*NO* Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 'Ko Ume Yourself'

[Liontamer]

Link:

ReMixer Names: ZorlaxSeven; Uboichi2
Real name: Zorlaxseven - SEstrada; (I don't know much about Uboichi2)
Email: dovieandie@hotmail.com (for Zorlaxseven
Website: N/A
UserId: ZorlaxSeven: 24554 Uboichi2: 10339

Name of Game: Legend of Zelda, Ocarina of Time
Name of ReMixed Song: The Twinrova Theme
Additional Info: N/A
Comments:

I should have a lot to say about this song. I don't know exactly WHAT to say though. I will start by saying that I am ZorlaxSeven. Uboichi2 helped me a long, and pretty much made this song possible; however, he isn't the one that's "talking" to you. The name of this song is Flamma atque Glacies, which means Fire and Ice in Latin. (I don't know how the tagging of the songs works anymore. I remember a year ago or so, you had this whole page about the tags, but I couldn't find it anymore. I just submitted the song as it is, I hope it doesn't "disqulify" me from being judged, and I hope that it doesn't make you all hate me for not doing it.)

This song was a work of love for me. I always wanted to be a part of the OCR community, but I never knew what song I wanted to do. I do know that I'll always want to do orchestral work though. I heard this song and I fell in love; it had such opportunity to be made into what I turned it into. It just fell into place for me, so to speak. So I wrote it out, and converted it to Midi. From there I TRIED to make it sound good with my freeware nonsense that I had on my computer. I showed it to the forums, and they were really nice to me about the composition. They all agreed that I couldn't master a song to save my life. I got lots of help on these forums (many nice people are about on them), and then Uboichi2 came in and did the song for me. I thank him a lot for his work and efforts. This email (rejected or no) couldn't have happened without him. Thank you so much for listening to my song and my little rant. I hope you enjoy listening to the song as much as I do (vanity), and as much as I enjoyed making it.

Much Love,
SEstrada

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http://www.zophar.net/download_file/12209 - 71 "Kotake & Koume's Theme"

Pretty solid samples. The opening bow movements in the first 4 seconds seemed exposed as unrealistically jumpy, but maybe it's just me. I recognize Shnabubula using those woodwinds on many occasions.

The original intro was pretty lengthy at 53 seconds. The call-and-answer high and low strings starting at :55 used a different 4-note pattern than the original, but used the same rhythm, so I think that works as valid interpretation. Melody finally kicked in at 1:03.

The track was 3:53 long, so I needed 1:56.5 of source usage for the pass. It sounded fine, but the source was complex and difficult to commit to memory, so I needed a breakdown to be sure. I'll name sections from the original and give an A-to-B connection on the usage:

A - :04-:12, long-bowed string pattern
B - :12-:21, verse & short-bowed string pattern
C - :21-:30, first part of chorus (w/long-bowed string pattern)
D - :30-:47, second part of chorus (w/short-bowed string pattern)

*1:03.5-1:07, 1:08-1:11, 1:12-1:15 & 1:17-1:20 (all B with original flourishes added), and 1:30-1:34 & 1:39-1:44 (C, liberal); all backed by the plucked string pattern from :55-1:48 (B)
*1:48-2:06, the low strings here used the rhythm of the long-bowed strings of the source; different notes, but fairly similar IMO. (A)
*2:01.5-2:10 (B), 2:13-2:28 (D), 2:30-2:39 (B & D), 2:39-2:56 (B), 2:58-3:04 (A), 3:22-3:34 (B)

That adds up to 138.5 seconds and that's pretty reasonable. There were some other areas where rhythms from the original were used, but the writing was too dissimilar melodically, so I didn't count it. Nonetheless, I think the breakdown was pretty fair while not gladhanding credit.

There were a couple moments where the high end got too loud and piercing (1:05-1:06, 3:31), but things were good otherwise. Let's try to get that touched up before posting it, but otherwise a strong, creative effort. Honestly, I'd never really heard this source tune before today, so I gotta say, props for tackling a theme from Ocarina of Time that gets no love. Very enjoyable, unique arrangement ideas by Zorlax, brought more to life by Uub. They clearly made for a strong tandem.

