The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From The Tree
Hi! I’m Jerry, owner of Jerry’s Blue Screen Emporium. More importantly, I write music for the Noxsquad Gameshow - all of it. Because the Noxsquad Gameshow is a descendant of the Noxcrew Gameshow, I felt it was important to reference our predecessor. As a result, some tracks are conceptually similar to Noxcrew ones to reflect their Noxcrew counterparts. While reading this article, I encourage you to listen to the tracks I mention to better appreciate the relationship of Noxsquad tracks to Noxcrew tracks. So let’s get started:
Every gameshow needs a main theme. Most of the Noxsquad Gameshow themes modifications of the Noxcrew Gameshows melodies. That includes our main theme (old and new), intro music, trailer music, and the Factory theme. All of these tracks are also written in the same key as the Noxcrew counterpart. My various remixes of that track reflect the different aspects of the gameshow; The Factory is a more subtle background version, while the new main theme is much livelier - both of which are now available on my Bandcamp (shameless plug).
Now, let’s talk about game music. The game Pyramid has inspired a few of our games: Atlantis, Temple, and maybe some others you haven’t seen yet... All these tracks borrow the same main melody (DA dadada Da dada da) from Pyramid. I have added a little extra section to it to create a little more tension before the melody repeats. The chorus of all these pieces share this melody, yet the verses go their own direction to reflect the specific game.
Noxcrew’s Factory and Castle inspired Mountains (and maybe something else?). I really love the chorus melody in this piece and the bass line because there are a lot of different variations I have composed. While only a few make the final draft, I still have some deep in my computer that I hope to pull out. What’s great about this melody is that it can serve as the main focus in the chorus or as a background function, maybe on an instrument you might not expect *cough* drums *cough*, but hey, maybe I didn’t do that on a new track.
One of the most subtle references I have written is in Pluslock. It makes reference to the Lockdown chorus in one of the verses. It’s hidden but if you find it (and maybe send me a time code), I would be impressed.
My personal favorite track is Sprint v3, so when I had the opportunity to make music for Sprint-like games, I was PUMPED! Journey to Puzzle Tower was our first Sprint type game, so it absolutely had to have the (du nu nu nu du nu nu nu) part that’s iconic to Sprint. Sprint is a very jazzy piece so in JTPT, and maybe another Sprint game, I wanted to focus on improvisation and have sections where the music just goes where it feels like it wants to go.
Some other Noxcrew games that found a counterpart on the Noxsquad Gameshow were Gridlock and a version of Blocksketball called Spooksketball (maybe you will get to see this one day). Spooksketball takes place in a graveyard, so the track has a lot of instruments that sound like bone xylophones to give you that graveyard feel.
Of course, we did make our own unique games that have tracks that I had to write with no reference. There are some really exciting ones this season. I think I was able to capture the setting in each one of my tracks. I look forward to sharing my work with you all in the coming months. As of this post I have officially released all "non-spoiler" tracks. Please feel free to reach out to me if you have any thoughts or questions. I love music and I am honored that I get to share my takes with the world.
OK BYYEEEEEEEE!!!