OCR00191 - Xenogears 'Broken Mirror Reflection'

[m68030]

Xenogears 'Broken Mirror Reflection'

Wow. This one just blew me away. It's beautiful. The gapped vocals and
sweeping cold pads mix with the throbbing bass line perfectly. The
piano support under her voice just makes this a solid solid mix that I
will sing along with (very poorly) any day. Excellent work on this one.

[orkybash]

This is quite possibly my favorite remix on this site. You ought to be ashamed of yourself for reading this if you haven't hit download yet.

[Ice Blue]

I'm no music expert. I wish I could do what these guys do. Small Two of Pieces is probably my favorite video game song ever. This is the best ReMiX on the site, hands down.

[tobmaps]

eat your heart out celine dion. now This is the ultimate love(/dance) song. excellent midbreak

[TheWired]

Alexander Prievert blows OCR with a beautifull remix of an originally amazing track, it was a risky leap of faith , but this song has gotten one o the best sounds hitting OCR in a while. This is comparable to some of the best stuff here.

Lets start with the utter basics : the beautifully played piano goes well along with the song, with the remixed vocals at a .1 second cut, and some fade-out and block filters on top of it, the voice sounds just perfect as it did on the orignal mix.

A good outro throbbing bassline near the end, this mix takes all the essential elements of the song, adds some extra talent to it screams out "artistic values!"

Alexander Prievert's Broken mirror is a must-have to all OCR fans.

[Sephka]

Jeez. When I read djpretzel's review I thought I'd be getting a good remix. I was totally wrong! It's not good at all; it's great! It's one of the best remixes I've heard from this site (And that's saying something). The vocalization is superb, not to mention the song itself! Absolute perfection! Beautiful! I'll be listening to this one for a while too.

Damn. I never thought I'd hear something like this! I give it 11 out of 10!

[Ice Blue]

Jeez. When I read djpretzel's review I thought I'd be getting a good remix. I was totally wrong! It's not good at all; it's great! It's one of the best remixes I've heard from this site (And that's saying something). The vocalization is superb, not to mention the song itself! Absolute perfection! Beautiful! I'll be listening to this one for a while too.

Damn. I never thought I'd hear something like this! I give it 11 out of 10!

By vocalization, I assume you mean he created the voice sample. Actually that was originally in the song.

I love the song... more than the original, I think. But you have to give some credit to the original singer. Joanne Hogg... or something like that.

[esden9]

This song is so good and cheesy. At first I didn't like it because it was so vocal. But then I listened to it a bunch more times (on my playlist) and it just grew on me. The timing is great. The builds are subtle yet incredibly effective, I love the pause after the intro at 1:22 and subsequent build. The synth goes along perfectly with the vocals after this. The ending is awesome, with the delay on the vocals being absolutely scrumptious.

[PerLichtman]

As a change of pace, we have an actual remix as opposed to arrangement/cover to discuss today. Now a lot of you are probably thinking: "How good could it be? The remixer didn't have access to the original isolated tracks or samples?" That's a valid concern that is best addressed in the following manner: Prievert has so masterfully blended together together the original instrumentation with new and carefully chosen synths, filtering, gating and eq-ing in an extremely artistic and effective manner. This remix is arguably much better than the arranged original and differs significantly enough to be played directly on a playlist without complaints. It has the qualities shared by my favorite mixes: it's emotionally powerful, skillfully mixed, artisticly enticing and has an epic or timeless quality. A worthy addition to any listner's library and another entry in Per Lichtman's growing list of Must Listen picks.

5 Stars

Per's OCR Star System:
5-One of my favorites.
4- I'll listen to it a fair amount but it lacks that extra "something" to be great.
3- Above average but not enough so to get much playtime in my list.
2- Average
1- Lacking

[Jugulator]

I agree with you guys, this is definitely the best remix I`ve downloaded from this site! It`s perfect, nothing more to say really :wink:

[Figo]

I just love the original song but definetl the remix is superior!! the best one here!!

[Gee-chan]

This is definitely a great song! It's one of my all time favorites. It's beautiful and the music/pace blends perfectly with the singer. :) It actually made me go and listen to the original song and while that song is nice, this one is better, in my opinion. Very lovely.

