[My computer hates Winamp]

Look for winamp 2.95. That's what I run on Windows 7. The program sucked ever since AOL took it over.

What version are you using anyway?

[Mega Man 7]

http://remix.thasauce.net/song/RTS0021/

An old Shade Man remix I think I did for PRC or something.

[Team Gato 2.0]

Still like the original better (Master P style uunnghhhs are priceless). We need to have a Gato remix project in honor of the 10 year anniversary.

[Super Mario RPG ~ Star Hill Piano Arrangement]

Overall was a pretty impressive performance, although I did hear some awkwardness in much of the rhythm (and could have sworn I heard a skipped beat in the middle of the song, maybe more than once). FYI, I'm also a pianist, so I tend to catch mistakes other people miss. ;p Despite some of the awkardness it's still easily 10 times better than any of the sequenced piano pieces I've heard on this site.

For a piano arrangement it's extremely short. I'd love to hear this played on Tonehammer emotional piano. Your keyboard doesn't really do justice to your playing style, and this performance is totally suited for Tonehammer's samples (maybe even the soft piano patch).

This would sound great with other instruments (i.e. slow strings, vocals). Good pianists are in short supply; I'm sure lots of people on this site would like to collab with you.

[Prelude-Final Fantasy(Most Games)]

It's a very simple hip hop beat with strings covering the melody (for the first minute or so). Zero originality so far. Though seeing it posted on newgrounds I didn't have high hopes to begin with.

The piano and gated backup melody is kind of nice, though the soft emotional piano really seems to clash with the ghetto beat behind it.

With some vocals the song might seem more complete. For now it doesn't really contribute anything to the original song (and the Prelude has been remixed nearly to death already).

[khoal - tmnt2 stage 4 (WIP)]

Sorry, I'm not a fan of chiptunes (especially when they're covering a game for the NES) with rare exceptions (i.e. Virt, though I've never heard him do a chiptune covering an NES game).

The only non-chippy synth at 1:30 (besides the bass really) is an extremely cliche saw lead. I really don't know why people make this stuff.

Mind you, the name "Overclocked Remix" is deceptive. This is really an arrangement/composition site, not a site for DJ's. This sounds way too NES to be a remix by site standards.

[MM3 Hard Man Remix - v2]

This remix would have been extremely cool like ten years ago. Reminds me of stuff Disco Dan used to make.

However, this song can be beefed up significantly. I had to turn the volume way up to hear it, so the overall level probably isn't that loud. I noticed the kick drum gets fuller past the one minute mark, though it still doesn't sound as big as it could be, and doesn't sound mixed quite right.

The drums beside the kick (especially the clap) are pretty quiet. The bass-line is really generic and old school sounding.

The portamento and vibrato on the lead sounds pretty cool at times.

Dunno if the 1:35 section is really necessary. It could probably use a different lead or better percussion.

Some of the backup synths sound too similar to the lead, so they're kind of competing for attention at times.

This song could use more bass (not just from the kick). Maybe add some distortion to one of the leads to make it bigger.

I don't think this would make it past the judges panel by their standards today (though it would have been a hit like 8 years ago).

Check out a Megaman (MM7 I think) remix I did a few years ago, though I overdid it on the compression, and the percussion could have been a lot better (and the song less repetitive), though I think I got things to sound pretty big. Still, I never submitted it to OCR, didn't think it was good enough for the site. http://remix.thasauce.net/song/RTS0021/

[Figuring out the notes you hear...]

I don't think anyone's commented yet on the example. It's basically a bunch of major 7th chords in root position with a lot of chromatic movement (i.e., the chords don't all fit nicely into the same key). If you figure the chords out first, the rest is easy since the melody basically follows them. Btw, those vocals really irritated the hell out of me.

Learning what intervals sound like is a good start, but being able to listen for entire chords is even better. I guess it takes experience and a heavy music background to do it quickly though.

[Do -you- 100% games?]

I maybe only 100% 10% of the games I play. Basically if it's anything in the zelda series I always finish it. I never finished Final Fantasy 7, or Super Mario World 2 (though I finished everything else I played from those series).

[Who would play an old-school themed RPG with a deep, open world a la Fallout, Elder Scrolls?]

