Rexy

Your sound palette has those familiar Synthwave tropes - the driving beat, the synthetic drums and bass, and the choice of backing synths all work together to bring the genre alive. Do note that at 0:32, you used the same patch to provide both a riff and the melody, and their identical tone and stereo placement make it hard to distinguish them. Did you mean to use a different-sounding patch for the melody there and at 1:51? If not, think about clarity for your instrument parts if you haven't done so already - like where they can be in the stereo field, additional layers if needed, or any separation via EQ tweaks. Aside from the clash of two patches, it's not overly chaotic in its current state. Source-wise, this track discarded the first 53 seconds and used that as the foundation - that entire stretch that anchored itself in that original E Minor key. Then, what followed was one loop through almost the remainder of the source, a simple breakdown, and a near-copy-paste of that previous loop before using the source's conclusion for the ending. You got the right idea with adding the pulsing rhythm synth at 1:41, but there's still more to do - Brad has already mentioned some amazing ideas for changing things up in the second half and adding more variations to the drum writing to keep making it feel fresh. A "theme and variations" approach to arrangement is fine, but I do want to hear those variations. :) I am all in favor of more synthwave, especially Stardew synthwave - and I see something special in this rough cut. I would love to hear another version with the copy-pasta problem addressed first and foremost, with further thought taken to drum variation and the dual patch issue. Do take advantage of the workshop on the Forums and Discord - help is but a mouse click away. NO (resubmit)

The sound selection for this mix is not too shabby. I like the lead tones chosen to anchor the mix; the bass tone has a nice subtle glide when not in staccato; and most of the instruments feel clean enough in the presentation. Two obvious things were louder than they should have been - the snare when in play and the organ for the Ganon sections. As usual, I back up Kris's suggestion for side-chaining, though that should also expand to having additional pads outside of the Ganon sections, also going under the side-chain effect. Anything to soften the blow of that organ would benefit it well. The arrangement also leaves a lot to think about. A simple 16-bar intro with elements getting slowly added over time is one thing, but so is hearing your Nightmare presentations with the same notation as the original and similar synth tones. Credit where credit is due for putting the Ganon fight BGM into 4/4 instead of 7/8 (there you go, Brad!), and with all the little cameos thrown in - but it veers so heavily into conservation and similar tones that it doesn't feel personalized enough. You can add some additional textures, change up backing patterns, give the main melody a personal touch, and so on - anything to make it sound less like Minako Hamano and more like you. Ultimately, I have more problems with the conservative arrangement than I do with the organ balancing, and so I can't see myself passing it until this gets further personalization and a presentation that moves further away from MIDI-rip territory. It's still a bold effort, so I hope you have the project files so you can continue working on it. NO

Brad had already hit things nail on the head, so I may as well also make this brief. I approve of the sound design decisions, the transformational slow-groove citypop direction, and the complete jazz-like chord sequence - no qualms with any of those - but all of the copy-pasta hurts it so much right now. I would suggest you take a look at these timestamps and see what else can be done to give them as much extra spice as some of the other variations. Do resub, please - we can never have too much Street Fighter rep, let alone Sakura. :-) NO

The combination of Brad's initial breakdown and additional pointers demonstrated the number of liberal twists taken with that familiar Marble Zone melody. It has a funky FM-sounding groove, starting well with splicing the original bass intro and allowing for melodic transformation from 0:20 onwards. The A-section ended up fitting a reasonably straight-forward adaptation, the B-sections at 0:49 and 1:47 relied more on splicing the opening component of that melody into a transformed melody line, the solo spot at 1:16 served as a fun break, and the return to the initial A-section at 2:22 felt gradual with the bass and drums placed in. It sounds like Marble Zone, without necessarily sounding like Marble Zone - which makes little sense in writing, but please deal with it. :) Now, the mastering is definitely in the loud zone, and if it had more than the three-tone polyphony setup, it could border on sausage-fest with the instruments on hand. Thankfully, nothing sounds over-compressed or overly distorted. All tones and percussion are crystal clear, like the waters of Labyrinth Zone, and the choice of synths has as much power as that well-known Green Hill wrecking ball. I wholly respect your decision to go as bone dry as possible - yet the only thing I can nitpick over is hoping to experiment with other effects like phasing and delay to add more to the soundscape, but that is more of a matter of taste than acceptance. You made a track with the intent to make badniks (and everyone else) go dance, and it's a solid presentation all around. Nice going! YES