[Zerrus McGaelic]

The first thing tha hits me as I listen to this great peice of music is the voice. The generation used is near, of not perfect. This twist and turn of a already great song from a good game is phononimal. The tune flows perfectly as the voice tips it off like a kinife through butter. Over all, (since I write semi long game reviews on my gaming board, ill make my music reviews short) this tune is a must listen to and must burn. This tip top tune ills the ears of punk rockers to classical listeners with joy and victory. If you have to download one song then this is it.

Chaos's Review: 10/10

[ZidaRose]

The piano, the vocalization ... I am blown away and my spelling is going down the crapper, speachless isn't spelled like that. The slight work on the voice along with ALL the other music just goes to make one awesome mix. The piano is there just enough to be heard and have the effect I feel normally only when I'M playing the thing. Beautiful is the best word I have to describe this track. Damn, gives rivally if not blowing the other beloved tracks out of the water in this area. This is the OPENING TRACK for the next CD I make! Wow ...
Ok, look, if you haven't DLed this track and you like sweet, new age classical (at least that's how I'd describe this), WTF are you waiting for!?! GET IT!!!!

A first time for everything ... that's all I gotta say

Zidarose

Edit: Does anyone know where I could get the lyrics to the song?
Edit 2: Xenogears ... must resist urge to buy game... will power fading ...

[Bagel Fuzzynuts]

Wow, this mix was amazing! Are there any other mixes on this site that have vocals like that? *request*

Not a whole lot of remixes on this site have vocals, but this one blew me away and I'm hoping for another taste!

[VampHunterD]

seeing so much good reviews makes me wanna listen to this thing except theres a problem i get this error after downloading *No combination of filters could be found to render the stream* sucks huh.

[GrayLightning]

Very, very nice. This has definitely stood up to the test of time. Everything else everyone has said is true. On the other hand I think, this is very much dependent on the excellent source material (Joanne Hogg's voice from the xenogears soundtrack). Anything with her voice is bound to be good. I still prefer the original much more, but this is still a very high quality mix. Excellent work given the difficult source material.

[Kylin Rouge]

This remix isn't anything that special, I don't know what you guys are talking about. I mean, when I hear a remix, I expect to hear something that totally changes the original song and makes it something amazing. Example: The 5 second Gato song was turned into a 5 minute song.

Here we have an already great song being edited around. If the original was better, then how is this deemed so great?

It's still good, because it must've taken the creator some effort to make the slight changes to the song, but I still say this isn't so noteworthy of praise as other songs that completely revamp SNES themes.

[elman]

11/10 AWESOME!!!

There's a funny story behind how I first attained your remix. I was searching on Kazaa one day for the original, and found yours. Looking at the "Artist" section I said, "So Alex Prievert is her name, huh? She's a pretty good singer!" After playing it I realised this wasn't the one in Xenogears. "Hmmm... this must be the original. Why would they remix it? They should have had THIS one in the game!"

Four months later I find out the real artist's name in Joanne Hogg and your version was the remix.

Long story short, I thought your remix was FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRR better than the orignal.

[XRanger]

nm, I got it now.

Great remix

[ffmusic dj]

this is such a bad peice ... but back then .. OMG ... this was the SHIZA! this situation is kinda like when Mario 64 came out, it rocked, but now it sux, what horrible graphic's! but let me tell you, it wasnt the graphic's that made Mario 64 what it is, it was just the feel of the game, the fun factor! and this song is in exactly the same situation! am amazing song! composed in such a beautiful way! man was this inspirational! I LOVED this song back then. now I look back and say .. wow did I really like this song?! and I answered my self by saying ... yes .... yes man yes!

[Isk]

Bumpin, the way electronica should be. I actually started liking the original more after hearing this remix. Great variation of beats, synths, and muted/obscured vocals. The girls who hear this really like it. =P

[Chibi-Bob]

Oh.

My.

God.

Can you say orgasmic? I only began playing Xenogears last night, so I decided to nab me some remixes. I saw this one and was like, "Pretty title, maybe I'll download it." Thank the gods I did. I am in pure bliss.

