VIRT INTERVIEW - 8/19/01

NICK: ....and, right now we have Virt on the phone. (mumbling)... Virt. So, let's get this guy on the air. Hey Virt, are you there? VIRT: I am here. N: Hello, hello. Now, what do you wanna talk about tonight? Anything in particular? V: First I must say, thank you for calling the Virt Network, your one-stop source for sexy man-on-man remixing action. To talk to Virt press 1 or say "yes" at the tone. JUSTIN KONG: Yes. N: Yes. Alright, now... V: Hi guys, how are you doing tonight? N: We're doing fine. JK: Now, now, was that prerecorded, or did you...? V: That was me. JK: That's incredible. V: I have a pretty high range. N: You do that every single time that people call you? V: Exactly. Especially when it's like, you know, people who I owe money. They usually just hang up, and it's, it's a great way to escape my debts. JK: Wow. N: Good idea. Now... V: Except when it's mom, and then she goes, uh, uh, "can I say no?". It's kind of messy, you know. So, how you guys doin' tonight? N: We're doin' just fine. We're doin' -- it's an interview-packed night here. V: Really? N: Yes. We've talked to... V: So we're on the air right now? N: We're on the air right now. V: Oh, that's just fantastic. JK: We're completely live. N: Yes. V: I've.. I've asked previously what we can say on the air... It's gotta comply to FCC regulations, right? N: That's correct. No, no swears. V: For example, y'know, I can bleep stuff out though right? N: You can bleep stuff out. If you can pull that off. V: Like, (playing Ice T clip) "Attention! If you are offended by words like BLEEP, BLEEP, BLEEP, BLEEP, ass, BLEEP, BLEEP," that's cool right? N: That's cool. You can say "rectum." V: "BLEEP" JK: And if you can't, we've already got a FCC slap on the wrist coming our way. N: It's already coming, so, we might as well say it if we can. V: (Ice T) "and by the way, suck my muthaBLEEP BLEEP," so we can do stuff like that? N: That's right, that's right. V: Can I say masturbation? N: I think so. JK: Think so. V: That's cool? N: As long as it's in the context of videogame remixing, yes. V: Like, "I masturbate every time I think about the Dark Queen in Battletoads?" JK: You too!? V: (unintelligible)... so HOT? JK: Yeah, I don't, I don't feel so alone now. It's incredible. SARAH: (at the same time they are talking) You can technically say that; you might wanna keep it to yourself. V: (to Justin Kong) We're good for each other. We should hang out more. JK: Yes, we should. V: Alright. N: Yes, um... JK: I'll give you my number, after the, uh, show. V: That would be so dreamy, y'know? N: Now people at home, Virt, probably are itching to know what it's like to do real videogame music as opposed to remixes of it. V: Wait, I do real...? N: Yes. V: Oh my god! That's a revalation right there! N: In fact, you did the Who Wants to be a Millionaire music for the Gameboy, correct? V: Oh my gosh. N: How was that for ya? V: I never... wow. Okay, so, uhhh, it's basically incredibly strenuous and incredibly rewarding. You walk out and you go to, like, a toy store or something, and you see something that you worked on on the shelf. And, I just turn into a puddle of boy juice. N: Yeah. I turn into a puddle of boy juice just looking at videogames that I didn't work on. So, I can imagine. V: Oh, I can imagine that too. N: And, we're listening to one of your remixes in the background right now, we can hear Contra in the background right now. V: Whhaaaaagghh! N: One of the.... (commenting on above exclamation) that describes it pretty well. The very... V: I've played that game since I was an embryo. Before the game even came out I was in love with it. N: We were talking about loving videogames before, and Justin said his first word was "Nintendo." But he was born in 1979. Which leads me to believe he was lying. Unless his first... V: They were a playing card company... JK: Yeah! Weren't they a playing card company since the early 1900s or the late 1800s? N: They were. V: Exactly. N: But, Justin, I was thinking, what if your first word wasn't until like 1986? That might explain it. V: That's true, the videogames came out then, but I mean, like, Hiroshi Yamauchi was still, uh... N: They were putting out Game & Watch systems and stuff. V: He's like a hundred and ninety years old; the guy freakin' rocks. N: Yeah, I'm worried about what will happen to Nintendo when he passes away or when he retires. Because... he has mysterious ways. JK: You know, he's probably got a