Text adventures need to be fun and engaging (like any other game). Realism, humor, good story-lines, clever themes and plot-lines are important. Of course, adding good game-play and artwork can also be important. I typically enjoy text adventures much more than games that rely heavily on graphics, so long as they're fun and engaging.

If it's MMO, then communication with other players, messaging, chatting, and game-play elements need a well-developed system. Player-to-player interaction can make or break a large, involving game.

[bringing out the best for vsts]

There are a lot of advanced techniques that pro's use that would be very difficult to explain here. Think about how thin an electric guitar sounds when it's played dry, and how it sounds big and huge after being put through an amplifier/cabinet. A lot of things happen when an amplifier processes the signal. For one thing, gain is added until the signal becomes big and distorted sounding. When a sound is distorted, new frequencies are added, and other frequencies are amplified. An amp also applies EQ to the signal to bring down certain frequencies that are taking up unnecessary space. Even between different guitar amps, you'll find a lot of variation on how a signal is processed. That is why certain amps are preferred by certain rock musics and better suited for particular genres.

How does this help your music? simple. By applying the right amount (and type) of distortion and EQ to instruments you can basically customize the way they sound. There are many free VST's and others that cost money that can do this. My favorites are FL Blood Overdrive, waveshaper, parametric EQ's, and Maximus. You'd be suprised how many kinds of sounds can be improved with the right amount of distortion (with eq applied afterwards). It's a difficult technique, but it can be mastered with practice.

Reverb can make things sound bigger, but the result is often more subtle. Low, short reverb can make synths sound more analog or fatten up basses, while high reverb is good for adding brightness. Longer decay and higher wet-dry basically makes things sound far away, not necessarily bigger. Really big sounds can be produced from a mix of long and short reverb (adding two to three layers of different kinds of reverb can be a good thing).

Lastly, it's important to be able to "see" the results of your mixing. Always use a spectrometer as much as possible. FL Wavecandy can give amazing results if you know how to use it right (though it has horrible default settings). By using EQ in combination with good spectral analysis you can really fill out your mix and increase the overall loudness.

[Anyone inspire you?]

OCR (in no particular order): Prophecy, bLiNd, DJ Carbunk1e, FFmusicDJ, Spekkosaurus, Russell Cox, goat, Sir Nuts, SgtRama

non-OCR (also in no particular order): Rachmaninov, Beethoven, Robert Miles, Tiesto, Rammstein, Danny Elfman, Nightwish, Rammstein, Juno Reactor, Master P, Dr. Dre, Journey, Guns n Roses, Enya, Nobuo Uematsus, Koji Kondo, Koichi Sugiyama

[Xenogears BMR 3 - 2011Version]

To start, I'm not a fan of horrible download manager sites. Might want to find a better hosting place, or you might not get as much feedback for your music.

I like the bass-line and the strings. A lot of instruments seem to be getting in each others' way in the mix. You have the guitar, the flute, and the vocoder all playing in the same octave. Either change the arrangement, or you're going to have massive EQ work to do get things out of each others' ways. At times, the flute and vocals are competing for attention. The guitar thing at 2:05 sounds out of place.

At 2:20, I hear a lot of distortion on that horn lead thing. It seems really excessive.

You're probably going to hate me for saying this, but I suggest looking at the mix in mono in a spectrometer. Where you see huge peaks in levels in the arrangement I'd suggest cutting out instruments or moving them around into different octaves to make room. This song is going to take lots of clever re-arranging and EQ to make things sound like they're not competing against each other for attention constantly. It kind of drives me crazy how many things you're trying to do at once.

I might get some heat for saying this also, but I strongly believe panning should be used as part of the final mixing process, right before final mastering. I never use panning to get things out of the way of each other. When I hear different things going on in each ear on my headphones that don't go together it only tends to irritate the hell out of me.

There's an old saying in music, "less is more" (except of course when it comes to cowbell ;p). It sounds like you're trying to do WAY too much at once.

[Final Fantasy V - Prelude To The Void remix]

Not at all what I was expecting. Really minimilist sounding. The piano has a really neat sound to it, but doesn't sound as realistic as it could. In particular, the descending arpeggio patterns starting at :31 need more emphasis on the first beat. A lot of velocities on the piano need work actually. The melody sounds pretty mundane too (every other note should be louder probably).