[Phoenixero]

Oh my god, this song is so beautiful! Hands down this is my favorite of everything on the site. I haven't even beat Xenogears completely yet, I'm leveling up before the final boss, so I hope this awesome remix doesn't spoil the ending song for me ^^' But wow this is truely an amazing piece of work. I'd have to say that I loved it more than Jeremy Soule's Terra ReMix. It's just so epic sounding, I can't believe it's not professional. Wow. Beautiful job, Alexander!!!!!!

[Night10194]

Great song. Truly great song.

[BlueEnvy]

I havent heard the original so I cant really judge it on how well it interprets the original. When I first heard this song, I didnt like how the lyrics were cut up in the first half. After a few more listens, I came to the conclusion that it worked well, and now I think it sounds very nice. The piano nicely complements everything, and the synth work is good...One part that doesnt seem to work is the tempo change, there isnt a good transition into it, since it kinda flattens out, and starts again in the new tempo. Otherwise, the rest of this song is great. I really like the ending, it has a wonderful sweeping feel on a beatiful chord. Too bad there arent any more mixes with similar style to this one (atleast I havent encountered any)

~Blue

[buliwyf]

If only her voice wasn't all broken up. this would be beautiful. I'd buy it if i could but as it is, it's still nice but i can't get over the broken vocals spoiling it :(

[NeoLutherus]

All in all, I think it's worth listening to, but the broken voice, especially in the beginning, really brought it down for me. I was struggling to hear the words and I'd have like to know what they were. :whatevaa:

[Mog]

At first that was one of my chief complaints about this song, but after listening to it a few times, I think it definitely adds something different. I've listened to 7 years broken for quite a while before I stumbled upon this one, so this had a lot to live up to. Still, give it a few more listens, you might end up liking it ^_^

[BobTheDog]

Wow. I don't usually listen to Remixes with vocals, but this one is just so... interesting. And DANG it's cool.

I haven't heard the original, but this ROCKS.

[Lumya]

OMG!!! this makes a beautiful song even more beautiful. The vocals are great, (a little "broken", but it's ok)I love the lyrics of the song and the beat is amazing, get this song NOW!!! :lol:

[BlueDisguise]

This is the song that got me hooked on OC Remix about 2 years ago. And in turn all of my friends. And then made me play xenogears and xenosaga again.

[Lumya]

This song basicly describes what I like in a song. Beautiful lyrics, an amazing vocal and a soothing melody. It just blew me away ^_^

[d3vil.vu]

My god... nothing like a fine piece of art to go with an fine game. This song just brings tears to my eyes and reminds me of the first time i beat xenogears and heard Small of Two Pieces...*tear*

keep up the good work!

[Moganium]

Actually, the gaps give me a headache while listening to it. It would have been much better without those and thus giving the entire piece a smoother flow.

[DragonFireKai]

Epic, Just Epic. Every aspect of the song screams it. It's like the Lord of the Rings, you may not like it, but you have to admit its greatness. I love the way the vocals weave through the song, and the Melody is excellent.

[rapa-nui]

Bump. For those that don't yet know it, this is probably one of the top 5 mixes on the site. Download now if you have not done so.

[Sefy]

Very Nice. And beatiful!! Can someone post the lyrics, please??

[Aamean]

Lyrics below, as requested.
I've had this song for a very long time (Xenogears being one of the first games I started downloading music for) and still love it to this day. Just a beautiful song overall, a must download.

Small Two of Pieces

Run through the cold of the night
As passion burns in your heart
Ready to fight, a knife held close by your side
Like a proud wolf alone in the dark
With eyes that watch the world
And my name like a shadow on the face of the moon

Broken mirror, a million shades of light
The old echo fades away
But just you and I
Can find the answer. And then,
We can run to the end of the world
We can run to the end of the world

Cold fire clenched to my heart
In the blue of night
Torn by this pain, I paint your name in sound
And the girl of the dawn
With eyes of blue, and angel wings
The songs of the season are her only crown

Broken mirror, a million shades of light
The old echo fades away
But just you and I
Can find the answer. And then,
We can run to the end of the world
We can run to the end of the world

We met in the mist of morning
And parted deep in the night
Broken sword and shield, and tears that never fall
But run through the heart
Washed away by the darkest water
The world is peaceful and still

Broken mirror, a million shades of light
The old echo fades away
But just you and I
Can find the answer. And then,
We can run to the end of the world
We can run to the end of the world
Run to the end of the world...

