In that case, it would be an awesome Sound Test Saturday, wouldn’t it!
April is a beautiful month, is it not? Spring is here, snow is gone, and the weather is beginning to warm up! Warmth and heat is always a nice thing… unless the whole city’s on fire!
For this week’s column, we got a couple of hot song covers for you all! And not just any kind of music covers: I mean high quality, grade A, top of the line, hot hot hot singing and songwriting! That’s right, this week’s Sound Test Saturday brings you pre-existing Sonic music with lyrics!
Let’s turn the heat up and start off with Smooth4Lyfe‘s energetic cover of Modern Crisis City, “Heart of Fire”!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzOSmhWSVHM
Smooth4Lyfe here went as far as giving lyrics to all of the main levels from Sonic Generations (barring City Escape), so it was a really tough choice deciding which one I would be showcasing since they’re all equally well done. So I just went ahead with his cover for my favourite stage!
“Heart of Fire”, I find, is a pretty well done take on the popular Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 original. The lyrics fit tremendously with the contexts of both Crisis City and Sonic Generations, and Smooth here does not only an excellent job at the lyrics, but the singing as well. Most of, if not all of his Generations takes provide an extra layer in terms of notation and musicality: basically, Smooth didn’t just sing with the melody to go by. He provides his own countermelody which works so incredibly well!
And now, we join the Darkspeeds Side!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxlFFCEc0Dg
You guys surely know the name of Elson “Darkspeeds” Wong! Whether it is for his activities as DJ Darkspeeds on SEGASonic: Radio, or his awesome Sonic Universe animated adaptation series, this bashful Aussie is a very talented dude in many fields. Music and lyrical work is of no exception to the Darkspeeds Side! This cover in particular’s been getting quite the attention lately, so it’s only fair it ends up featured on TSS somehow!
For “Speed-Way Jam”, Darkspeeds invites his friend Speedio322 (who shares a similar musical hobby) for a Classic Speed Highway rap collaboration. Both dudes have written their own lyrics and came up with something incredibly upbeat, quite catchy, and very fun to listen to! Lyrics are on-screen too, so feel free to sing along!
The lyrics, while unique to Darkspeeds and Speedio, do match the essence of Speed Highway perfectly! Going up and down and all around, using your feet or spinning like a ball, exceeding the speed limit by thousands of miles per hour… you know, Speed Highway stuff!
The collaborative effort is what makes this particular cover shine. Hearing both dudes go back and forth with the verses then tackling the piece simultaneously towards the end is truly something to enjoy! The kind of vibe I’m feeling from these two seems akin to that of a brotherly duo!
And that is this week’s dynamic Sound Test Saturday!
Interesting to note about those police radio segments near the end, the Chief of Police has a somewhat egg-like vocal complexion…
Found a cool remix, cover, or original song somewhere? Want to submit something of your own and see if it gets featured? Then send it over to vizardjeffhog@sonicstadium.org!
DARKSPEEDS, I TOLD YOU I WAS GONNA DO IT! >D
FALCON….Mixed Opinions.
I am so in love with Smooth4Lyfe’s singing and lyrics, that counter melody he pulled off made him sound a bit like the lead vocalist from Scapegoat Wax 😀 Amazing cover, maybe SEGA should hire him for a theme song.
But well…. have you ever been a fan of someone for so long, that the first odd thing you sense about them, it breaks the infallible image of the guy.
Darkspeeds: Great Artist. Great Writer. Great Actor. Great Musician. Great Person overall….. not a good singer :/
But hey, the Speed Highway song has enough narm charm it works as a fun karaoke song. Just my two rings 😕
Wow… and I just recently found and watched a buncha this guy’s vids. Didn’t expect them to suddenly pop up here.
I really like the ones Smooth4Lyfe has made, but I really don’t like how he doesn’t sing during the best parts, like the violin solo at the beginning of Crisis City, and the guitar solo in Planet Wisp.
All this fan generated.. stuff needs to be put into a sub-section on the homepage, like a “note-worthy” section separate from news
While I quite like the Crisis City one, the rest kind of sound a bit samey…
The lyrics are great, could easily fit in with the games.
Again the Darkspeeds/Speedio322 ones lyrics fit perfectly…just not overly keen on the vocals i’m sorry to say. But that’s just my opinion..