Touhou is a video game developed by the team Shanghai Alice, which is in fact run by one person - "ZUN". I could now tell you how hard it is to create an entire game alone and make it such a gigantic success, but that's not what I wanted to talk about in this article, so if you'd like to learn more about the game itself, please feel free to visit the wiki.
I found out about Touhou maybe a few years ago and you could list at least a few of the reasons why it's so special and catchy - music is one of those reasons. I'm pretty sure you have your own favourite song that you could listen to for the whole day and not get bored, everybody has at least one of those. Now you probably heard various remixes and re-arrangements of that song, maybe some were good, some were bad, but it's usually the original that we prefer the most. But what if suddenly, hundreds of different artists from the entire world started to make high-quality arrangements of your favourite track keeping original composition and overall feel of it?
This is pretty much what happened in Japan. For some reason, the music compositions made by "ZUN" are so great that various professional artists decided to dedicate their passion and skills to arrange and remix the same songs over and over again. And you know what? It never gets boring.
Okay, so you got the initial idea what is going on and you're probably all wondering how that music even sounds like, so let me help you with your curiosity :).
Here are 4 songs that I decided to share with you, from 4 different music genres and artists. Your objective is to find what connects all of those. Don't feel obligated to listen to all of them, pick genres you enjoy listening to:
幽閉サテライト (Yuuhei Satellite) - Opposite World (Vocal/J-POP)
CROW'SCLAW - Scarlet Devil (Metal/Rock)
SOUND HOLIC - Noite De Carnaval (Jazz)
WAVE - Dectet, Nonet, Octet (Orchestral)
You should now say "wait, those songs sound exactly the same, yet different in all of those arrangements, what is this?!". Exactly, because all of them are based on this single composition made by "ZUN" for Touhou 6: Embodiment of Scarlet Devil:
Sounds familiar, right? Now imagine there are at least 200 (if not more) arrangements of just that single theme - I linked you barely 4. It's like you'd be able to modify your favourite song to every possible genre and your mood. You could listen to the same composition of notes for the 100th time, and it would still sound awesome yet different and interesting.
It's hard to say what exactly is so special in all those compositions, they're catchy and sound nice - remember that it's still music made just for one indie video game, it's not even composed by any professional musical studio or artist, just a single talented guy.
And the best thing is - it's spreading. It's not only Japan that is that deep into this thing, there are arrangements from various countries and from various languages. It's like the whole world started listening to the same music, just adapting it to it's own personal taste and the mood. If you ask me, it's amazing, I'd love to hear some original arrangements of old-time classics, such as songs from Chopin or Beethoven.
Last, but not least - a few months ago I spotted a new Polish musical circle named Youkai Paradise, and though it doesn't have that big collection of arrangements yet, it's very promising:
My questions to you:
1. What do you think about all of that? Do you also think that there is something strange in this, or maybe it's just Japan and it's... awkward things... :).
2. What musical genre do you like the most? Let me know if you'd be interested in listening to more of this - after all I linked barely 5 arrangements and 2 different themes. That's not enough to show the full picture, but I didn't want to bother people too much either, not everybody has to be interested in this.
3. Did you enjoy presented arrangements? How would you describe them in terms of quality? Maybe you'd like to compare it to usual stuff you're listening to.
Thanks for reading!
Sources:
https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Doujin_music
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touhou_Project
https://www.youtube.com/
http://www.pcgamer.com/an-introduction-to-touhou-project-japans-biggest-indie-series/
http://kourindou.exblog.jp/
http://safebooru.org/images/456/f9eab7ece3f791b3e80532e5168cfb6f6566f98f.jpg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJQ5HsXlPTo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwiFl6w5fUE
Comments
When it comes to favorite music’s genre - I don't have any. To be honest the only moment when I have time & I can listen to the music is when i drive a car. I can describe it as a mix of genres - it depends on a radio station - mostly pop and rock.
When it comes to your question - I don’t like listening such kind of music but I think it’s worth to know that there are such strange types of it.
To sum up, Japan is full of weirdness. But on the other hand, when you look at foreign tourists from Asia visiting Poland, they make a lot of photos. What does it mean? Are they curios? Maybe, they just have seen let’s say an European absurd. It my opinion we can’t judge that it’s strange or weird music - it’s just different, specific for another culture. That’s the way I consider this kind of music. For me it’s enough to know about it. Now I am glad that I know such new (for me) and different kind of music.