clone in cryogenic storage. N: Probably Nintendo, while they're not working on videogames, works on cloning technology. V: (unintelligble) ...powered through cloning or something, Nintendo will cease to ever have existed. N: They have, like, a twenty year, a twenty year old Yamauchi out there, sitting in a chamber, waiting to take over for his, uh, for his clone-father. V: That's almost as scary as the thought of Walt Disney doing the same thing. JK: Wow. N: Yeah, Walt Disney's head, frozen out there somewhere. V: Eeek! Thanks! Now I'm never gonna sleep again. N: Now, are you working on any... what are you working on now? What projects? I don't know if you can say of the videogame, like, soundtrack stuff, but any remixes that you're doing? V: Well, I'm actually working on a Super Metroid remix, and I'm also doing a little bit of an F-Zero remix. Um, let's see... I'm also considering remixing the, uh, Team Gato remix again in, like, Blink-182 style. All kinds of guitar-based stuff. N: Good idea. V: That would be quite a lot of fun. Maybe I could team up with Jaxx on that one. N: Yeah. V: Anyway, I've prepared like a little, a little tribute to, uh, one of my best friends out here. N: Alright. V: So, if you guys would like to hear it, I can... N: I'd love to hear your tribute. V: A little impromtu flow. N: You need any special, uh, music or anything? V: Yeah, a shout out thing. N: Alright. V: So, if you'd like to do it. Can you, uh...tell me if you can hear this. Dip, dip! N: I can hear that. V: Can you hear this? (silence) N: I can't hear anything. Play it again. (nothing) V: Can you hear that now? S: No. N: No, not really. It's too quiet for the speakerphone not to cut out on. (quiet beats) V: You can hear that, right? N: Very faintly, yes. V: (rappin') Uh, yeah, what, there we go, yeeah... N: I can hear that. V: (rappin') To all my homies in OCRemixers, especially... Prozax. Yeah, uh, what, Every morning gotta' get in tight / yeah I got a tough job gotta' do it right / after a hard day's work I come home to relax / I take off my shirt and I take off my slacks / and I take off my shorts and I take off my socks / I get into bed and I get off my jocks / I know deep down that I'm gonna get sex / from the P R O to the Z A X / Anyhow (?) / he makes me cry then he makes me laugh / but one main thing that I love him fo' / is he gives me lovin, yeah he's my ho / (unintelligible under laughter) / Prozax, Prozax, that's the name / I scream it out all day and night / then into the morning cause he do me right. Yeah, uh, Prozax. You my bitch. I love you like nothin' else. N: That was touching. JK: Wow. (clapping) N: I'm crying, that was so touching. Wow. That was beautiful. V: I have a certain obligation to, you know, you know, Prozax greeted me last time, so I have to go out to him yet again, with the reverse greetings. JK: That was incredible. S: You know, even if you are involved with Prozax, I think Dale has a secret love for you. V: Oh, he does? S: Yeah. He informed me, and he wanted me to tell you. V: I thought it was all for the sex. Dale, I'm flattered. I'm, I'm really...(speechless) it's like real vindication here, I thought I was just being a whore. N: You're breaking down. You know what we have that I stole from you while you were sleeping in your house at night? You didn't know? I have a copy of your Metroid remix that's in the works. V: (high pitched weird noise) N: I actually have it here at the station, and we can play some of it. Now, it's not complete. It cuts off at about three and a half minutes. V: Right. But, that's because I haven't actually, you know, finished it yet. N: Indeed, I figured that much. Now, do you have any idea where you're gonna' go with this? If you're gonna' go on for half an hour longer or just one more minute, or... V: It's probably gonna' be about eight minutes, and, um, I'm going to, like, actually remix all of the music in the game. It's gonna be kind of like the Contra mix, but it's gonna... N: I noticed it had a similar sort of sound in one section. V: Yeah, well, I'm trying to actually branch out stylistically a little bit; there's going to be a section in there that's, uh, actually using my cocker spaniel. N: Wow. V: Yeah. S: Dog! N: Sarah loves dogs. V: I can actually, I've become quite adept in the playing and technique, of, uh, cocker spaniel music. N: That's amazing, I've never heard any cocker spaniel music. (dog noises) V: See? (laughter and girly "awww"s) S: Puppy! JK: Now, now what exactly do you have to do to play the cocker spaniel music? N: I hope it doesn't involve any sort of, uh, things that the animal regulation people would come down on you for. V: No, it's actually the, the most unbelievable thing about the entire phenomenon is that I don't even have to touch her. I just sit there and I go "(musical sad dog yelps)" and she goes "(singing dog noises)." N: Wow! V: If I'm playing guitar, I can do this, uh, by just yelling at her, and we have these in-depth conversations about, uh, god knows what. N: That's incredible. That is just incredible. Now where can people find your music, other than Overclocked Remix, which everybody knows? V: Pardon? N: Where can people find your music other than at Overclocked? V: Oh! My music is, um, let's see, aside from your local toy store --HA HA!-- you can find it at virt.zophar.net. N: virt.zophar.net. Yeah. V: However, the agonizingly slow access times of that site have made it so that I've actually taken a whole bunch of my stuff and put it just on my own webserver, just running off my hard disk. And that's at splitsyndicate.com. N: At split sydicate? V: All one word. N: Alright, splitsyndicate.com. That's wonderful, and, uh, just name off some of the games that you've worked on so people can, uh, bask in the glory. V: Let's see... The first one was that dry mouth game that never actually got off the ground, but it was released. N: Mm-hm. V: Um, and then after that, M&M Minis Madness, which is a really, uh, terribly cliché platformer... N: Mm-hm. V: And then after that there was Who Wants to be a Millionaire? N: Mm-hm. V: And then.. what else did I... see, I don't even remember! People are like, "It must be so glorious!" but I don't even remember half this stuff. So, um, let's see... then, after that, there was... JK: This is tough right now, cause I'm sitting here in anticipation, you know, waiting for him to say something, you know, some game, so I can be like, "I love that game! Oh my god!" You know? V: The new Pokémon game. JK: WOW! V: Yeah. Not quite, but... that would've been great. JK: That would be cool. V: Yeah. N: And, uh, did you not also create the thong song on Gameboy? V: Oh the thong song? Yeah, that's, uh... basically, I have to say that most of my inspiration comes from Absolut Vodka. (laughter) S: Someone told me that you did Q-Bert and Atlantis... V: (muffled)...actually inspired by getting drunk. N: Hey Virt... S: Did you do Q-Bert and Atlantis? V: Oh, there was Atlantis too! Alright, yeah, Disney's Atlantis, and there was David Beckam's (??) Soccer, which was only released in Europe. They're a bunch of crazy limeys. N&JK: Ahhh.. V: Yeah, that's the way it works. JK: Now, do you do all the music for one title, or just select tracks, or...? V: Well, it's usually I do all the music and all the sound effects, because they're too cheap to hire someone else. JK: Ah-ha. V: That's the way, I mean it's.. it's basically, uh, why hire two different people to do music and sound effects when I can just do both of them? N: Right. V: I prefer the music by a wide margin. N: But, you do what you must. V: Right. N: Now, we're gonna' play your, uh, in-the-works Metroid thing up to about three and a half minutes... V: Okay. N: And we're gonna have to let you go because we've got yet another interview lined up and we've got more music to play. V: Okay, well I just have a couple of things to say before we get out of here. N: Go ahead, go ahead. V: That's right, just in case you missed that part about the vodka, I have to just make it imperitive to you that... you kids at home, listen closely... the true path to being a memorable artist is intoxication. Let's see, aside from that, what do we have? S: Public radio! JK: (laughing) Public radio? V: Aside from that, let's see... S: A family show! V: Let's see, I gotta say hi, I gotta' say hi to Kristi! Kristi, I love you like an Irish man loves, uh, whiskey. That's pretty much more than anything else. N: I thought you loved Prozax. V: I love Prozax too, but... N: Shoutout to your cocker spaniel! V: And my cocker spaniel too, shoutouts to the entire freakin' world! N: Alright, I think you've got it covered now. V: That sounds great, so you're gonna' play my Metroidsploitation? N: Yes. V: Sounds great. N: Thanks for talkin'. V: Hey, thank you guys! N: No problem. (cheers) N: Alright, bye! V: See ya', buh-bye. (hangs up) N: What a weirdo.   **Check out http://www.vgmix.com for more of virt's music.