Mike Osso is an audio engineer and musician based in New York. He is currently the head composer for Solarbots. For our series of team interviews, he explained the intricacies of victory fanfares and told us about some of his pet peeves when it comes to video game music.

How did you get into music?

When I was young, my older brother found a guitar in a basement. He started playing it and immediately I thought: That’s what I want to do. I guess I was the jealous younger brother. So I bugged my parents and eventually, they got me this crappy little digital piano and signed me up for piano lessons. Usually, when you start playing an instrument, the first thing you do is practice scale, the standard stuff. I remember thinking “That’s boring. I’m writing my own stuff.” Looking back at it, I was definitely an annoying child. (laughs) The first thing I wanted to learn on the piano was the Legend of Zelda theme song. Riveting. 

Then later, a lot of my career mirrored what my older brother did. He went to audio engineering school, so I went to audio engineering school. Then we started a band together. I shouldered him mixing our music for years. I’d watch and emulate it on my own.

A lot of audio engineers go on to become great producers and musical masterminds – the people who pull the strings in the background to make great things happen. Like Jimmy Iovene and Dr. Dre to some extent, I was thinking about this documentary I saw on them recently.

Thank you for calling me Dr Dre. I am Dr. Dre. (laughs) The priority for me was always live music. Making sure it wasn’t boring for people to watch or listen to. I’ve been in a lot of bands and played live, and you can’t just stand there looking at your shoes. So the audio engineering had to be like that too. I loved nerdy, stupid little things, tweaking sounds to make them like a good type of “bad” sound, hyperfocusing on details. Composing is a hyped up word. Like, when I think of composers, I picture a man named Mr. Maestro with his fancy cufflinks. I’m just a dumb idiot making riffs like puzzle pieces and pretending I’m “professional”. I get all my fuels in different flavours from the Solarbots team. 

Yes, last time we talked to Jess and she also noted that her process is a lot like collaging. I hear that she also has to do with you joining Solarbots?

Yes! I owe it all to her, 100 percent. I’ve known Jess for a few years, we’ve been online goons together. One day I was talking to her, and she told me about Solarbots and these incredibly wicked human tales of the story behind the game. I was actually overwhelmed and had to hit the studio. Later that day I sent her a file called SolarBots.mp3. I didn’t expect anything in return. But then, boom, right away I was talking to the bossman himself, Misotsune. He asked me to write another piece of music, like a tryout or an audition. He was inviting and kind. He wanted to see if I could paint a clearer picture of the world he was creating. It was very natural.

I feel like this is a theme in the interviews: The working environment is very relaxed, oriented towards fostering creativity and appreciation.

There’s something specific about being an American on the Solarbots team, working in a relaxed work environment. The American work ethic has a dysfunctional attitude, “Go! Now! You have to get this done fast or you’re in trouble!“ Everything in here feels like gentle guidance. I was honestly sceptical at first, it was unusual not having a boss bark orders and throw coffee cups across the room. (laughs) It was and still is a process of deprogramming. Misotsune has done a good job making me feel welcome. That in turn makes it easier to write better music. 

Speaking of work and pressure, please don’t mind me asking: What are you working on at the moment? Can you share some details with us?

I've been creating victory fanfares. A victory fanfare is what you hear when you beat your opponent, a sort of completion jingle. I studied up on many victory fanfares to understand what these other composers were going for. I want to understand it so I can turn it on its head and make it a little different. I want each faction of Solarbots to have a completely different musical experience. Everything. Down to the victory theme. I arrange Lacrean music as traditionally classical gothic and operatic in motif. For Illskagaard, flipping historically Nordic folk into Americana and Western music. Arborian is just artificial world music. Synthetically produced naturalistic sounds. It’s good to work with small parameters.

Can you explain to us, from a musicians point of view, what makes good or bad video game music?

A video game is doing at least a decent  job when it doesn't make me immediately open the settings and turn the music slider all the way down. If I can do that well then that’s a damn good first step! A menu theme can even be a 5 second loop, but it has to be good, otherwise the ears get tired, and the player will mute the music.

I’m definitely guilty of doing that, of turning the video game music down first thing. I also think that today, with Spotify and all that, we are very used to the fact that we can just skip something if it doesn’t vibe with us. The patience for bad music might be lower today.

You shouldn’t have patience for bad music! I don’t blame anyone. In games, you cannot pause the music without muting it. So the arrangements are under strict scrutiny of the player. If you cross one line that slider is hitting zero.  

What is some of your favorite video game music? I think mine is the OG Prince of Persia. But I might also just be nostalgic because it’s one of the first games I played in general. I also like the Papers, Please soundtrack. I guess I enjoy ominous old-school sounds.

I could name a billion games, but I’ll try to keep it short. I was 6-7 years old – Mega Man X for SNES had these incredible metal riffs from Yuki Iwai. She’s a damn wizard genius. She started that fire for me. Similarly, F-Zero’s fun midi guitars, Super Metroid’s sound design. RARE’s Perfect Dark and Jet Force Gemini. David Wise from Donkey Kong Country. More recently anything from Metal Gear to Katamari Damacy, Cuphead, and the Fire Emblem series. Also anything Mick Gordon does is gold. DOOM Eternal OST is insane! Oh man and Disasterpeace. I’d advise anyone out there to listen to Disasterpeace’s music right now.

And your pet peeves when it comes to video game music?

When the music is completely mistreated and second hand. People don't have to be musicians to react badly to throw-away music. They’ll react subconsciously. If it's just a sobbing violin for hours, who cares? I've never had a friend pass me a youtube link of game music that was bland trombones droning along. It has to communicate symbiotically with gameplay somehow or it might as well be elevator music. While the Hollywood film pulls from slow broods, classical music, and overtures, the video game pulls from prog rock. Riffy things! Fast arpeggios! Slightly off the cuff. That’s a videogame. The film tries to get you situated in the story you have to watch, but the video game has to get you motivated, amped to keep playing, into a state of directed disarray. It’s almost a bit like jazz, it’s gotta be all over the place.

I’m going to ask all team members this question: Which faction is your favourite?

Well Lacreans are blood thirsty cultists and Arborians lay acid traps that kill travellers. Ilskagaardians are hard workin’ folk who just wanna get a modest job done. They stick to one pace and master their craft possibly to the point of insanity. So I take to 'em.

So you’re in the market for some Illskagaardian Solarbots?

The first NFTs I invested in were 5 teams of Solarbots. I came from that very countercultural place, the NFT seemed stupid, what are they? But when I moved away from the noise of public opinion of economic politics and did my own research, NFTs seemed like a cool way to empower some digital artists. Artists usually make no fucking money from their work. In Solarbots, the sprites have to be made with the consumer and player at highest priority. People are investing decent coin. It’s a pretty good eco system of quality.

What 2022 Solarbots development are you most looking forward to?

I like looking at the way the team is developing, everything keeps getting better and more well defined. Right now we’re fixating on the process and making it grow into a crypto game that’s for real. Wait, I do look forward to ******** an  ******* ***** in the head, man.