The drums overall are pretty bad. The saw wave sounds pretty out of place and annoying, too, along with the pads. You probably need some slow strings instead of all the weird ambient sounds, and it would sound better.

The part at 2:45, oh dear.... I'm not a fan of any of these synths.... Is this your first try at electronic music? I'm really turned off by everything in this section. Stop using synth presets and learn how to make your own sounds because they don't work in this song.

4:08, this section actually doesn't sound that bad. I'm still not a fan of the pads, but the piano sounds pretty good. The piano part at 4:29 sounds less coherent, notes literally running into each other. This part needs fixing, not just velocities, but keeping notes out of the way of each other (maybe moving one part up or down an octave to start).

[Some metal song I'm working on]

The song sounds really tinny, especially the guitar. The drums are pretty boring and seems like they could use more changes. Both guitar parts are really repetitive. The part at 1:00 was an interesting change, but it doesn't keep up its energy that well. The solo at the end seemed really random.

Needs better mixing (sounds like its mixed on laptop speakers), with full sounding mids and bass, make the beginning less repetitive, try to give the song more energy overall. If rhythm guitars are going to drive the song, they need to sound huge and badass (think Rammstein). Pretty much everything sounds pretty weak though.

Might want to try googling free guitar soft amp vst's and use them for your mix. They might beef up the guitars quite a bit. I'd find better drum samples or learn how to eq and compress them properly, too.

[Heart asks pleasure first (The Piano) (+updated +midi)]

Well, first I must say, I haven't seen the movie, but the piano in the original song sounds really fake. Sustain pedal on a real piano doesn't stop abruptly the way it does in this song. It sounds almost like the piano has been harshly beat sliced or overcompressed by some dumbass engineer. For a movie that's supposed to be about a piano I'm really disappointed.

The melody isn't particularly catchy either. It just sounds like the composer tried making something emotional sounding with a lot of movement. Quite frankly, I find this arranging/composing style to be really annoying and a disgrace to great late romantic composers like Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov.

Now, I'm listening to your version. In some ways it actually sounds better than the original, roflz. Slowing it down actually brings out the emotion better for one thing.

However, I dunno if it's compression or what, my head is starting to hurt. The dynamics on the strings seem really over-the-top. They fade in way too dramatically (it's probably the samples you chose). The piano itself is way too bright sounding. It's just simply a bad sample (FL Keys or Florestan Piano soundfont?). I'd try Tonehammer emotional piano if you can(or I could render it for you if you send me a MIDI), or else maybe find better samples.

It's hard to really judge how well you're sequencing the velocities of the piano due to the poor piano samples. I know it can definitely use more rubato (tempo changes) to add emotion. In this case, I think it would make sense to start off a phrase (each phrase is probably one or two measures in this song) with a slower tempo and accelerate towards the end of the phrase. Of course, the reverse principle often works in many situations, and other types of tempo changes you may find appropriate.

[Singer Collaboration!!!!!!!! C4C]

Well, don't get discouraged, but posting here I assume you want honest feedback. I'll try to be as helpful as I can.

I hate to say this, the background music on your remix sounds pretty cheesy to me (though she might think differently, but who knows??). Starting with that lead. And the bass is pretty bad. It sounds like a midi sample of a picked bass, and doesn't really go with the beat. The percussion you got is basically generic disco, and the drums aren't terribly strong or big sounding.

The vocals don't sound properly mixed for the style you have. I can hear some of the background noise in the original song, along with the guitar. If you're doing a serious remix, you probably need to process the vocals better, like taking out some of the background noise, and maybe eq'ing and compressing the vocals. I'd keep away from autotune since she's basically singing on-key and that could be insulting.

I'm confused as to what you're doing. You say you're doing a hard rock/metal album with a girl, yet that's obviously not what this is. It sounds like cheesy techno. If you're going for metal and can't get musicians at least get some decent guitar samples like Shreddage and a DAW/VST host (though you probably need NI Kontakt and Guitar Rig to get the most out of them). Heck, some of the free guitar soundfonts I've used weren't that bad either.

