Rapper Takes on Super Mario Land's Oddities

[Tom Goldman]

Rapper Takes on Super Mario Land's Oddities


This rapper feels that Super Mario Land [http://www.amazon.com/Super-Mario-Land-Game-Boy/dp/B00002ST28/ref=sr_1_1?s=videogames&ie=UTF8&qid=1280156028&sr=1-1] was motherf**king weird, motherf**ker.

Duane Zuwala, also known as 8bitduane, is a rapper that spits his rhymes over the music of classic videogames. His most recent work covers Super Mario Land, the first Mario game to hit the Game Boy back in 1989. It's a little racy, if young, impressionable children happen to be around.

Super Mario Land was a very weird game compared to the other Super Mario titles. Koopa Troopa shells exploded when jumped upon, a sphinx and a spaceship are end-bosses, "fireballs" bounce around the screen, and there are even segments that put Mario in a plane for shooter-style gameplay. The game appears to have confused Duane, and he wrote this song about it.

I like Duane's work. This is the third video available on his Bad Dudes [http://www.youtube.com/user/8bitduane]. Duane and his associates properly put his lyrics in each video so you can understand what he's saying. Some lines show that Duane is not just rapping over classic tunes and that he actually understands the games' content, saying that "liars and cheaters are all around" in Castlevania II's town (as townspeople lied in that game).

Duane's Comix Zone [http://www.myspace.com/actionadventureworld] is coming up next. He's already got a bunch of other songs and appears to be developing one video a week at this point in time. Duane could be the master of retro-inspired videogame music that includes the work "f**k."

(Via: GameVideos [http://gamevideos.1up.com/video/id/27876])

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[Vigilantis]

Hah! I generally dislike Rap, but I think I can listen to this one a few times over. Makes for a good laugh at least.

 

[Jared]

Certainly unique XD I suppose I can let this slide =P

 

[MercenaryCanary]

http://music.todaysbigthing.com/2009/04/01
This was how I first found out about him.
And I hate rap.

 

[Omikron009]

This song makes me want to shoot myself in the head.

 

[Mushroomfreak111]

This song makes me want to shoot myself in the head.

YES! I'm not the only one that hated this!

 

[ReincarnatedFTP]

I heart nerdcore.
For more in this vein check out
(Rock/Hardcore version) HORSE the band.
(Another rapper) Charles Hamilton. He's a huge Sonic fan and he incorporates the game sounds into his music. There was one interview where he basically said "Sonic is my religion".

 

[Mstrswrd]

I'm just sad that Duane and Brando are no longer a team. Everyone remember the Epic Megaman 2 rap? Yeah, that was both of them. Now, that'll never happen again.

This is still awesome, though.

 

[SovietSecrets]

Loved it haha. Stuff like this is always fun for me to watch.

 

[dfcrackhead]

I loved this video and was gonna make a post about it later tonight, I guess the escapist ninja'd me this time. Drat you

 

[Low Key]

Wow, every other word seemed liked it was "fuck" or "************". Quite surprising for a nerdcore rapper.

 

[AboveUp]

I'm just sad that Duane and Brando are no longer a team. Everyone remember the Epic Megaman 2 rap? Yeah, that was both of them. Now, that'll never happen again.

This is still awesome, though.

They're not together anymore? NOOOOOooo!

 

[tsu-money]

I'm just sad that Duane and Brando are no longer a team. Everyone remember the Epic Megaman 2 rap? Yeah, that was both of them. Now, that'll never happen again.

This is still awesome, though.

What happened to them? The Mega Man rap was their best work IMO.

 

[ProfessorLayton]

That is actually pretty awesome. That guy has some talent.

 

[Epictank of Wintown]

I'm just sad that Duane and Brando are no longer a team. Everyone remember the Epic Megaman 2 rap? Yeah, that was both of them. Now, that'll never happen again.

This is still awesome, though.

What happened to them? The Mega Man rap was their best work IMO.

They split up. Creative differences and the like.

Still. Duane and Brando are some pretty talented dudes.

 

[DazZ.]

I was smiling all the way through that.

I loved that game as a kid, only now I realise how different it was to the other ones. Makes me want to find my big fat ass grey Gameboy and see if I can find the game.
I know the Gameboys somewhere...

If you didn't like that you won't like this [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Le783XimMBY] either, also made with the old school Mario tune.

 

[Caliostro]

music

I'm fairly certain you can be sued for false advertisement there...


... But anyways. This is pretty bad... The lyrics seem particularly uninspired at best, horribly forced at worst, he seems to have some sort of speech impediment as he finishes every sentence with what sounds like "HUUUR" ("in my CHURRR", "over DHUURR", "in this HUUUR"), he needs serious diction lessons and his English makes me hurt a little inside.

Managed to watch around a minute and a half before my will to kick the "rapper" in the teeth overcame my curiosity to see if he was going anywhere...

 

[SirPumpkinLongshanks]

I'm just sad that Duane and Brando are no longer a team. Everyone remember the Epic Megaman 2 rap? Yeah, that was both of them. Now, that'll never happen again.

This is still awesome, though.

Luckily since Duane is the stronger of the two I don't doubt we'll see something of that caliber again. And I honestly think Brando puts out stronger stuff on his own so this is ultimately a good thing for us, it's just a shame things fell apart for the reasons they did.

 

[SirPumpkinLongshanks]

music

I'm fairly certain you can be sued for false advertisement there...


... But anyways. This is pretty bad... The lyrics seem particularly uninspired at best, horribly forced at worst, he seems to have some sort of speech impediment as he finishes every sentence with what sounds like "HUUUR" ("in my CHURRR", "over DHUURR", "in this HUUUR"), he needs serious diction lessons and his English makes me hurt a little inside.

Managed to watch around a minute and a half before my will to kick the "rapper" in the teeth overcame my curiosity to see if he was going anywhere...

The main thing that disappoints me is the mixing. They've always had that problem, y'know, where you can hear the music but you can barely tell what the rappers are saying. I'll agree with you that when the lyrics fall flat they bomb, but the better rhymes redeem it in my opinion.

Of course, if I'm perfectly honest, I'd have no patience for this guy if he wasn't doing video game raps. His biggest strength is that he knows how to evoke nostalgia. But I'd tune him out completely if the music wasn't technically sound and the lyrics weren't damn hilarious sometimes. His take on Robotnik in the Sonic the Hedgehog rap was hilarious-it was one of the rare cases when I liked it better because I couldn't understand it.