Hirokazu "Hip" Tanaka has a firm place in Nintendo's musical foundation. Most prolific in the '80s and earlly '90s, some of the more memorable songs in his repertoire include the themes to Metroid and Kid Icarus, "Song B" in Tetris and "Balloon Trip" from Balloon Fight, among many others. The man even had a hand in designing the Game Boy's audio hardware and also made the Game Boy Camera.
So what is a talented man like Tanaka doing nowadays? What he does best, of course. Red Bull Music Academy Radio has recorded Tanaka, who now largely goes by Chip Tanaka for his club performances, blazing a more than 30-minute live set at the Cart Diggers event in Japan. You can listen to it below:
[video removed]
So what do you think of Tanaka's sounds in 2014? Let us know!
[source rbmaradio.com, via tinycartridge.com]
Comments 22
Saw Chip Tanaka in Tokyo at Square sounds Festival this year! Awesome! Chiptune Rules!
Cool. But ANAMANAGUCHI FOR LIFE 💙
But it's Severus Snape!
Thank you Nintendo Life for the continued coverage of 8bit/Chiptune music.😉
amazing.
Does anyone know where I can buy these songs? This is incredibly awesome, but all I can find is his game-related stuff.
Oh. Wow. This is fantastic.
He did the soundtrack for Super Mario Land, oh my, my, my!!, I love this soundtrack and videogame!!
I see his only game credits for nintendo in the last 20 odd years are the last 3 smash bros games, why dont they get him on more titles. I know he works for creatures now but it seems a waste of his talent working on the lesser pokemon games
Get him working on Metroid 5 already.
Sounds like Earthbound... I love it!
Based Tanaka!
@PvtOttobot There's a reason it sounds like EarthBound, just in case you didn't know.
Not really much into electronic music, but I listened to this last night after it was posted on Tiny Cartridge and it is fantastic. Dude burns it down.
@TimLatshaw If by that you mean he composed for Earthbound, then why didn't you mention it?!? Earthbound's music is incredible! I'd put it only after baloon trip in that list you gave!
Would be fascinated to hear what he'd bring back to Metroid in a soundtrack for a new game. Would never trade what Kenji Yamamoto did with the music in the series, but it would be very cool to get the original vibe back and see what fresh take Tanaka could bring. Collaboration would be a dream.
Oh yeah, and I haven't listened to all of this but sounds pretty rad.
Isn't he also the president of Creatures inc., and has composed for the Pokemon anime? Or am i mixing him up with someone else?
@PvtOttobot His list of work is so long and impressive, choices had to be made. Hard choices.
@Xilef You are correct! He does so much!
wow, i like super metroid and metroid prime music, but is the first metroid music that stands out more to me, kraid's lair, brinstar, and all the tracks are superb, so atmospheric, futuristic and alien! 8 bit classics, i'm really into electronic music and my fascination began as a 7 year old with the music from this guy on metroid from nes. i love him.
this set is amazing!!
I like Anamanaguchi better. Easier to listen to because it's more melodic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EP1mczaq3zo
At 18:10 and beyond <3
Tap here to load 22 comments
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...