You put this mix together from no musical background? That's a bold effort; respect! :) When I saw "90s house" and "Dreamer" in the same post, I was ready to brace myself to hear the melodies in that style - but little would I know that all you took from the source was the opening arpeggios, and then you ran with it for five minutes. It's as valid as an arrangement approach as ever, but stretching it out into a guns-blazing track for that long, with hardly any opportunities to breakdown and build back up, makes it tiresome to listen to. I understand that you were aiming for this progressive / dream house direction, but the best advice that I can give you is to listen to a lot of commercial reference tracks of this same genre - preferably radio edits when necessary, and definitely not club mixes - and pay attention to the textures' shaping over time. You were on the right lines with textural variation, but dynamic shaping and a look into envelopes sound like the next big step. The production techniques also need improvement. The first thing I noticed was that master low-pass at 10k hz of all places. If the idea of emulating 90s House for you similarly meant emulating the average MP3 file of the era, I could understand, but the 10k+ range ideally is where your higher-toned instrumentation should go, particularly your cymbal selection and any other similarly toned sounds. However you decided to make that frequency cut, please undo it - you'll get a cleaner sound without it, and the reference tracks certainly don't have cuts like that. Similarly, Brad also mentioned the overwhelming sub-frequencies as well. I used an EQ analyzer to high-pass the file and that did take the edge off - but it's all on you to balance the rest. Assuming this is your first musical project, I would suggest balancing out all the percussion pieces and SFX first, then get the bass to sit in, then the melody, then the pads, and finally any pitched rhythm parts. Keep them all under 0dB both as individual instruments and on the master, and then you could do the rest with experimenting with your master chain and seeing what else works. Not a bad start at all. I like the vibes here, and I'm all for a trance arrangement like this to make its way onto the front page - but for this to get there, it needs more TLC in the mixing department, as well as a further look into the writing so that it doesn't drag like it's currently doing now. I'm seeing potential, so please keep at it. NO

This is one of my fave sources from the OG Streets of Rage! You've definitely hit a chord with me, no pun intended. So, obviously the arrangement is very meat and potatoes - started off as a straight-forward metal cover, though the shoutout to the SoR1 theme at 1:37-1:48, the additional strings, the guitar harmonies and the ominous closure in the final reprisal were beautifully done. Arrangement-wise, it's hit a solid direction that stayed fresh all the way through. I do love your guitar tone going into this - and considering what you said about recording your parts, downtuning it and feeding it through an amp sim, it sounds a lot like an actual 7-string, so kudos on the idea. Though, as much as I love the production-based ambition, this does have flaws. As Brad mentioned, the bass has a very awkward EQ shift that sounds like it's trying to be a Chapman Stick even though it feels too tinny to do so. I wouldn't have minded going in for an ordinary pick bass rather than the direction you're going in there, but if you're able to resolve the tinniness another way, by all means go for it. And then there's the drums. Yes, to a casual ear, these would be hard-hitting - but I noticed the machine-like constant velocities and writing. Larry already touched upon the former, but for me, what I want to emphasize is the same two-bar groove - down to the kick, snare and open hi-hat placements - getting copy-pasted with only some minor variations on fills, a couple of ride cymbal breaks (0:51-1:00 and 2:17-2:26) and the tom breakdown at 1:20-1:29. With fills also mirrored between sections and in similar places, I had come to the conclusion that this component of the track is underwhelming and needs some revision before I could see it get posted. I really want to see this track get out there, Andy. I did mention my gripes with the bass shaping and I hope you're able to address it at some point, but for me, the stale drums were the biggest dealbreaker and I hope you're able to go back into this project and vary up those grooves. Please send it back - there's never enough Streets on OCR! :) NO (resubmit)

