ReMix: Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island 'CrystallineCaverns'

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Beautiful, and an imaginative and thorough overhaul of the caverns theme from Yoshi's Island. As a fan of McVaffe, trip-hoppish downbeat, piano-driven pieces, and Yoshi's Island, this ReMix is obviously partial to me on several levels. I loved the theme in question back when I was playing YI, sometimes referred to SMW2 - minimal, but neverending and cavernous . . . as a cavern theme should be, no? McVaffe takes the essence of that and imbues it with a life and character all his own, layering fantastic, organic processed drums, subtle pads, atmospheric synths and some nice slice fx circa 2'20". But the anchor and meat of the melodic portion of the track is a very strong acoustic piano. This must have taken some restraint for McVaffe - at least it would have for me - as the piano never really belts out into a full-blown solo, but is instead consistently strong throughout, with variance and ornamentation to avoid straight repetition. I have to confess that I do consider this a missed opportunity for what could have been a bitchin' two-fisted piano solo, Billy Joel-style, forming a clear climax to the work. But I have my style and McVaffe has his, this is a very good thing, and I respect and admire the restraint. This is a shimmering work that creates a complete audio universe, and represents some of McVaffe's best beat work (esp. in the 'intriguing percussive textures' category) to date. It's also quite different in style and execution from most mixes of the Mario series at large, adding something new to the compendium of Kondo creations. Highly recommended.

― djpretzel