is pretty great. I love the bit at 1:05 especially. Great song, and probably my favorite song of the day.

The accordion intro of this one is really nice. The mild bossa influences are pretty nice as well. The vocalist isn't my favorite, but she isn't bad. I do agree with kao that the first half is better than the second half when the beat kicks in. Still a good song overall.

Magus Confronted is okay. It's nothing special to me, but it has an alright melody. Mitsuda's certainly done better with these types of themes though. Gonna favor Angel Rain this time.

Match 2 is the clear winner of today.

Votes:
Secret Cave
Tenement of the Blue Spirit
Angel Rain

Secret Cave
To The Distant Sky
Angel Rain