2016-06-01 4:01:02 ¶ ●

By Malcolm Brown

It’s funny how a soundtrack can affect a scene’s perception. The action in this part of the Flash (can I still call it a Flash?) isn’t so different from the prior part: kids bounce around in combat, while Lord English executes his classic ‘pound Trolls into the ground with your fists’ fighting technique.

Yet the music is darker, more ominous, and that casts a shadow on the whole section. Maybe the heroes will avoid destruction, but there’s no way they can truly win here. Not yet, anyways.

2016-06-03 4:00:42 ¶ ●

Original track by Clark Powell, with additional work by Toby Fox

Act 7 gets a bad wrap.

Does it leave a lot of loose plot threads? Oh, without a doubt. Homestuck currently has more hanging threads than that pair of cutoff jeans you should have thrown away a year ago. I think most of them will never be revisited. Apologies, but man, I don’t really care about Zillywave and Sawhoo, and I don’t care what they’re up to.

For being the ‘last’ part of Homestuck, I get the disappointment in Act 7. Some of that salt will probably be hosed off in the epilogue. That said, I really liked seeing the rise and fall of Lord English in Act 7. I thought it was a really cool, poetic way to sign off.

On to the song. If you’re wondering about the differences between the old version and the new, this track has a new Doctor / Sburban Jungle section that starts around the 6:20 mark.

If you’re going to buy some music, though, and you’ve got three more bucks to spend, then pick up Symphony Impossible to Play, which includes the majority of this song, and also three more. The version of Sarabande on that album is spectacular.

2016-06-05 4:00:46 ¶ ●

By Dallas Ross Hicks
A new take on ‘Nine Lives One Love’, off of coloUrs and mayhem Universe A (also written by Dallas Ross Hicks). I try not to directly compare different variants of the same musical theme, but this is such a solid step up, I think it’s worth talking about.
'Nine Lives One Love’ has a really diffuse, layered sound to it, and it feels muddled. Bells, bells, and more bells. It drags on a bit.
MOG^3, on the other hand, flies by. It’s an even longer song, and there’s so much more to it. The song’s anchored by the same musical motif, but new instrumentation choices and new variations on that theme really hooked me in.
Most of all, the song’s flow is much improved. The deep, synth-distorted bridge around 1:45 gives that same starting motif a brand new sound. New wrinkles after that (at 3:10, 3:45, 4:30, etc) keep the track interesting and well-paced, all the way to the end.
I like this song a lot. I think it demonstrates an awful lot of artistic growth.

2016-06-06 4:00:55 ¶ ●

By theh0nestman
A chill, early-rock-style guitar track. This could work great as the intro track for Sherriff Horuss’s Western TV serial (in which he beats crime itself to death with his bare hands).

2016-06-09 4:00:59 ¶ ●

By circlejourney
A warm, smooth 2X COMBO of slow keyboard in the foreground and sugar-hyper synth in the back.

2016-06-10 4:00:59 ¶ ●

Written by Anna Marcus-Hecht
A live piece! The performance is a little bit wobbly, especially in a couple spots where the xylophone part gets challenging. But that doesn’t distract: it adds character (my definition of ‘character’, of course, being ‘an off-note here or there that makes me like the song even better somehow’). I especially like the high-energy ‘overture’ bit that starts around 1:20.

2016-06-15 4:01:15 ¶ ●

By Nate Tronerud
A mix of sweet and sour. Wait, not sour… soul-gripping terror. Yeah. A mix of sweet and terror. The first half sets up a cool jam starting around the 1:15 mark.

2016-06-17 4:01:03 ¶ ●

By violasarecool
A simple song, and with such wonderfully off-kilter vocals. Meshes really well with the light ukelele-and-piano melody. The lyrics are an interesting combination of fluffy and dark.

2016-06-19 4:00:59 ¶ ●

By Oliver Hendricks
A good beat led by that droning synth line. Kinda Strider-esque. Well, not Strider, I guess, but like, Dark Strider.

2016-06-20 4:00:58 ¶ ●

By Laurent DS
For what’s ostensibly a Latula track, this one charts a pretty dark course. Cool, crashing percussion, with the extraterrestrial melody carried on the off-beat.

2016-06-22 4:00:50 ¶ ●

By Dallas Ross Hicks
I could have sworn I had heard this one before. It’s more of a consistency of style than melody, though; it shares the same vibe as MOG^3. I like the bassline that underpins the whole track.

2016-06-26 4:01:02 ¶ ●

Homestuck Sonata (by David Ellis)

A pretty piano-only take on a couple of old classics. The first half’s a new wrinkle on Homestuck, and the second half’s a ¾ interpretation of Penumbra Phantasm. I’m no student of classical music, but I can’t help thinking of Beethoven on this one.

2016-06-28 4:01:12 ¶ ●

By Seth “Beatfox” Peelle

The opening snippet we heard of this song during [S] Collide was just the tip of the iceberg. Even the second time I listened to the full track, chills ran up and down my spine when the choir kicked in.

That’s not a live choir, by the way. Not that I could have discerned the difference without reading firsthand that it’s a sampled effect. I’m baffled as to how technology can replicate such natural sound.

Skies of Skaia has had a link to Tolkien ever since Mark Hadley wrote Elvish lyrics for it when ‘Song of Skaia’ was released. Even more so than that song, the second half of this track gives off a huge Frodo at the Crack of Doom vibe.

For what Beatfox presumably set out to accomplish, I can think of no higher praise to give.