The quantity of those covers is indeed impressive for score composed by one guy for a video game. It's not like rearranging popular songs is a rare thing, but it's good to see a video game theme get as much recognition.
I must admit that very interesting presentation. Congratulations
I must admit that very interesting presentation. Congratulations
It's hard for me to find those subgenres in Touhou, mainly because I'm not familiar with them, but give it a try if you want to - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UNdUBfmLk4 | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqnT8JBtksw :)
My favourite genre is hiphop, i think this could be quite funny to hear that song in this type.
Your article is another proof how different, yet interesting, Japan is.
First of all, to be honest, before you published this article, I saw the title. I thought, it would be boring. I was wrong - I'm sorry :) I found out some interesting things, really.
My best friend went crazy on music like this. I can't uderstand this phenomena but I can agree with your statement that "it's possible to listen to the same composition of notes for the 100th time, and it would still sound awesome yet different and interesting." He finds "new waves", moments, vibrations etc, all the time!
Do I enjoy it? It's hard to say. I cannot say definitely 'no!', but on the other hand if I confirmed, it wouldn't be true. It depends on the soundtrack.
What's more, this kind of music reminds me soundtracks used in games. Thanks to it, playing, you feel this specific climate and deep focus.
To sum up, Japan music is not my favourite type but I can agree it can be addictive. It's unbeliveable that one song (or even theme) has numerous remakes but this fact (among others) makes it's worthy interest.
I enjoyed the Vocal/J-POP genre. But the best for me was the original song. I’m not a huge fun of a Japanese music. At first, I was a bit skeptic - seeing the title of this article. But after 30 seconds of listening to original songs - I completely have changed my mind. This song invoked a feeling of a childish joy in me. It reminded me the songs from Sega and Dandy games I used to play with my parents when I was a kid. And now I’m listening to this song on repeat, putting comments to other articles in this blog. Thanks for new music which fits for a background while working.
I said that it is not something that interests me very much, because I prefer different types of music. While I work I prefer classical music, indie folk or Red Hot Chilli Peppers :-) which I am a huge fan of. I also like to explore music and look for some new sounds on youtube, however I do not really search for this type of music or japanese games or anime melodies for that matter.
I am open when it comes to new songs and artists, but not really into listening different arrangements of one specific song.
Of course, it's amazing that this song has so many versions. But is it really so unique? How about main melody from Mario or Mortal Combat?
And music there is also very good, it is amazing that they can make so many remixes of one song and more amazing is that it is all composed only by one person.
This arrangements are very immense and catchy and I like them very much.
I am just wondering how long it takes him to release that game?
You didn’t say much about the game it self, or his arts
it looks pretty awesome
have a look
http://static.zerochan.net/Touhou.full.1885103.jpg
http://static.zerochan.net/Touhou.full.182543.jpg
http://static.zerochan.net/Touhou.full.1953191.jpg
What musical genre do you like the most?
i listen to almost everything, except smooth jazz ))
http://www.fullredneck.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Funny-Japan-Meme-12.jpg
:D
There are plenty of covers/remixes/remakes on the Internet, but usually they go in another direction. As a rule, the base of these kind of remakes is one of the songs of one of the super famous artists.
In this case what is nice, apart from the ear-catching music itself, is the idea. I'm certainly not an expert in this area, but original song seems to be just an ordinary song, which makes the whole remaking thing even more outstanding.
2. I listen to disco polo. It reminds me of the times where I was going to REMIZA club and had lots of fun.
3. I didn't really enjoy the presented arrangements. However, I really appreciated the effort that you have put in writing this article :) . Unfortunately, it is definitely not my type of music :(
Moving on to the music itself. Well, it is not my cup of tea. I don't think it's bad, but this music style doesn't match my taste.
2. I like most musical genres generally. I think in pretty much every type of music you can find something interesting, but 3 of my favorite band are metal.
3. I did like the first one, not really the Polish one.
http://i54.tinypic.com/xejv9x.png
:)
http://i54.tinypic.com/xejv9x.png
:)