R.I.P.1.0.3. TRACK 3: Knock 'em Back & Knock 'em Out (Theme of Creepy & Crawley)

So, a bit back, Dio put a request in for a R.I.P.1.0.3. track: she wanted me to do a short, 30-second long "eyecatch" jingle/loop inspired by one of her ongoing projects, Creepy & Crawley.

Me being me, I said "nah fuck that, you're getting a 1-minute-ish ending theme inspired by it instead". Me also being me, the 'ending' bit got changed to 'opening' because the melodies that came to me were much bouncier then I initially planned.

For contexts sake; Creepy & Crawley is a series that centres around a team of Paranormal Investigators made up of perpetually down-on-their-luck misfits. The team in question is made up of the following individuals: Alestor , a sharp dressed gent and trickster archetype who would feel all his at-least-two-millennia of age were he not permanently drunk; Yoko, a mysterious who's incredible power, waning by the day though it is, is outmatched only by her beauty; Leo Griffin, lone survivor of a military unit who (sort of) makes up for his not-so-bright nature by being reasonably competent with firearms and explosives; Henri Bitner, the most mature member of the group, and a a 13 year old boy serving as the conduit for an all-power demon hive mind called the Legion; and finally Mei Asakawa, a way-out-of-her depth young lady with an incredible sixth sense. The stories revolve around the various escapades the team finds themselves in- ranging from 'pedestrian haunting' to 'world ending cataclysm'- that they inevitably have to solve using a dash of wit, a smidge of cunning, and about 10 metric tons of luck. Which is a bit of a shame, as to paraphrase their creator herself; so astronomically bad is their luck that, if given access to a weapon that would always hit its target and could never break, it would invariably jam before they got a shot off, or they'd somehow manage to miss with it anyway. They're all still alive, though, so they must be doing SOMETHING right.

Pretty much from the word "go", I wanted to do something with a pretty strong Jazz flavour to it. In my head, the world of Creepy & Crawley has always had a bit of a jazzy, sleazy funk groove rife with upright bass and bouncing bongo beats running in the background- probably because, whilst the series is absolutely entrenched in horror and a touch of genuine tragedy, there are strong elements of both action and comedy that run through its veins as well, so something that managed to capture that blend of emotions and moods was definitely in order. Besides, R.I.P.1.0.3. is technically this years "12 Tracks" project, and we can't very well have a 12 Tracks release without The Twisted Kerchiefs making an appearance of some kind (it's about the only time the alias turns up, something for which I am eternally sorry for). A bit of rock grit snuck in there too, something I put down to listening to Yasushi Ishii's work on the Hellsing TV series way, way too much.

Getting the 'Jazz' part of the brief came fairly naturally- the upright bass in particular came together very quickly and cleanly, as did most of the percussion- but when it came to defining melody lines and integrating some Spook Factor, I had to experiment with a few different ideas before things began to click. Having to work on this in short increments for a couple of days due to family events and such several days on the trot only spaced out the work more, natch. There's still an annoying little voice in the back of my head screaming 'THE MELODIES ARE DULL DWEEB' because, well, Certified Perfectionist™ over here, but what I really notice listening to this song back is that my ability to write out- and my willingness to write out- more complex arrangements is definitely increasing. It's something I'd noticed in a lot of my more recent work from this year, but with this track in particular (which, barring the Manos soundbyte and the thunder cracks, is sample-free and 100% written in Music 2000 using only in-program sounds and no premade riffs) I think it really comes across that I'm getting a lot bolder with my compositions. Is there still a lot of room for improvement? Absolutely- I'm nowhere near where I want to be, yet- but I'm on the right path, and that's a good sign.

Incidentally, I find it both extremely funny and very telling that the track sounds less like an anime opener, and more like the attract mode from an 90s arcade game. Perhaps it's the theme song for the officially licensed Creepy & Crawley Beat 'em Up released by Nincom? (nahhhh, probably not; Gonkaka didn't write it)

~ Decon Theed (19/10/18)