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Die

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  1. I like the acoustic guitar style. About the name, are you trying to translate "Mr Robotnik" to Spanish? If so, then it'd be hard to know the exact translation, since Robotnik is a made-up name. "El Señor Robotnik" would be accurate, since it doesn't change the name. Though you could also say "El Señor Robótico", and that would mean "Mr. Robotic".
  2. Thanks ! I'm glad you enjoyed it. I'll redo the piano this Tuesday with another VST. Maybe I'll even play again some parts. I'll follow all the other recommendations too and see if I can polish it more.
  3. Thanks for your reply. I'll try to bring the hi-hats down if they are at an annoying level, but not too much, because the track would lose its personality. The hi-hats med-swing rhythm is an integral part of any jazz track. I'll try to level it properly. About the mechanical sequencing, it's hard to do it more real. I actually played almost all of this in a MIDI Controller. Maybe I could change the VST for the piano and see if it helps. I'm using TruePianos right now. I'll try with Colossus Bright Piano or some other good VST. I also noticed that lack in dynamics, but didn't know exactly how to get around with it. Maybe I could take the levels a bit down after the first take on the source ends (around 1:50), especially managing the drums' level. I'll see what I can do and post an update.
  4. Thanks for your reply. Glad you liked it. I believe you are talking about the hi-hats, especially the open hi-hats. I had the same impression when listening to the mastered track after the final EQ, to be honest. Too many highs. At first, it was too loud on the lower frequencies, but looks like now it's gone the other way. I could take some db from its higher frequencies to remove the hissing. I EQed it that way because it's important in the genre's rhythm, but maybe I overdid it
  5. All right. I decided to post another remix. This time I spent hours leveling, EQ'ing, managing effects, etc., trying to make the mix sound cleaner and better. I'm not sure if I did a good job, but I'm quite pleased with how the mix sounds right now. In any case, I have the project with all the original audio files, so I can re-tweak it anytime. There was virtually no mastering after the mixing process, since I don't have any knowledge on how to use a multiband compressor or any other plugin related to mastering. All I did after the mixdown, was to use a Stereo Expander, a Loudness Maximizer and a Limiter. I'd like to receive feedback and if there's any correction to be made, please let me know. NOTE: I don't like how the song sounds on SoundCloud (don't know why), so I added a link to download the original file. Original song: Remix: http://soundcloud.com/diego-vizia/the-tiger-n-the-swing Downloadable File: https://rapidshare.com/files/211034120/The_Tiger_n__the_Swing.mp3
  6. Hi, thanks for your reply Now about the remix... The beginning of the song tries to do exactly what you said, it's a church organ heavy chord followed by a drum fill-in with a lot of reverb, very similar to what you hear in Abandoned Castle from Castlevania: Curse of Darkness. About the conservative take on the source... if you pay attention, you'll notice that it's not that conservative. The melody is preserved, yes, but the chords and arrangements are not. The original source uses only one chord (Am) in the first part, and then Dm, back to Am, and finally the dominant. I used two chords alternately in the first part (Am and E7), then before going to grade iv, I used V/iv briefly, which the original source doesn't. Then I used, Dm, Bm7(b5), E7, and back to the first part. In that final part, instead of just using Am and E7, I did Am - E7/G# - C/G - E7 - F - E7 - Am. After that, the solo takes place. And about the sounds, maybe the mix is not good, but I don't think the sound quality is bad. The drums are from Addictive Drums, the harpsichord from EWQL Colossus, the bass from Spectrasonics Trilogy and the strings from EWQL Symphonic Orchestra. They are all excellent VST's. Maybe the bad sound mixing and lack of audio processing makes them sound messy. And about the mixing... I sequenced it in SONAR, and then all I did was export the whole mix to Audio, without any further post-processing. If you could give me a few tips on how to get a better sound from the MIDI, I'll be grateful, because I don't have any knowledge on the matter. I'd like to know what filters/effects can be used to get a better sound, if there's any specific plugin to use, which software is best, what steps to follow, etc..