I'm a not-quite-first-time listener here - I heard this on GameDuels back then. I followed along with the source breakdown just fine, and with these sources brought in, I'm glad that the Knight n' Grail music provided most of the melodic anchoring - they made it much easier to follow. I am, however, going to disagree with the difficulty of following grooves as outlined further up, and that's because the groove does have a downbeat leading into the individual bars. It is tricky to anticipate when there's a change to another time signature shift, though, but it is way less of an issue when most of it is at 7/4 initially. Credit where credit is due with the soundscape - there's a great selection of dreamy pads and synth/keys that send this in a more atmospheric direction, and I am all for the ride. But mix-wise, it's not a perfect one. There is bass, but it's a very light sub-bass - and that takes more of a backseat to the various leads, which vary in panning, echo, and tone. One is a piano that is louder than the others, is hard-panned to the right side, has a high amount of reverb and a pinch of a chorus effect, and dominates over everything else. It works when cooperating with the hard-left organ and has had moments where it allowed the sweeping pads to take more of that front stage. But it's not as effective when it's eating up the soundscape around it and, therefore, adds unnecessary clutter. Now, here's the big question. Is this a dealbreaker? Surprisingly, no. The master has no issues with clipping or over-compression, and the waveform allowed for a consistent level of narrow dynamics without going the whole "waveform sausage" route. This decision is something that I can chalk up to artistic intent despite its imperfections. If it does get sent back, then I wouldn't mind the panning being tighter and some tweaked instrument balancing - but after further deliberation, I see no reason for it not to be posted as it is. We would appreciate a warning the next time you send in something that a previous iteration of the panel had last assessed, just saying. ;) YES

Good ol' Lavender Town. I appreciate you going the whole chaotic dance direction with this one, and the source is so evident a timestamp isn't needed. Credit where credit is due on tweaks - the arp had seen variations including doubling, tripling and even quadrupling on notes; 0:45 went as far as double-time during the build; the groove following had elements of the arp subtracted and later reversed (!!), and then the build at 2:38 opted for a more syncopated variation. And then there was the last minute going for the arp jumping between half time and double time and the main melody opting for syncopation with the main theme alteration. I'd say that with the minimalism of the melody, enough was done rhythmically to make it feel like your own. However, this is also a curious soundscape - one that starts off with some fun sweeps that give the illusion of a thick soundscape, no thanks to the aformentioned sausage - but even then, the pads and drum selection feel thin when isolating them in a vacuum. The only way that a track can sound this congested while tonally sounding minimal is through an unclear mix. Sidechaining had been mentioned before, but paying attention to EQ and shaping them to give other instruments room to breathe is a core fundamental. As of right now, anything that is not a bass or kick drum doesn't need the low frequencies, so they can get cut out - and similarly, any instruments with tonal similarities to each other could also either have some cuts done to separate either or get placed in far-away parts of the stereo field. I also want to like the section at 1:52 in particular with the triplet grooves (and the similar idea with the final build for the end), but when the bass and kicks are rolling around in the same frequency, it's hard to pick up on where the pulse is meant to be. It got easier at 2:15 when the drum was reduced to just on-the-beat, but it's still one of those situations where either a kick drum frequency tweak or a side chain won't go amiss to separate the two of them. I also would really like additional layers on your instruments as well, to make them feel as thick as the sweeps that were used - but definitely look at the EQ problem first before adding anything else. Layers to me are the equivalent of adding double glazing onto a window before actually installing the window, if that makes any sense. These are definitely fun ideas in the interpretation of the source, but the impresison it left me is that it needs more mixdown TLC before trying again. I also recommend that you take advantage of the Workshop sub-forum should you decide to keep working on it. Please keep going. NO (resubmit)

