[Liontamer]

Greetings, and Happy October. I don't know about you, but it's my favorite month. Cool autumn weather, the turning of the leaves, Mazedude's Birthday, Halloween... ahh.

So, once again, I am submitting a particularly Halloween-flavored remix. This has been arranged specifically for the upcoming "Bad Dudes EP - Halloween '07" remix project put together by Mustin. Our plan is to release the EP on the 24th, so that there is enough time for the mixes to cycle through to everybody who wants to play them on Halloween night.

We would love it if Overclocked could support the effort by releasing this remix (and perhaps others, Mustin will provide more details) to coincide with the EP release. That, and a link to the EP's specific page, which I imagine will be under www.oneupstudios.com. Again, Mustin will be able to provide more information regarding that.

Now, on to the remix!

Title: Psychotic Censors
Remixer: Mazedude
Game: Psychonauts
Original Composer: Peter McConnell
Original Title: The Censors Unleashed

Description: "Well, Psychonauts has become one of my all-time favorite video games. It is inventive, humorous, clever, and fun. Coinciding with this is an amazing soundtrack, composed by one of my all-time favorite game composers, Peter McConnell. His partnership with Tim Schafer on previous adventure games such as Day of the Tentacle, Sam n Max, Grim Fandango, Full Throttle, and others have provided me with countless hours of video-game playing joy. As a composer, he is very difficult to remix, as his chord style is very chromatic, unpredictable, and complex. Yet, as a die-hard remixer I have taken the time to decipher a few of his songs over time, and have enjoyed the challenge in remixing them.

The soundtrack to Psychonauts is rather unusual. While it still maintains the Peter McConnell vibes, it was heavily influenced and inspired by the soundtrack to the feature film "Beetlejuice," composed by Danny Elfman. In fact, this particular track is reminiscent of the score to the scene where Beetlejuice becomes a giant snake and attacks the family. So, all in all, I am blending a great many things together in my remix (like usual, hehe). We have Peter McConnell, Danny Elfman, a hint of Henry Mancini (as the bassline is also slightly reminiscent of "Peter Gunn" ), some circus elements (considering the game itself has a lot of circus elements), and of course, good ol' industrial Mazedude goodness."

Enjoy!

Mazedude

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Thanks a lot to DarkeSword for providing the source.

Psychonauts Original Soundtrack - (13) "The Censors Unleashed"

A solid arrangement. Not as outright sinister as some of Chris's past work, this one still added some darker edges to the original, particularly the industrial percussion and piano which gave the track much more deliberate pacing.

Some of the instrumentations changes held pretty fast to the feel of the source but were still really clever, such as the SID chip harmonies at :23.

The mainstream song references from 1:19-1:42 rubbed me the wrong way as feeling out of place, but they were in the source tune regardless. Didn't like it, but no big deal; clearly doesn't affect my decision. Peter McConnell's gonna punch me in the face!

Great idea with the dynamic shift at 2:10, followed by some more chippy goodness in the background from 2:27-2:40. Definitely some weird stuff with the composition for the last section from 2:23 until the end that evoked chaoticness and uneasyness in a good way, befitting for a Halloween-themed piece.

Once again, solid work here that was able to retain much of the character of McConnell's source tune but then fuse it with Chris's own signature style.

YES

[Liontamer]

Source Tune

[big giant circles]

Drums have definitely intensified the vibe of the source. This has been arranged excellently. This is great, actually. This is the type of source and arrangement that one can listen to once, and on the first time say "Oh, yeah. This is clearly a remix of that song". Props. Wish more mixes were like that.

The only weakness the remix bears is it's volume. The master needs to come down--there's some clipping and noticeable loss of sound quality throughout. For example - cymbal crash at section starting at :15. You can easily hear the cymbal get eaten alive by the clipping. :31 is another good example. 2:35, left pan. Anyway, I'm not going to timestamp every one of them--there's several places. And it's no big deal--a quick volume adjustment and rerender should fix it.

Solid stuff. Very fitting of the Halloween vibe. Great work, Mr. Dude.

On the condition of the volume being fixed,
YES

[JJT]

fast chromatic piano lines for the win.

nice work here, Chris. very personal, very memorable take on a challenging source tune. BGC's mastering concerns didn't stick out to me when I listened to this, but that's his perogative.


YES

[zircon]

Very quirky source - I can see how it could easily lend itself to a Halloween theme. I also caught the little Mozart quote in it... fun :) Anyway, on to the remix.

The production here sounds a little muddier and in general not quite as tight as some of Mazedude's previous subs. This might be an intentional production choice, but I don't think it really benefits the mix overall. Part of it has to do with the low piano chords meshing with other instruments in that crowded lower register. The end result is that it's harder to make things out, so the dissonance doesn't even really come through like it should. That being said, it's not a dealbreaker.

Considering the disjointed nature of the source, I think the level of arrangement here is very good. While it might not be the most creative approach, as it has the same general mood and style of the original, the remix is thoughtful and well-executed. One thing I love about Mazedude is how he rarely just relies on a single groove or riff to carry a piece; there are always significant musical aspects of his mixes that are changing at any given time.

A fairly straightforward-

YES

[The Orichalcon]

OCR's halloween theme 2007. I don't have any issue with the volume that BGC seems to have. The clipping sounds more like intentional distortion to me.

The melody is awesomely remixed in a retro-dark mood, pitch-sliding all over the place. The beats are dark and thick, the piano is evil and foreboding. Can't ask for anything better.

YES

Get this posted for Halloween for sures.