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32 - Clair Obscur’s Score Needs Context, Not Just Theory · Mythic Mind Games

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to a special episode of Mythic Mind Games.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: I recently posted to my YouTube channel a response to
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Ben Shapiro's review of the music from Obscure Expedition thirty three,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: and so he watched them clips provided some commentary. I'm
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: not convinced you got it quite right. I'm not convinced
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: he was using the right lens of analysis to do this,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: and so I decided to put forward my response. And
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: you can find the link to my video of this
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: response on YouTube in the show notes, and you can
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: also find the show notes a link to his full review.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: That way you can get his full thoughts.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: So now I'm just going to include the audio from
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: my response here, and I'd love to hear your thoughts,
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: and so please let me know if you have any.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get to it today. I want to
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: provide a critique of Ben Shapiro's critique of the music
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: from Claire Obscure Expedition thirty three. Now, to be fair
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: to Ben, you should watch his entire review, just because
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: you know I'm going to be providing some clips from
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: his review and it's worth getting the fullness of his thoughts.
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: I don't think I'm taking him out of context or anything.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: You know, I'm trying to be charitable to that, But
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: at the same time, you should hear all of his
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: thoughts to give him a fair shake. Also, it should
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: be noted that, as Ben admits he really doesn't know
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: anything about this game, I assume his producer or somebody
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: on his staff. I knew that this was a popular game,
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: that the music is well liked, and they thought that
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: talking about it would get them some clicks. And so
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: I assume that's what's going on here. But I still
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: think it's worth engaging with some of his thoughts here,
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: and so I'm going to go back and forth and
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: providing some clips from his review and then providing my response.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: And so let's start off by giving it to Ben.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: Folks, today we are apparently reviewing music from the video
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: game Claire obscur. I have no idea what this is,
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: as you can imagine, Okay, putting I'm putting on my
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: music at Okay, let's see.
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: Okay, I'm waiting for agains to that theme. Is there
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: is there? I'm mightying forart again to the theme. They
• 2:07
  Speaker 3: should be the intro to the theme?
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: Yes, all right, now, a few things already, and this
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: is gonna be an ongoing criticism of his. I feels
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: like the music isn't really going anywhere. And first of all,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: he's listening to clips right, so that alone prevents him
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: from getting the full themes that are at play here.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: Now to his point that, yeah, a lot of these
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: songs are kind of they're kind of meandering right where.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: There's not always a super clear chorus at play. I mean,
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: sometimes there is, but sometimes there's not, or or maybe
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: it just takes a while to get there. And as
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: we're going to see by the end, if you don't
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: already know, I mean, Ben certainly knows the technical side
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: of music theory. I mean he knows more than I do.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: I played the tello back in the day, but I
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: wouldn't go ahead ahead with him on the technical side
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: of musical theory. He definitely has the advantage there, but
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: I think that he's missing his Aristotle. See, before you
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: can properly say whether or not a thing is good,
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: you have to know what the thing is, what is
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: it supposed to be? And in order to know what
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: a thing is, you have to know what a thing
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: is for what purpose is it serving? And so this
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: is not a piece of music that should be treated
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: in isolation, but it is a piece of music that
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: is part of a story, just like a piece of
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: music from a ballet or an opera or a movie soundtrack,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: like it's all meant to be doing something in service
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: to the story that is being told, the art that
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: is being created, and this game in particular, it's a
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: story about grief. It's a story about sorrow and how
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: we integrate grief, or perhaps how grief kind of integrates
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: us into its fold. You know, if if you've ever
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: been in a state of serious grief, as I know
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: that I have and and adds are you have too,
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: even if it looks a little bit different than mine,
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  Speaker 1: then you know that grief itself is destable, that it
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: doesn't seem like it's really going anywhere. It's an emptiness
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: more than it is a harmonious substance. Now, maybe you've
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: been able to find solid ground through your grief, maybe
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: even more solid ground than you would otherwise have. I
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: know that's been my experience. I've learned to be grateful
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: for the things that I most wish didn't happen, because
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  Speaker 1: they've allowed me to see the enduring value that remains
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: when the things that I seem to most want are
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: stripped away. And so you know that grief has that
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  Speaker 1: destabilizing element, even if it might serve to provide a
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: greater degree of stability, in the end, that greater degree
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  Speaker 1: of stability comes from something else than the grief itself.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: Grief itself is meandering, it is destabilizing. And so it
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  Speaker 1: makes sense that a lot of the music from this
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: game seems kind of meandering. It seems kind of pedantic.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: It seems perhaps like you're wandering around and not going anywhere.