Sampling copyrighted music is technically illegal. Things that are uploaded to the internet are basically copyrighted automatically, so you could get in trouble if she gets gets pissed off at you and decides to sue you for using her music. I'm pretty sure it's not considered fair use either. Though that's extremely unlikely to happen in any case. ;p

Well good luck. It sounds to me like you're pretty new to music sequencing and might want to stick around this community for a few pointers.

[Which mix sounds better? (Rock arrangements)]

The second one is noticeably louder than the first on my headphones. That guitar just sounds excessively loud. Also, it seems really mid-heavy. I'd look at it on a spectrometer (FL Wavecandy is awesomeness) and see what you're missing. I don't hear much in the way of bass, low mids, or highs on that second one.

The first one is better mixed, but not as loud, and still missing quite a bit in the bass department. I'd look at the whole mix on the spectrometer as well as some of the individual instruments and see how they interact with each other. As far as getting max loudness out of the track, there are some good tools for that (I'm a fan of FL Maximus). Compressing each individual track could help, as long as it's done correctly (watch your threshold, ratio, attack/release, etc.) Also, if you put an equalizer before a compressor, the compressor acts as a sort of multi-band compressor. You could do this with single or multiple instruments and see what works better.

If you want to really see how things interact on the spectrometer, try converting the mix temporarily to mono (FL Stereo EQ is great for this). Panning conflicting parts of an arrangement won't necessarily get you a lot more loudness out of a track, while filling in all the frequency gaps you're missing generally will.

[Updating My Old Mixes - "Just Blaze Type Party Beat"]

I want to guess that those aren't your samples. Sorry, I'm not a fan of the slice the crap out of everything and loop it to death genre (that's like 99% of hip hop though). It doesn't sound over-compressed, but the low-end and is definitely pretty weak. The drums could use some punch too.

[Helixer - instrumental]

Percussion, very electronic sounding, but tightly mixed, and nice sequencing. Doesn't sound bad at all.

That orchestral hit is like WHOA. Wasn't expecting that at all... bleh. I like the panned pad things that come in after that. The choir sounds cool, but I could really do without the string hits. The bassline that comes in sounds pretty nice, not the catchiest or most interesting bassline I've ever heard though.

It's probably the headphones, but the panning on the pads is starting to bother me about halfway through.

This track feels like it's missing something. Probably vocals. There doesn't seem to be anything really driving the song, like a strong melody or hook. It's okay for a backtrack though, but it's pretty minimilistic. I started skimming through after the 3 minute mark. Nothing much really happened after about the first minute.

I'd say it's probably pretty good for background music to a game or something, though not really interesting enough to listen to on its own. Pretty solid overall though.

[Synthetic/Orchestral Accompaniment]

Sorry I can't offer sound advice without hearing the original track. You can always send me a secret PM though if you want better feedback.

It seems to me like the piano and dulcimer might potentially conflict with each other in the arrangement or in the mix. I'd go with which one sounds better. I don't know why you want to mix both a bright and soft piano together. I'd probably stick with the soft one if it's a chill out track.

You didn't mention non-tuned percussion. I think that's basically essential in 99% or more of music.

If it's chill-out I'd avoid staccato brass. Sounds to me like it would kill the mood.

Stringed instruments are typically used to support the soloists. It's good to have an instrumental solo besides the vocalist, but a violin may not be the best choice (unless maybe you find a live violinist who's really really good). Flute is a good choice for a solo. Emotional guitar lead could also be good, or even a piano solo. Of course any instrumental solo is going to sound better if performed live, or it's not going to mash up perfectly with the solo vocalist.

[Tips for arranging/remixing for piano]

I'm done with the whole guitar vs. piano argument (at least in this thread, roflz).

If you want to REALLY learn how to sequence good piano, listen to the song

. It's simple enough that it's easy to figure out what's going on, and yet it implements some very effective, emotional piano playing techniques.

Make sure to pay very close to attention to dynamics and tempo changes. Here's a few things to keep in mind:

• Emphasize the first beat of an arpeggio, especially when it's playing the root of the chord.
  
• Bring out the velocities carefully on the melody, emphasizing the beginning of each beat or important notes.
  
