Liontamer

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What did you think? Post your opinion of this ReMix.

What did you think? Post your opinion of this ReMix.

Man, this opened up so promising, so I was wondering how it could get NOed, then it became obvious as soon as more stuff faded in; this is total mud with no high-end clarity. Perhaps a purposeful approach, but the fullest parts sound swamped, almost like the track's in mono, which is brutal. Had some sort of original interlude from 1:43-2:12 that didn't sound bad in a vacuum but also had 0 synergy with the "Dreamer " treatment, then right back to the arranged groove at 2:13 basically copy-pasta'ed. Nah, you've gotta go somewhere else with this, barely anything's developing once the groove's established. On the plus side, good use of sound effects here and there, even if they got mostly swallowed up and were lossy-sounding. Yeesh, finally something new around 3:41, more focused on some SoR SFX sampling, then getting back into the melody and changing the textures a little more. Like proph alluded to, trim the fat and get to the meat of things more quickly. That said, it's not enough to just reduce the runtime. Man, this needs dynamics, it's almost all just slammed intensity, barely any "let me up" sections, or changes in the groove, OR exploration of other areas of the theme as a form of dynamic contrast. Then a complete nothing of an ending with no transition, how come? :'-( This has potential, but it's gotta have further development. Poor mixing aside (is there stereo???), the core of this really beefs up the source tune nicely, so you have a legit good base here, but it has to change things up more quickly and not drag out. As I say to all the wanna-be musicians, G83, I applaud you. :-) I have a ton of musical ideas and don't enter the arena, so I respect you aiming to create something and showing genuine promise on top of that. Do keep at it; would love to hear another pass at this one to see what more you can do with it! NO (resubmit)

Just going to close this out with the same sentiments. Everything until 2:02's a superstraightforward cover with little interpretation beyond the adoption of this instrumentation, which itself is close to the source tune. Reconstruction/recreation's not a bad goal in a vacuum, it's just outside of our interpretive arrangement standards. I linked several melodically conservative arrangements in the writeup for this piece that still manage to still stand apart as distinct from the original music: https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR04414 Piano tone from 2:52-3:09 was too thin yet bright, which exposed that particular sample moreso than any of the other stuff like the bowed strings. That said, the energy of the track's strong and uses the samples well overall; very much a doujin scene-style track. If you're willing to rework the first half, this definitely could have a place here. We hope to hear from you again with another submission, even if it isn't a rework on this specific one. :-) NO (resubmit)

The intro wasn't promising as far as standing apart from the original, but there was more edge to the guitar performance after :23. I did catch what proph noticed about the bass sounding odd from the intro until :22; it didn't bother me personally, but it's arguably too much. The drums did feel underwhelming and with a quality disparity of those uncanny valley samples juxtaposed with the very lively guitar. The plodding snare writing was sapping energy from the killer guitar work, even though the fills were good. I liked some of the fills and writing, but the overall feel of the drumkit was repetitive, plodding, and underwhelming with the core snare pattern. The melodic line of the beginning of the chorus (:50-:59) was very quiet compared to the backing guitar; it doesn't HAVE to be punched up, but didn't necessarily seem intentional. I did like the brief moment from 1:19-1:29; even though the drums sounded thin, it was an extremely cool way to adapt that brief part of the source, and easily the most transformative part of the arrangement. 1:29-1:48 had some good original writing on top of the theme via the guitar soloing for some more personalization of the approach. Nice use of the 1-Up SFX at 1:18, that was a nice touch. Not a huge deal because they were couched reasonably well in the soundscape, but the strings from 2:17-2:26 were pretty fake-sounding; they're actually a decent element and add good texture throughout the piece overall, but they were higher in that particular section and more exposed, so it was worth calling out. 3:05 with "The Street of Rage" cameo was a nice piece of personalization, especially as the finish; I would have loved the instrumentation approach here to sound/feel more distinct from the source in the way that you did with the "Street of Rage" cameo, but I don't inherently have a problem with what's there. Fairly solid for a more cover-ish/sound upgrade arrangement approach. Definitely want to get this posted in some form, and I could also see the case for passing this as is. IMO, the snare drum pattern being bland, mostly metronome-like, and seemingly lacking round-robin style humanization/variations from verse to verse (i.e. not overtly different-sounding enough) was holding this back. proph seems to think this only needs some minor adjustments, and I get where he's coming from; aside from the drum issue, it's otherwise well in the right direction, Andy! If this doesn't make it as is, I definitely hope you're open to some tweaks to the drum writing/programming to really get this sounding its best. It's a pleasure to see something from you in the inbox once again! :-) NO (resubmit)