  7. Key modulation = cliche? That's ridiculous. Key modulation is an essential musical resource since the days of baroque music. It's up to the composer whether to use it or not, but it's definitely not cliche. If you want to modulate from D to E (assuming you're talking minor), you could do many things. One could be Asus4 - A7 - Bsus4 - B7 and use B7 as the dominant of the new key. Or you could also do Gm - F - Eb - Dsus4 - Dsus4/C - B7, and again, use B7 as the dominant, etc.. Try and see what you like.
  8. Well, it's all about the the arrangements, the rhythm, the chords, etc.. For example, something sounds jazzy when the chords have jazz extensions, like a dominant with an augmented 5th and an augmented 9th, the rhythm is "jazzy", for example med-swing, the bass does jazzy arrangements (i.e. playing with the chord notes along with its extensions), etc.. If you want your song to have a particular "feel" to it, you can listen to some songs from the genre you want to compose in, and pay attention to the harmony and the arrangements, particularly the drums and the bass. Identify the chord progressions, that's essential. Also identify the chords extensions, especially if you want to compose jazz. If you want something baroque, learn about secondary dominants, circle of fifths, baroque bass arrangements, etc..
  9. Don't worry. Play songs by ear and you'll train your ear. And about music theory, you can find lots of useful information just by googling. You could look for... 1) The notes 2) Scales 3) Intervals 4) Chords (along with its inversions, extensions, etc.) 5) Harmony / Chord Progressions Those are the basic things that you'll want to know. Then comes arrangements, rhythm, etc., but with those, you'll do just fine. http://www.musictheory.net is a good resource, and it's easy to use.
  10. Ahhhh, sorry, I misunderstood what you said about GM. Well, you could try with some presets like the one I mentioned, and start tweaking them to see what you get. Or you can start from scratch and play with the oscillators to try to get to it, which is much harder... I think it's easier to tweak a little some presets. Most likely you won't get the exact same sound, but it'll be a pretty close one I guess. Omnisphere is a good place to look for synth sounds.
  11. Hmmmm... They could very well be using General MIDI sounds. General MIDI is not a synonim for low quality. General MIDI is a specification, not a sound module. That means it establishes rules to follow, like controller 1 = Modulation, 7 = Volume, 10 = Pan, etc.. It also sets the numbers for each instrument, like 1 = Grand Piano, 2 = Bright Piano, ..., 41 = Violin, 49 = Strings Ensemble, ..., 89 = Fantasia, 101 = Brightness. Any keyboard that complies with the specification MUST use those very same instrument numbers, so that any program/VST designed to function with General MIDI works as expected. It's up to the keyboard manufacturer to decide which sounds to include in the General MIDI Bank, whether low quality or high quality. As a side note, EWQL Colossus, one of the most acclaimed VST's out there, has a General MIDI bank to use with GM-compatible keyboards/controllers, and it has incredible sounds. For example, GM1 (Grand Piano) is a 2GB instrument sampled from a real high-quality grand piano. Oh, and if you have a MIDI controller running Ableton Live, you can try Sonik Synth or Dimension Pro. They both have a ton of synth sounds to try. I'm pretty sure you can find something that sounds like that in them.
  12. You can try with whatever keyboard you have right now. Try those two sounds and see if they sound any similar. Additionally, you can use a synth software, like SONAR, Cubase or FL Studio, download some VST's, like Cakewalk TTS, Dimension or Sonik Synth, and try those sounds there.
  13. I'm not referencing any keyboard. Fantasia and Brightness are sounds from the General MIDI specification, so they're virtually in every synth on the planet. And layering is stacking synths on top of each other to get more than one sound at the same time.
  14. Sounds like brightness to me. Though it also has some Fantasia in it. The sounds changes from keyboard to keyboard, so you can't get the exact same sound, unless you have the same sound module, that is. You could try a dual instrument (layering) with Fantasia and Brightness and see what you get.
  15. This is the Captain Silver theme remix. I've already posted it, but when I did, I didn't know about the Mod Review option, and it wouldn't let me change the prefix from Finished to Mod Review, so I'm posting it again for feedback. Sorry for the double post... Here's the link --> PS: The original track is included in that video.
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