• As far as tempo goes, generally pianists play the beginning of a measure fairly quickly and slow down at or near the end of a measure. Even if subtle, this technique can add a lot of emotion.
  There are lots of other subtle expressive changes, but this covers most of the main ones.
  

Here are a few tips/ideas for arranging:

• Piano + slow strings = win.
  
• Use arpeggiated broken chords with the left hand and use the right hand to play the melody. Don't forget to add sustain pedal, and use 9ths when appropriate to add color/emotion (i.e. C, E, G, D, not necessarily in that order). Broken chords can typically be spaced rather far apart (i.e. use C, G, C, D, E, in a broken chord rather than C, E, G to make more interesting/emotional arpeggios). Rachmaninov style arpeggios tend to get much crazier than that (more space, more notes, use of triplets, 5-lets, or 6-lets).
  
• You can also simple right hand patterns or arpeggios and use left hand to play bass (Beethoven used to do this a lot).
  
• Big chords sound better on higher notes, while the low notes of the piano are better for octaves or broken chords. You can even use two handed chords on the high notes if you have the rest of the orchestra playing along (frequently used in romantic style concertos during a build up or finale).
  
• Chord progressions: use chords that are in key, use mode mixture, or borrow chords from neighboring keys. You can experiment until you find something that sounds interesting. If this is confusing, you might want to study up on on music theory (there are lots of free sites and some gurus on this one that can help you).
  

Piano is a very versatile instrument so feel free to try different styles depending on what you're going for. Good luck and have fun!

[Tips for arranging/remixing for piano]

Believe me, I've tried sequencing piano, it's hard as hell to do. I'd believe you if you told me you spent dozens of hours working on that song (if not more) to try to get it to sound real. Hell, I pick apart live performances by classical pianists every so often, so you got me on that one. Sometimes it's hard for me to tell how other people are going to react to a song because my standards are usually so much higher.

I'm basing what I think of guitar sequencing based on my own experience. As far as rhythm goes, I can make several catchy riffs in 5 or 10 minutes in Shreddage that could fool all but the most experienced guitarists. I haven't used any of the high end software used for leads, but the tutorial videos I've seen really do make it look easy. And since I'm not a guitarist, I'm not acquainted with all of the numerous articulations and variations and styles of playing.

I agree with WillRock, making just about anything sound real can get very difficult without access to live performances. And if all the piano songs on OCR sounded as good as the Trial in Concert, then I think I could die happy.

[Tips for arranging/remixing for piano]

I don't follow, maybe if you said more than just "it's bad, it's awful, it's bad, it's wrong, it hurts my ears, it's wrong." I'll understand the problems you have with it, because to me it sounds fine. His piano is compressed, which is probably what you're actually talking about.

It'll take me a while to point out everything, maybe later when I get home and have my headphones.

The first descending arpeggio sounds like a fade-out. Dynamics are over-exaggerated.

The left hand notes at :08 sound too soft without any louder notes to accentuate the beats. The whole section sounds basically soft and mostly monotone except for a few louder notes that appear to be completely random. You might be surprised at how little randomness is in a live performance and how deliberate variations usually are by the performer. That's why humanizing/randomizing doesn't typically work (unless it's smart humanizing designed to do tempo and velocity changes in very specific places, i.e. Sibelius).

The part at 1:15 sounds kind of clumsy to me. Some notes are being emphasized that really shouldn't be. The 1 beat on each measure is too soft, the 3 beat is too loud, etc.

Well that's a few things, and I skipped over quite a few of the more glaring ones, and sorry I can't really be that clear or specific. For the most part I hear dynamic changes that would look good on paper, but aren't being implemented right during sequencing, if that makes sense. The interpretation of dynamic changes during a performance isn't suppose to mathematically follow what's written on paper. Any experienced performer knows this and is able to give music proper rhythm and emotion during a performance. However, it's just simply not easy to put down on a sequencer.

and thanks for pointing out the compression; I'm on really bad speakers, so it's hard to tell. Compressing this type of piano performance is usually a bad thing, for the simple reason that it will nearly always end up crushing your dynamics.

[Worst game sequel]

Warcraft 3

Warcraft 2 was actually extremely fun, humorous, and had good balance.