Nick Marino

5 in 5 is an EP series created by my friend and record label owner, Brian John Mitchell. The concept is right there in the name -- five songs in five minutes. And we're talking exactly five minutes (which is a lot tougher to do than you might think).

My Nik Furious contribution to this Silber Records series is called Super Wet. It's 300 seconds of (mostly) synth-soaked instrumentals featuring the full and final versions of some music I've shared here on my blog over the past couple of years.

You can listen to Super Wet on the Silber website. It's only $1 to purchase the five-minute journey, which I've billed as the key to accessing the nexus of reality. Find out more by reading the album's press release.

Each one of these songs was salvaged from the wreckage. They were some of my favorite musical moments that had, for some reason or another, not been able to cut it in the past. But with some love and determination, I was able to transform the incomplete recordings into five short tunes that I can now rep with pride.

The first track, Unsung, is named after the documentary series by TVOne. It was previously recorded on a whim as the backing track for So Unusual, a mini-rap I released last year. This weird song is comprised of my voice and a beat I pounded out on my desk. No instruments.

The second song, Hayze, is named after a character from my friend Heather Nunnelly's webcomic, VACANT. This punchy tune was chopped from a lackluster recording that didn't hold up as a longer song. I named it Hayze because it was one of the options I gave Heather when she was picking her podcast theme song.

The next two tracks, Le Fever and Brave, were remixes that I created for my friend Kelly Thompson. Late last year, she asked me to come up with some music for her book trailer for The Girl Who Would Be King. I discussed the process more here and here. Basically, these tunes didn't work for Kelly. But I was determined to find a good home for them and Super Wet was the perfect opportunity!

Finally, there's Silber Funk pt 2. The original version of this track was created using a drum machine on Brian's website. While I enjoyed adding some slap bass to a digital drum loop, the song always felt unfulfilled to me. This album was a fantastic chance for me to revisit this beat and flesh it out some more.

So that's it! The story behind all five tracks on Super Wet. By now, I hope you've started unlocking reality. I poured a lot of passion and thought into these songs, and I hope that love transfers over to you as you jam out to them.

UPDATE: Check out my scrapped Super Wet album cover on deviantART.

A cover of the theme song from X-Men: The Animated Series. My version is electronic, synth-y, and slightly funky. I made a YouTube video of the song featuring some of my favorite stupid stills from the 90s cartoon:

Here's an audio version:

For 2.5 years, I've been watching X-Men and reviewing it on A Podcast with Ross and Nick as a part of something I call EXTREME. And today we've finally finished!!

In my opinion, X-Men is a terrible cartoon with a wonderful theme song. It's composed by Shuki Levy, who's got a pretty impressive list of credits.

Covering this theme was trickier than I'd expected. I thought I'd be able to teach myself the melody by ear, but I couldn't. Luckily, this video helped me nail the riff.

Still, it's a tough song to play on the keyboard, especially when you're working with a truncated set of keys on a microKORG.

Anyway, I hope you have as much fun listening to this cover tune as I had recording it. Watching all 76 sloppy episodes of that TV show sucked and I'm so glad to be done!! Recording this song was my victory celebration.

Buh Rick is a remix of the intro to Brick House by the Commodores.

The evolution of this track is simple -- I was compelled to toy with the iconic sound of the Brick House introduction, layering the song on top of itself and swishing the sound between the left and right speakers.

Ronald LePread's funky bassline, the tight Commodores horns, and Walter "Clyde" Orange's grunts are fun to mess with because of their staccato bounce.

I wish I had more backstory for you, but this is the most straight forward track on my Sunday Best mixtape. I loved the original and I wanted to chop it up. That's it!

On Monday, I'm debuting my new Super Haters collaboration with Jared Catherine, creator of Incrediman Comix. It's called Mr. Magnifico Unchained. The most powerful hero in the Super Haters universe has gone nuts, and only Mind's Eye and Destruct-O-Tron can stop him!

Like my past two Super Haters story arcs, I made a trailer for Mr. Magnifico Unchained featuring music by my melodic alter ego, Nik Furious:

Here's an mp3 of the Mr. Magnifico Unchained trailer music:

The songs used in my previous trailers had rich, involved histories with complicated evolutions. Sadly, that's not the case with this tune. The history of this trailer music is short and simple!

Since the trailer begins with a parody of the upcoming Superman Unchained series by Scott Snyder and Jim Lee, I thought it would be fitting to use a bit of the Theme From Superman by John Williams. I played the opening riff on my microKORG.

Then a I used a few noises from Freesound and spliced in the beginning of Destruct-O-Groove. I made Destruct-O-Groove last month to coincide with the debut of the free Super Haters eBooks. I split the song into four parts. You can download each section by visiting the webpage for the corresponding volume of Super Haters.

Mr. Magnifico Unchained a.k.a. Jared Catherine Guest Week begins on Monday, March 25, 2013 at SuperHaters.com. See ya there!

13 tracks. 22 minutes. Old school and original instrumental funk.

Above you should see the embeded player from Sunday Best on PodOmatic. But if you don't, then here's a version on NickMarino.net:

You can also download the Sunday Best mixtape as individual tracks:
• nik-furious-sunday-best.zip (36:09, 53 MB)

Tracklist:

1. Buh Rick
Remix of the intro from "Brick House" by The Commodores

2. Bustin
Remix of "Ghostbusters" by Ray Parker Jr.

3. I Was Made to Remix
Remix of "I Was Made to Love Her" by Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Wonder

4. Infinity Well
Remix of the intro from "Keep It Comin' by The Jones Girls

5. Numb Brrr Won
Remix of "Your Love Is On The One" by Lakeside

6. Ooo Ahh
Remix of "Hold the Line" by Toto

7. Phoenix Bay
Demo version of "Remix the Phoenix" by Nik Furious

8. Remix Da Bass
Demo version of "Da Bounce" by Nik Furious

9. Station
Song by Nik Furious, inspired by Station's Creation

10. Sunday Best
Remix of "Chance With You" by Brother To Brother

11. The Wrecker
Remix of the outro from "Gumbo" by The Ventures

12. Ugly
Remix of the intro from "She Blinded Me With Science" by Thomas Dolby

13. Wakanda
Remix of "Africa (Acoustic)" by D'Angelo

Over the next few months, I'll blog about the creation of each track from Sunday Best. The beats on this mixtape were produced between 2004 and 2012. There are a lot of stories behind these songs and I look forward to sharing them with you.

Oh, and here's where the name of the mixtape comes from.