YES

[anosou]

DAMNIT!, bitch stole my source :'(
I've been thinking about remixing this for ages... expect serious bias!

h8 aside, this is quite interesting. A good arrangement to be sure and I, being familiar with the source, felt it was dominant. Very nice melodic interpretation all around, you impressed me there Zorlax. Snorlax? Ok, sorry.

I thought the samples were sometimes borderline fugly. Especially the strings sounded very dry and unrealistic, especially the introduction. Woodwinds a bit better but still fairly dry. Some nice hall reverb at the master could've helped a bit. When it gets going with the pizzicato and the oboe you realize how piercing some frequencies are. Should be toned down before posting no doubt. Also, panning the bass ALL the way to the right is probably a bad idea for this genre, feels like the piece loses focus. I'd love that to be fixed too. Otherwise, this is a damn good job with free stuff for sure.

Overall I thought the arrangement outweighed the sample quality. It's a tough decision because the strings just sounds really bad at times. If you go the extra mile and fix the piercing frequencies and don't hard-pan the bass I think that would give this the final push needed to get over that bar. So, without further stalling:

YES(conditional on touch-ups)

[Palpable]

Nice arrangement, man. Apart from the long intro and the short outro, it seemed like it all drew from the original, sometimes liberally, sometimes not so much. The key changes were pulled off very skillfully. You have quite the knack for partwriting.

I wish the production had been on the same level. The articulations and to some extent sample quality were not as strong as the usual orchestral song we pass. The intro sounds fake, especially the first few notes, which sound as if a string sample is being triggered several times by a DJ. Higher-pitched strings also sounded off at times. Part of the problem is that the samples are so exposed. Some more hall reverb would definitely help, like AnSo suggested; I want to see the instruments pushed back a little. The remix gets stronger once the plucked strings comes in at 0:53. At that point, it gelled a little better and the realism wasn't so much an issue.

It's definitely close, thanks to a strong arrangement, but I feel it's too short on the production side to really make up for it. If you can touch up the issues with this, I would pass this. And it might pass without my yes anyway - good luck!

NO (resubmit)

[Vig]

I'm not going to hold the samples against this tune.

I think the introduction is captivating, if somewhat..sparse. the body of the tune, starting at 1:00 or so i find less interesting. You've got the oboe and violin parts, which are both very busy, somewhat contrapuntal, but from that perspective, poorly written. There's a lot of linear overlap i.e. parallelism. To be honest, the writing doesn't sound very well-planned.

on the whole I find the arrangement to be somewhat divergent and spastic. I'm going to have to go

NO

[Fishy]

Introduction was very shoddy, but once more instruments had joined in things started to sound better. lol, I really wasn't expecting 0:53 at all. Some very nice string runs in this, but the sustained notes are pretty unbelievable. Everything sounds pretty dry. It also gets quite dissonant at times, not necessarily a bad thing :3. Sounded like it had ended at 2:55 and then this bizarre bass comes in. The subsequent key changes are handled quite well, and then the actual ending is okay. I don't think I have any major arrangement annoyances, its quite brave, but there is some thought even if the harmony is not uh... particularly classical in its execution.

To be honest though, the production is poor, and when you have dry scratchy samples like these you need to work them for realism. Also the bass instruments just sound like pitch shifted violins, which is never good. Lots of rework needed with respect to velocities and lengths, on the intro especially. I would like to hear a new version of this.

NO Resub plz

[DarkeSword]

Gotta agree with Vig's points. Things get a little messy with the overlap with the violin and oboe.

Add to that some obnoxious clipping in the oboe something like twice in the song, and it's a no go.

I'd work more on humanization in your sequencing too. Think about velocities and how each individual note would be played by the musician; successive notes are rarely played at the same exact velocity. Downbeats (or upbeats, depending on the style) will be emphasized.

NO, resub

[CHz]

Interesting take on the source, I kind of dig it. The writing worked really well sometimes and other times not quite so much, so it seems kind of random overall. The intro and ending are good, but it's the middle where things occasionally get unfocused.

Production I think is a bigger problem. Dryness has been mentioned repeatedly, and there's a lot that could be done for more realism. The parts were the samples are exposed, the beginning and 2:58, sound especially bad. Humanization would go a long way, a lot of the runs are pretty stiff.

Some very cool arrangement ideas, but they're not good enough to make up for the production.

NO (resubmit)