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  Speaker 1: And when Ben notices that, he sees that as a
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: point of negative criticism, Whereas I see that, and I
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: recognize that this is actually doing something really profound, is
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: doing something really meaningful. And that's because I have an
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: understanding of what the thing is for. And if you
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: don't know what a thing is for, you don't really
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: know what a thing is.
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: All right, let's go back, Okay, So I keep dying, and.
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: That's just a repeat that harmony. I mean, you know,
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: I like the string arrangement. That's nice, but I'm waiting
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: for the song as he goes somewhere, it's better not
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: be a repeat again.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: The song it is, it is going somewhere, and it's
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  Speaker 1: taking us along with it. It's taking us deeper into
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  Speaker 1: the psyche, which doesn't always have a firm guardrails, it
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: doesn't always have a clear direction of mind, even though
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  Speaker 1: it's always moving, it's always going somewhere, and it's that
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: elusive quality that actually makes the music really work.
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: The song never went anywhere. That's unfortunate.
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, listen, I'm a sucker for like anything
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: that shows me a slow mo picture of a Steinway.
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: Viola.
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: Okay again, like give me instruments, but that that song
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: didn't go anywhere.
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  Speaker 3: That song didn't go anywhere. I was waiting.
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: I was waiting for the actual chorus, and there was
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: no chorus to that song. One of my main critiques
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: of many modern songs, including apparently ones for video games,
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: the song has to go somewhere. If the song goes
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: nowhere and you just get me bum bum bum but
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: a bum bum bum but a bum bum bum like
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: over and over and over, that's not a full song.
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: That is the intro to his song.
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: All right, So he and I clearly just not listening
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: to the same music because I mean, it definitely does
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: go somewhere. I don't know exactly what he's looking for.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: I guess I kind of do. Later on, he talks
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: about how music should build towards something like a grand harmony,
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: but again, that just doesn't fit the aesthetic of this game.
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: And you can't really tell what a thing is unless
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: you know what a thing is for.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: Okay, So apparently this is a song called di chev letoy. Okay,
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  Speaker 2: I'm waiting for it to go somewhere, and it's starting
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: to it's building to something, I hope.
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: I guess the idea.
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: I guess the idea for some of these songs is
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: that they're not supposed to go anywhere.
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: I guess because you just play them on repeat.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, so I guess that it's not supposed to like
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  Speaker 2: build anything, and so it kind of is repetitive. Yeah,
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: it's kind of sounds good, all right, not terrible, not terrible, Yes, correct,
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: I think that's right. Video game Elevator music is an
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: excellent thank javvy.
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: All right, So I get his point here that this
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  Speaker 1: is again it's kind of meandering, is kind of repetitive,
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: and that's because well, this is world music, this is
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  Speaker 1: background music. This is meant to It's a world building
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  Speaker 1: dynamic that that's meant to give you a certain kind
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  Speaker 1: of feeling. It's creating a certain kind of esthetic as
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: you engage with the world of Expedition thirty three, and
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: it can't really be separated out from that. But even
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: if it is separated out from that, it still provides
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: a certain haunting, melancholic beauty that I think is pretty
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: inescapable if you're really listening to it. Yeah, I think
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: it's beautiful. I think it's sorrowful. I think it does
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: exactly what it is that it's supposed to do.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: And this is widely considered to be the best song
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: in the game. Okay, here here comes the French accent.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: You ready, Here we go un v at the Mayor.
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: This is another song that's gonna go nowhere. So okay,
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: I mean, I mean this is supposed to be I
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: guess near the end of the game, during some of
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: the pivotal this is only a fight. This does not
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: sound like it's near a fight. What kind of fight
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: is it? Is it a fight where he pose a lot?
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: Again? He just he does. He's not aware of the
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: context of this game. He's not aware of the context
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: in which this music uh Is plays when he says,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: I you know what kind of fight is This is
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: a fight where people pose a lot. I mean, to
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: his credit, this is not traditional battle music. But that's
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: because as you move through the narrative of this game,
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: it becomes increasingly evident that the main antagonist isn't really
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: any particular person. Yeah, I mean, there are personalities that
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: play an antagonistic role, but ultimately the antagonist of the
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: game is grief. It is sorrow, it is loss, and
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: so that is principally what is being fought against. And
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  Speaker 1: so this music helps us set that tone that we're
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: dealing with something emotional, we're dealing with something psychological, more
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: than we are dealing with a flesh and blood threat.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: So again, this is just a case of him not
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: understanding what the thing is for, and then not understanding
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: what the thing is for. He doesn't really understand what
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: the thing is.
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: Okay, this part okay, this is this is better, this
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  Speaker 2: is better. Okay, Well, I like that the song actually
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: built towards some things.
