Kirby's Gourmet Race Remixes

About

Kirby’s Gourmet Race Remixes (Japanese : グルメレース) refers to a style of MAD videos that utilize the audio track from the Gourmet Race mini-game included in Nintendo’s 1996 game Kirby Super Star.^[1] The theme has been widely used as a popular source material for various remixes on YTMND on the English-speaking web, as well on the Japanese video sharing service Nico Nico Douga (NND).

Origin

This song was written by Japanese composer Jun Ishikawa for Kirby Super Star and later featured in a second game in the series, _ Kirby Super Star Ultra_ as well as in the Super Smash Bros. series. One of the earliest mashups^[2] paired the Gourmet Race theme with rapper Snoop Dogg’s 2004 hit rap single ““Drop It Like it’s Hot,” which was uploaded by YTMND user Barf on September 24th, 2006. Another YTMND site^[3] with a more intricate graphic was created by the same author on October 11th, 2006. A month later, the second version was re-uploaded to YouTube, where it earned more than 2.7 million views in just under six years. This instance also went on to inspire a series of YouTubePoop remixes combining video game footage and rap songs by Snoop Dogg.

Spread

The Gourmet Race theme was first used on Nico Nico Douga on November 30th, 2007, in a video titled “Masami Hisamoto seems to have exploded her head.”^[4] This video was the catalyst for another MAD series, Hissu Amoto San / Airmoto.

Over the next several months, the Gourmet Race theme was incorporated into mashups with other NND fads, before it began appearing in YTPMVs made outside of Japan in 2008. In September of that year, a template video was uploaded to YouTube for people to easily make mashups of their own. Other notable remixes have been featured on Go Nintendo^[12], Overclocked Remix forums^[13] and Unreality Magazine.^[14]

Wazukana Jikan wo Mitsukete

On Nico Nico Douga, many Gourmet Race remixes use the snowclone “Wazukana Jikan wo Mitsukete Y Suru X San” (X doing Y whenever he/she finds a short amount time) in the middle of the video. This is a homage to the line “Wazukana Jikan wo Mitsukete My Revolution Suru Hisamoto San” featured in the original Hissu Amoto San remix. MAD editors challenge themselves to reproduce this line using only the audio resources from the source they are using in the mashup. In the Falcon Punch themed remix below, the line heard is “Wazukana Jikan wo Mitsukete PK Fire Suru Kirby San."

Notable Examples

As of May 2012, there are 4310 results for Gourmet Race on YouTube^[7] and 2293 results on Nico Nico Douga.^[6]Videos also are shared on Tumblr^[11] with the tag “Gourmet Race.”