There's sequenced orchestra, and then there's the source for this very arrangement. Interesting choice considering your intent and speciality. Thanks for the breakdown, as usual - it managed to confirm how you integrated the very minimalized parts of the source into the overall scope of things. I do appreciate how you were able to take the frantic nature of the source and turn it into something ominous and suspenseful, as if it's pre-boss as opposed to the real deal. And I absolutely like the idea of unusual time signatures integrated as well - some 7/4 bits in part 4, and 10/4 bits in part 6, which naturally made me feel very happy to hear. However, what I immediately sensed was how flat the humanization felt. Yes, the parts have their proper place in the stereo space, but it felt like all of the articulations and dynamics felt too soft and stayed in that same place for the track's duration. There had even been stretches where the attacks on the instrumentation remained completely mechanical, with hardly any room for key switches for any more elaborate swells. And without any harsher dynamics to take the edge off the low-mid EQ space, it's added up to something that I feel needs more TLC with humanization shaping before getting posted. I do trust you with orchestration, as I do - but it needs another sequencing pass before I can consider seeing it as mixpost-worthy. Do keep at it. NO (resubmit)

Brad already did the source breakdown, so there was no need to re-tread that. This one has the tropes of prog that I have come to expect - the structure, the creative drum writing, the guitar riffs, all of the rhythmic variations, especially the shift through all of those time signatures in the instrumental break from 4:24 onwards - there's a lot to love for me. Given how you've opened the track and presented the vocals with those introspective lyrics, I can see why you initially started in a different direction. Writing-wise, there's hardly a seam out of place for me to look through, so I am all for the ride here. Kudos. The overall technical presentation was clear, though I got some elephants in the room to address. Yes, the drums do feel like they're all at a very similar velocity, but that doesn't matter to me since they're there to provide as much energy as the rest of the instrumentation, especially those djent guitars. And while I did sense the sibilance issue that Flexstyle pointed out, this, to me, is no dealbreaker as the vocals themselves are clear enough as they are - and I can also play devil's advocate and see it as an after-effect of the initial shoegaze idea. Even then, the hi-hats have a dim quality to them (in a good way), so there are no major frequency conflicts either. Very passionate and thoughtful work all around - let's see this get posted! YES

I haven't heard the original submission, but even with the resub, the arrangement is completely on point with the shaping of the main source, integration of smaller source sections for the sake of drama, and the overall shaping of it all - so for once, I don't have a reason to break this down. :-) However, my most significant issues while listening were with the sequencing and production. Credit where credit is due, the choice of samples is solid, and hearing that you've performed the cello part with an EWI makes me understand the overall intention of its placement, velocity variation, and all. Wes already touched upon the main body of attack being something that can get touched up with envelopes away from the EWI to make it feel more authentic, rather than touching upon the uncanny valley, so that's one aspect to shape that up. But then you have parts like your piano that sound like mouse inputs with no velocity or note length variation, and your backing instrumentation with the strings and brass has similar issues. The percussion is way more expressive in comparison, though once that leaves for the final theme repetition at 2:57 before the hand drum returns at 3:21, there's a whole bunch of exposed mid-frequency space that makes it feel empty. I recommend transposing some of your higher strings down an octave so that you can fill that mid-space more efficiently and that your flute writing also gets some breathing room. This idea is brilliant. I understand that you've gone to great lengths to work with better samples now, but some extra attention to articulation and frequency space would get this over the bar for me. Please send over a third version! NO (resubmit)

Despite the length, this track was still easy to follow. The intro got a full minute of exploration by itself, then the exploration of the theme itself over the following three minutes focused more on breaking apart the B section and restructuring as it sees fit. The blast beats during the trailer section helped break moods together before going into working on the source's A section on return at 5:36 and going through transforming the entire loop. I will play devil's advocate with Chris's repetition critique above and say that chopping and repeating individual sections is a way of transforming the source into your own. That said, the transformed B section got used the same way three times with little differentiation between them, and with a track as long as this and sections as long as that, it adds up quickly. Even changing up the rhythm guitars or percussion in the background - also while genre-appropriate - can be very helpful with carrying the ideas forward. The production is a curious one. The diluted first minute had the mood to set me up for whatever brand of black metal would emerge, though the whiplash from expressive bells to machine-gun drums and rhythm guitars felt very sudden. At least when the sums of the parts bind together, they feel clean enough to do what they do - but I wish not to want everything at full pelt all the time, which gives off a mechanical feel. I like how this arrangement is going, but the repetition and mechanicalization are significant issues that need addressing when making a future revision. NO (resubmit)