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  Speaker 3: That's good.
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: Most of the songs that you've played me so far
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  Speaker 2: sort of stay in the same register and then they
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: don't rise into an upper register.
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: So it goes, it goes somewhere.
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: I'm not sure that it builds someplace so dramatic that
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: I'm you know, riveted by it, but at least it
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: builds somewhere, So that's good, all.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: Right, So a good When he says things like that,
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: we're just not listening to the same piece, I can't
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: understand not being riveted by that.
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: This one is called the Paintress. Okay, and apparently this
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: is the song for the main boss of the game,
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: the final Boss. Okay, so they're using they're using dissonance, right, Okay,
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: that's which is what you should use it for a
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: for a villainous character. Dissonance is where the harmonies aren't
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: that don't sound pleasant to the year you had the
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: violinist up top. But the violinist wasn't actually doing anything
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: difficult there. The violinist is just playing very high notes repeatedly.
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: There are difficult violent parts. That is not a difficult
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: violent part.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: Maybe that's not a difficult violin part. But I don't
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: really consider that to be ground for criticism. I mean,
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: something being complicated doesn't necessarily make it better. I mean,
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: it might be an impressive display of skills. But really
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: the question is is this section of music or is
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: this element of the composition serving the goals of the
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: broader music, the broader art. And in this case, I
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: would say yes, it is. Whether it's simple, whether it's complicated,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: it's kind of irrelevant to the more basic question of
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: is this doing what it's supposed to do and is
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: that worth doing? And now would say yes on both counts.
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: A lot of music is about creating intensity and then
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: dissipating the intensity. So this is one of the things
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: about classical original classical like this isn't baroque music.
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: There's almost no dissonance. It's supposed to be pleasant.
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: So in sort of the postmodern era, in the post
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: Schernberg era, you get a ton of dissonance in music
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: and it can be really, really powerful. So, for example,
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: if you listen to Bartok's Concerto for Orchestral, which is
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: one of my favorite pieces, Bartok is writing very very
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: dissonant music. And then in the first movement of Concerto
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: for Orchestra, listen to the Fritz Reiner recording with the
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: Chicago Symphony Orchestral, which is the best recording the first
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: movement is enormously dissonant, and then it resolves. It resolves
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: into this thundering horn section, and the horn section is
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: quite non dissonant, and it really is stirring because you
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: went from dissonance into harmony. So it's very cool you
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: can use dissonance in really interesting ways. But this is
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: why you need to know the rules of the thing
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: you're doing before you break in.
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: All right, So here he says that dissonance is potentially
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: a powerful element, but that it is meant to resolve
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: into a harmony. Well, I think that a major theme
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: in this game is the fact that grief itself is
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: a kind of dissonance that doesn't necessarily come together into
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: a harmony. Like grief itself, it's devastating, it takes and
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: well sometimes it doesn't give anything back. And I think
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: that that emptiness, I mean, it's very much the kind
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: of feeling that you get at the end of this
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: game that even if you pick a resolution to the
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: narrative that you think it's the better option, well there's
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: something missing out of both of those options. There's a
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: certain kind of emptiness that you know is never going
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: to be filled. And so the unharmonized dissonance that we
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: get in a lot of the pieces in this game, Well,
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: they're serving a very important purpose in creating the kind
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: of esthetic in demonstrating the reality of grief on a
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: deep psychological level. And so again I've been pretty repetitive
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: about this, even as Ben is pretty repetitive in his
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: criticisms of things aren't really going anywhere. Well, I've been
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: pretty consistent in my counter criticism that that is kind
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: of the point, and that you can't really know what
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: a thing is, including a piece of music, unless you
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: know what it is for what is it trying to do?
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: And at that point the level of criticism turns away
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: from these strict technical elements of what you think a
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: piece of music ought to do to now we're trying
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: to figure out does this music accomplish the aims that
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: sets out to accomplish, and then are those aims worth accomplishing?
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: I think those are really the fundamental questions. And I'll
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: provide a fuller review of Clare Obscure at some point,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: but for a general statement as part of this particular video,
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: I'm going to say that I think that it's accomplishing
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: something meaningful. Yeah, I've got my criticisms regarding exactly what
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: the game does with these themes, but generally speaking, I
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: think that it's doing something very important. I think that
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: the music does an excellent job of serving that end.
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: So there it is, Ben Shapiro destroyed with facts and logic.
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: Make sure that you are sub to my channel and
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: the Mythic Mind Games podcast for more on Claar Obscure
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: at some point in the near future. Until next time, godspeed.
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: Walker, Do sleep.
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: Mh.