Sliding to Victory! – Music Monday – August 17, 2026

Do you have a song that just ramps your energy up? I have a handful of songs that I’ll listen to when I need a bit of a perk up and some of the best ones are video game music.

I was recently asked to be in a Mario 64 Versus Royale, which was a 16 person race for Super Mario 64. It had eleven rounds and each round was a ten star benchmark with a specific star to end on, making it one of the most interesting races I’ve ever been a part of, even if I was eliminated in round 3!

If you’d like to see the VOD of the race, check it out below:

While I was playing in the race, adrenaline was high, and I was thinking about some of the songs and how one specific song just makes me want to race. That song is Slider from Super Mario 64:

There’s a good chance you know this song already if you’ve played any Mario game post-Mario 64. It’s used A LOT in the franchise even all the way up to games on the Nintendo Switch.

I think the mix of the whistle and banjo(?) and the fast harmonica just working together just gets the blood pumping! The melody in this song is also one that could be considered an earworm. I constantly whistle or hum this song when I’m not thinking. Granted, I’ve heard this song since 1996, as it was one of my first games that I received on my Nintendo 64. It helps that the melody is a variation of the main theme in the game as well, and you can hear the melody in Bob-Omb Battlefield, Whomp’s Fortress, Cool Cool Mountain, the Cap Stages, Tick Tock Clock, Rainbow Ride, etc on top. Only a few of these are the slider tracks too.

One of my favorite covers/variations of the track comes to the (you guessed it) orchestrated versions of the song. Super Smash Bros. Melee (I barely played the game, but I loved some of the tracks from the game)

I also found this really nifty video on YouTube that takes many variations of the song and mashes it into one video simultaneously. It’s a testament to how the track itself hasn’t changed a ton in the 30 years since its introduction:

Now I want to go slide down a very long slide (preferably not a carpet one…that would burn) and listen to this song on loop. Do you have a favorite variation on the Slider Theme? Let me know in the comments or let’s talk about it on Discord!