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My vote from 2021 remains the same: The arrangement aspect of it is just too minimal. Just two repeating lines of the stripped down source tune that desync and wind up back in sync. A fun audio gimmick, but not a developed arrangement by any stretch. And that’s OK, it just falls outside of our arrangement standards. I'll add that the source tune itself has more ideas to mine or be inspired from like the string accents (arrive at :12) or textural/dynamic changes (1:14-1:39 & 1:58-end), so consider adding in some arranged accents, or trying something else entirely different that's additive (since the base pattern keeps the source usage). It'll sound like I'm saying you have to reference other areas of the source; that's not necessary, but there needs to be further arrangement development due to the premise as is not offering enough of that. NO

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Original Decision Artist Name: Michael Hudak This is a phasing music piece that repeats the riff from "Guardian Battle" over and over, which I think reflects nicely the relentlessness of the Guardians themselves. I first made this in '21, and have since made tiny tweaks off-and-on over the years. About phasing: Phasing is an approach to minimalist composition in which two identical tracks start playing at the exact same time and tempo, but slowly move out of phase with each other as one track speeds up or slows down while the other remains the same. As they begin to slide out of phase, first you hear a doubling effect, then a delay that becomes more and more pronounced, and then finally they become totally de-synced as new rhythms appear and different combinations of notes overlap. Steve Reich popularized (many say came up with) the idea in the 1960s with his piece "It's Gonna Rain". He took two tape machines with the same tape, started them at the same time, and after a few minutes they began to move out of phase due to one of the machines playing very slightly slower than the other - "process music" as he called it. He would expand on this idea over the next several years with "Come Out", "Piano Phase", "Violin Phase", "Clapping Music", and "Drumming". Reich would become one the most influential American composers of the 20th century in large part to his phasing music pieces. About this piece: Obviously, a DAW will play a loop perfectly for as long as you want, so I started with a ~4-minute loop at 160 bpm, and another starting at 160 but eventually ending at 158 using an almost flat tempo automation ramp. I wanted to get a vintage tape machine sound like in "It's Gonna Rain" and "Come Out", but also the reverb of the orchestral space in "Piano Phase", so I tried to combine those lo-fi and hi-fi sounds. I ended up creating two more identical tracks by filtering out the low end and bringing up the white noise. The hissing, more airy tracks slowly pan out as the more midrange-y tracks pan in, and vice-versa. The loop is an octave higher than the source; I experimented with the original octave but it didn't "pop" the way I wanted it. It became too much of a low-midrange drone. There are some slight granular effects that simulate the grinding low piano in the source, but overall I REALLY had to resist the urge to add more bells and whistles, and to just rely on the purity of my initial idea of Reich + Guardian riff. As for source usage, it's ~100%, if - and here's the gray area - IF you can train one ear (either one - it's easier with headphones) to discern the source as the tracks move out of phase. The bit from 0:04 in the source is always playing, but whether or not it's recognized is on the listener, hence my incredulously long write-up for submission. For ~15 seconds at the start it's played by both tracks at once, and again for ~15 seconds at 3:25 after everything comes back into phase. 3:32 has the only appearance of the melody that happens in the source at 0:12. In the end, I couldn't resist adding it. Thanks for anyone tasked with judging this one for taking the time to read this long explanation, and for considering another left-field submission. You won't hurt my feelings if the lo-fi aesthetic or the esoteric nature of the piece disqualifies it from the main page. Just had to finally close the book on this one either way. Games & Sources Source arranged: Guardian Battle Steve Reich compositions that inspired this ReMix: It's Gonna Rain; Come Out; Piano Phase; Violin Phase; Drumming.

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