I have not heard any of the revisions prior to this one, so I'm rolling with the one I see here. I'm liking the approach with the theme variation, the breakdown, the brief referencing into the sisters' battle theme, then back into a theme variation at the end - and all the melodic florishes that I am hearing and the change of tonal moods have broken the sources enough for them to be their individual thing. I can't fault the writing direction - keep that as it is. But the thing I noticed first when listening is how muffled the entire mixdown is. Joe mentioned the comparison to a pillow, which makes sense with the scooped mid secton that I'm hearing. It's interesting because I'm able to hear everything in the mix as standalone instruments, but the flat impact tells me that those holes need patching before it's ready for primetime. Whether it be tweaking anything on the master chain that might be causing it, or adjusting EQs on instruments with tones in those ranges, anything that can be done to add those values again can bring this over the bar after all the time it's spent like this. I can definitely vouch that this is almost there. If it fails this time, then another mixdown pass is all it needs to hit the mark. NO (resubmit)

I can confirm that the source quota fit the scope well, even with moments with the A section's chord progression being the only usage present and entire parts of the arpeggio getting cut away in favor of a half-time approach. It can be "building blocky" as Larry said, but that is the nature of progressive trance - the slow builds into the crunchy bass, then the dip into a second faster groove and into the outro. But as long as everything evolved within that framework, that is not a concern to me. However, that half-time groove established at 1:14 went back in at 2:27 and 3:40, restoration of the A section and all - and again for the ending at 4:38. And that standard A-section as it was appeared five times throughout under different textures. This is something that I can't chalk up to the genre itself due to the sound choice of that FM-sounding bell synth. The rest of the mixdown is already strong, with the beefy drums, bass and rhythm parts. But this bell not only sounds louder than everything else, but also has such a bright tone to it that I'm hearing more of its resonance more than its pitch. This is something I would've liked to have heard an EQ cut to get rid of the resonance as well as any other layers to add some warmth, but the way it repeated phrases as it did added up to one big issue. I do like this, but the bell synth's mixing and its patterns need more TLC before it's ready for the front page. I hope you still have the project file, because this is otherwise a sweet homage for a friend. Keep going! NO (resubmit)

I love the direction as well. I felt like it lured me into a false sense of security with an adaptation for what sounded like a single Game Boy as opposed to two, and then all of a sudden, it started developing with a busier soundscape and textural shifts to make this two-variation direction work. That also makes me feel confident that you are getting a whole load of mileage out of LSDJ, no thanks to the careful attention to noise shifting and texture/pitch manipulation on the fly. The Sherm variant is on point, the sudden Streets of Rage SFX was unexpected, and the choice of differing harmonies from the OG makes this a strong sticking point for me. Now, repetition-wise, the only thing that feels like a problem for me is the drum writing, which has the same pattern outside of fills and breaks. The tonal elements around feel like enough work as the sum of their parts for me to consistently see them as dealbreakers, but the basic boots-and-cats-and-etc setup runs its course very quickly. Drumwriting isn't easy to work on, but studying other potential ideas for grooves and figuring out how to implement them into your software is a good idea. Similarly, with six channels of pulses and two of noise, the mono sound also feels like it's hurting the mixdown so much, to the point that I'd like to hear the details of each individual channel rather than them mushing together. From what I saw in the LSDJ manual, there should be a way to mute individual channels and put them all into a single DAW, then tweak their properties (panning, EQ, other effects) from there - which I'm under the impression is how gravitygauntlet mixed down some previous work of yours. It's a fun fakebit arrangement, and it'll be amazing to see on the site, but it needs some repetition re-work and another mix pass. Know that you have a great network to assist on the latter when required - you've got this. NO (resubmit)