Awesome Music

George Lucas once said that the Star Wars movies were “designed as silent movies.” His approach was to let music and visuals drive the story. Danny Boyd from CinemaStix explores this concept and whether watching the films without dialogue makes them even more powerful. If you ask us, it’s John Williams’ masterful scores that truly elevated the franchise.

Do you like music and math? Then you’ll dig polyrhythms. JLChnToZ (Vistanz) created this captivating video that displays a representation of these complex and often hypnotic sounds in concentric circles. For maximum effect, put the video on full screen, dim the lights, and crank up the volume.

For over 40 years, legendary music producer Rick Rubin has been helping a diverse array of artists create their seminal and most significant works. The Creative Act: A Way of Being sees Rubin share his observations on creativity and how being creative isn’t about what you make but how you see the world.

The music from the Super Mario Bros. games can be energetic and uplifting. But it can also be quite relaxing. If you need to calm your nerves on a hard day, all you need is to hit play on this clip, and you’ll get 75 minutes of the chillest Mario music ever. This is the music that spas should play while you get a massage.

Stressed out? Put on your headphones, press play on this video, and expand it to full screen. Project JDM created this digital music box that plays notes as its dots bounce back and forth along rainbow-colored arcs. As the hypnotic visual patterns evolve, so do the soothing sounds, panning from ear to ear.

The music from the first couple of Sonic the Hedgehog games is some of the best in the history of video games. Among our favorites is the music from the Chemical Plant Zone, which drummer gotobejake made even better by adding a live rhythm track. We also enjoyed Jake’s take on Duck Tales.

From the 1960s through the early 1980s, department stores played mellow instrumental music that was supposed to encourage shopping. Fardemark compiled nearly 90 minutes of this vintage stock music and recorded it onto an old cassette tape to best evoke the sounds of a bygone era. If you need more, here’s part one.

Radiohead’s Paranoid Android is about a young man who feels alienated by a materialistic world. Super Mario 64 is about a plumber trying to rescue a princess. You’d think they’d have nothing in common, but on4word managed to create a version of the in the steel drum style of the game’s soundtrack.

This stainless steel card is the ultimate cheat sheet for guitar players. One side of the pocket card features 42 common chords and their finger placements, while the other side has a fretboard diagram, chord charts for minor and major keys, and a circle of 5ths. The card comes with a matching leather card sleeve.

Musicians will get a hoot out of this clip from Leon Waves, which in which he explains the largest chord possible in music theory. Even if you could use every finger and toe to play, you’d need extra limbs and digits to perform it.

The members of the Harvard THUD percussion ensemble shake their plastic tubes like a Polaroid picture with this playful cover of OutKast’s 2003 hit Hey Ya! For more boomwhacker fun, we recommend their versions of the Charlie Brown theme, Eye of the Tiger, and the Mii Channel music.

Musician Joe Porter is back with another one of his rapid-fire instrumental performances. This time he offers up an all-too-short medley of three cartoon music. The Tom and Jerry theme sounds particularly good on the Slap-o-Phone, which sounds like something the cat and mouse would use in one of their fights.

Want to produce your own music or perform live electronic concerts? Ableton Live is the production tool of choice of the pros. This series of six courses will help you learn everything you need to know, from basic recording, to controlling MIDI devices, to editing, to DJ-ing. Another bargain from The Awesomer Shop.

Downwrite.com is a collaborative songwriting platform where artists and fans can co-create music. Fans commission original songs from working musicians, indie artists, and even notables like Everclear founder Art Alexakis. It’s a cool alternative way for artists to earn money and remain co-owners.

Since the late 1960s, synthesizers have become a critical component of music production – especially in genres like alternative, pop, and dance. Musician and synth enthusiast Doctor Mix walks us through the ten most famous and essential electronic music makers of all time, along with examples of the sounds they each produce.

Developer Dylan Turner’s online music maker lets you build sequences by placing sound blocks in 3-dimensional space. Each composition doubles as a work of visual art. Intimidated? Try their community-submitted tracks, including Coldplay’s Clocks, Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata 3rd Movement, and the Nyan Cat theme.