OCR01659 - *YES* Marathon & Halo 'The Forerunner Mix (Alpha)'

[Liontamer]

Double submission; typically not allowed, but I'll let this one ride on due to the obscurity of the source material - LT

Hi,
a couple of weeks ago I made a couple of tracks celebrating the music of marathon and halo, basically taking themes from both and orchestrating them together. They are currently up at halo.bungie.org:

But I can email them to you if you want.

The first track uses the theme "Leela" from marathon and mixes it with various motifs and rhythms from the halo soundtrack, mostly from the theme 'Covenant Dance'. The second is based on "Chomber" from Marathon and "Under Cover of Night" from Halo.
No samples from the originals were used.
I'm not good with names so I've just been calling them Marathon Mix 1&2..pretty lame I know.
anyway let me know if there's anything else I can tell you

By the way I'm a composer from London Uk working freelance for film/TV and trying to break into the game industry, more info on my website if you're interested.

thanks for your time

Nick Singer
http://www.nicholassinger.com

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Marathon - "Leela"
Halo Original Soundtrack - (14) "Covenant Dance"

Pretty subtle on the arrangement side. Basically takes the slow progression from Leela's melody (first used around :26 of "Leela") speeds it up and adds notes to help achieve the Halo style from "Covenant Dance". The stutter style intro of the arrangement is arranging a backing part from :33 of Leela (also at 1:00 of Leela) as well while having thematic similarities to "Covenant Dance" (e.g. :54 of that source).

The progression of the Leela melody was all over this arrangement starting at :08, transitioning into the bowed strings brought in at :22 handling that aspect on their own at :39. Switched over into some wholly original industrial type lead :54 while the strings were brought way down (but not out) and proceeded to fade back up all the way until the end of the section at 1:25. Nice work there.

1:25 then worked in the style of :54 of "Covenant Dance" with some vox-like pads to add to the emulation of Halo's feel. Pretty liberal, but uses a small phrase from C-Dance and worked with that 1/4th of the time until 1:55. The rest seemed original from there to close it out.

Wow. My intial impression was that it ended before it got started, but I wasn't appreciating the subtleties here. The development and dynamics clearly were there. Super-liberal approach on Leela via the bowed strings, but I thought it was a very viable one. May run into some disagreement there. Otherwise awesome stuff and by my conservative estimate (about 1:32's worth of overt source) just over the 50% source usage threshold that I look out for. Nice work on combining elements from these two Bungie cornerstones. Hope to hear more from you, Nick.

YES

[Liontamer]

Marathon source (http://judges.vgdj.net/mp3s/sources/Marathon%20-%20Leela.mp3)
Halo source (http://judges.vgdj.net/mp3s/sources/Halo%20-%20%2814%29_Covenant_Dance.mp3)

[Liontamer]

Hello
just wondering if there's anything I can do to help to speed up the judging process- I know I'm just one of many submissions in the waiting, I only ask because I have some time coming up and I was planning to either re-work the tracks I submitted, or work on some new tracks, so any advice would really help.
best regards
Nick Singer

I told him to hang tight and work on some new material. In the meantime, he has inquired within. Let's get moving on this.

[big giant circles]

I've not heard any other of Marathon's source tunes, aside from this one and Chomber, but from these two, I gather it must be fairly similar to Halo's.

As is the case with your other Marathon/Halo mix, I'm adequately impressed. Basically, without sounding too copy+paste, I'll just say that you've meshed two source tunes in a stylish manner, with clean execution and great listener appeal. I think this one should be enjoyed by many of our listeners.

This one seems to have a slightly more tenuous source connection to both sources, but a recognizable connection nonetheless. At 1:28, "Under the Cover of Night" becomes a little more apparant, with the adapted Leela riff fitting over-top of it seamlessly.

I really don't have much else to say. Hope to hear more out of you soon, Nick.

YES

[Palpable]

The incorporation of the two themes in this song was smart. The Leela progression was slightly extended and provided the backbone for the first half of the mix, and it seamlessly led into a phrase from "Covenant Dance". The intro had a few modified takes on this phrase which helped tie everything together thematically. The connection to the source was not always overt but it's definitely there for the first 1:56 of the song. The arrangement was also imaginative, using an atypical set of instruments. I loved the shift in rhythm emphasis at 0:39, which made the song sound more like a waltz.

Production was immaculate; this is a fantastic song on headphones. Instruments are crisp and clear, and there are countless details for those who listen closely, all woven in smoothly. Very nice work.

I was initially concerned about the short length of the song. Discounting the subtle fadeout, there is only about 2:10 of material here, and the build-up was slow. It also doesn't help that the climax basically ends the song - as a listener, I really don't want it to stop there. Does that mean the song needs more to it? In this case, I felt it didn't. Each section, even the intro, introduces enough new ideas that none of that time is wasted. This is close to the borderline of length of arrangement though.

YES

[zyko]

oh ok

marathon music is, indeed, very similar to halo music and you definetly got the style down. this is an engaging piece through out... almost in a subtle, exploratory way. the violins are key to this as i think they bring on the sensation of movement. i'm impressed with your ability to seamlessly bridge one source into the other. excellent.

i hear something that a lot of people will enjoy to hear.

YES