Over The Hills is a digital experience based on music, design, 3D and creative programming.

An Innovative Album Preview

Over The Hills is the website designed to showcase the album Over The Hills by the Dead Pirates. Although the album is also available for streaming via bandcamp (and embedded in the lower right hand corner), the site offers a unique way to play around with an intriguingly-designed site while previewing the music. The site was designed with 3D shapes and navigable via the mouse, an experience similar to playing a video game. The interactivity is more limited than a game, but still cool. You begin by dropping a virtual needle onto a virtual record player and cranking the handle.

Find the Hidden Keyboard

As the Dead Pirates song plays, Over The Hills gives you freedom to explore the “room” in which the record player is sitting. As you rotate your position throughout the room, the sound changes to mimic how things would sound based on your location relative to the speaker. There’s also the ability to “scratch” the record player in real time, as well as the option to play along with the song via a “hidden” keyboard. That keyboard offers the most fun aspect of the experience because it shoots out various shapes every time you hit a key (and because each of the keys you press is a note that works with the melody of the track). The experience playing around on Over The Hills was definitely entertaining for the fairly short runtime of the song, and it also succeeded in making me somewhat of a Dead Pirates fan.