[Jediknightjace]

This song would be truly AWESOME if it didn't sound like she was singing it in an airplane going through major turbulence(not to dis the song, sounds like a heck of a lot of work went into it). Crying shame, though. :cry:

[DarkTelepath]

This song would be truly AWESOME if it didn't sound like she was singing it in an airplane going through major turbulence(not to dis the song, sounds like a heck of a lot of work went into it). Crying shame, though. :cry:

Yeah... I felt the same way, I thought it was horrible how garbled the voice sounded, but then it kinda grew on me. I don't even notice it anymore and it actually starts sounding pretty good. Give it a chance to win you over.

[Crepti]

I'd just like to say that I love the way this song is executed. My late best friend loved the original song, and she sung it all of the time, so Small Two Of Pieces is a rather emotional and important piece for me - And I think you remixed it wonderfully.

Well done :)

[lady zelda]

I completely agree ^. Small Two of Pieces is a truly beautiful song, my favorite (drastic understatement), and I can't stop singing it myself either. So this remix is awesome cuz it adds a different touch of that same beauty to the song. What else can I say? You've made a masterpiece, Alexander.

[F'lar]

This remix has to be the most beautiful song I have ever heard. So good in fact, that this remix made me go and BUY a ps1 and the game, just to hear the original as well, which I'm glad I did. This remix is, as I sai, the most beautiful thing to ever grace my ears. Download it immediately, you will not be dissapointed. Wow. Alexander Prievert outdid himself this time, nothing more to say about this masterpiece, but if I one complaint about it, it's the fact that it only has the first verse and the chorus. Other than that, musical perfection.

[your the man now dog]

****. ****. ****. This song makes me so happy. What a great remix. Remixes with vocals almost always win.

[Dr.d]

My friend introduced me to this song since it is his favorite song from the site. I agree that this song with vocals is a win. Great job

[Duo]

How can this song be gripping, emotional, and epic all at the same time? This really is a perfect piece to me. I love everything about the way it sounds, the way it's sang...I've played Xenogears through before twice, and now I feel the need to buy the OST just to hear more of this, though none of it will match such greatness. I especially love the buildup at 1:32 until 2:05, as well as the lyrical part that follows. Ugh, how can I pick a part that I like best?

[Indigo]

When I listen to this song I get the mental image of a soft, dark path with a shower of glass shards (nevermind, let's say gems since they're less sharp and cut-y) raining down, catching the light of some unseen light source and refracting it into the colors of the rainbow.

I did not take LSD while listening to the song. It just rocks.

Sadly I've never played Xenogears all the way through.

[WillRock]

This one has a strong following, and its not hard to see why.

I love this, its awesome :D

[Wild Armor]

The vocal track was a great addition to an already amazing song. The Synthesizer (ensemble?) was nice, but just felt a little too much on the volume.

I would have liked to hear some more direction with that Synth. Great track.

[Lucentas]

Mr. Prievert is shaping up to be one of my favorite ReMixers on this site, and this piece is one of the reasons, if not the reason, why. I've never heard the original song, but somehow I think listening to it after having heard this piece would be almost a disappointment, as I feel he captures the essence of it so well. This is one ReMix that won't be leaving my playlist for a long, long time.

Actually, it'll probably be there for the rest of eternity.

[goombapatrol]

damn, i can't believe i haven't listened to this before.
amazing work of art.

[Catharsis]

Yeah, this really is one of the best ones out here. How come he hasn't produced anything on here in awhile?

[42]

:shock:
To each his own I guess...

The distorted vocals make some sense, as if it were filtered through broken glass, but well, this isn't quite my cup of tea.
The best I can say is to try it out for yourself.

[OA]

I'm glad this track made it through the lockdowns despite the heavy sampling of the original. The gating effect really makes it sonically unique and interesting, and there is a ton of expansion of the theme on it's own. The gating makes the tempo change possible too, without ruining the original waveform. Great source and a nice mix of it. :-)