Liontamer

Never!

Preview VROOM: Sega Racing: http://youtu.be/X6q4jLltA-U Download VROOM: Sega Racing: http://vroom.ocremix.org Torrent: http://bt.ocremix.org/torrents/VROOM_-_Sega_Racing.torrent Racing games were a huge love of mine, despite my being mostly terrible at them -- generally, the better the powerslides, the more fun I had -- and Sega's most fondly remembered products of the genre offered unique experiences, usually with music best described as "smooth," from rock to jazz and back again. It was probably fate I ended up working to finalize this album release, formerly subtitled "The Best of SEGA Racing." This was a long time coming: several years and several directors, many ups and downs, regrettable delays and omissions. Be aware that several tracks may have spent years in limbo, but are presented here without freshness dating. I was asked to take what we had, revise album art and help put together a release package, but I quickly uncovered quite a bit of incomplete work that I felt needed attention and further development. I'm pleased with the result: because of staff and artist efforts, we were able to establish a ten-track album (plus an instrumental), as opposed to a six- or seven-track EP. The original vision was to showcase the variety of soundscapes a person could drive a vehicle to, from slow-cruisin' tunes to more accelerated, upbeat tracks, to high-powered lead-foot bangers. We wanted to basically give you a smooth, steady ride in each song. What our artists and staff have put over the finish line will hopefully provide that sensation for you, even if you're not licensed and out on the road. Special thanks to Robbie "AkumajoBelmont" Sabo, creator and initial director, and to successors Niyazi "DiGi Valentine" Somnez, Stevo "Level 99" Bortz, and Dustin "Theory of N" Lagaly. Thanks also to all our contributors past and present. Enjoy the ride! - José E. Felix (José the Bronx Rican)

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

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

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

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

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

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

It could be because the filename was too long, which may have made it get truncated or altered after you downloaded it. I'm not sure if you're using Windows and your Windows Explorer hides file extensions, but if so and you're using Windows 10, open the album's folder, do View > Options > View folder and search options > Click the "View" tab > uncheck the box that says "Hide extensions for known known file types" > click "Apply" button, then you should be able to correct the extensions of the files to lowercase ".flac" and ".mp3". Let me know if I'm misunderstanding your issue though.

Jeez, tell 'em how you really feel. In any case, yes, it's dated, but it's actually not bad at all. The textures could have been filled out more and the lead selection could (arguably) be different, but I thought this was a nice upbeat interpretation. Good transformation here for its time. Some more clarity to the soundscape would have been nice as well, but it more than meets the bar for early 2001. The second half included some good padding via the light female vox, though it still felt a bit repetitive despite that. I thought this was a good start for Haroon, who showed that he had the right idea on personalizing his stuff from the start.

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The track was 3:21-long, so I needed at least 100.5 seconds of overt source usage for the VGM to be dominant in the arrangement. :26.5-:42, :48-1:03.5, 1:09.25-1:25.5, 1:30.5-1:46.5, 2:07.75-2:54 = 109.5 seconds or 54.47% source usage The approach here was definitely transformative, so I needed some time to get used to the track; I revisited this weeks later after making my first post, so I recommend the NO votes revisit this as well to make doubly sure they can't wrap their heads around the source usage. I did take some time away from it, but once I came back to it today, I understood the source usage pretty plainly; in fact, when it was in play, I couldn't help but focus on the source melody on brass RATHER than the surrounding instruments. The source tune's a pretty simple melody, so I strongly disagreed with the judges who said this is too transformative; being frank, I think rejecting this for the source tune being "unrecognizable" or "not recognizable enough" means we're doing a bad job, because aside from slowing the melody down and adding other writing in front on it, the melody is pretty straightforward. I'd get if the song were slowed down to 1% or something extremely drastic like that, but this is hardly slowed down enough to where we couldn't make it out. That said, doubling down on my previous point, the arrangement standards to my understanding are not and never have been whether listeners should be casually able to connect a ReMix to a source, but whether the judges engaged in active listening can. On the production side, I could have done without the hissing from 1:51-2:30, which sounded arbitrary; I'd rather have it removed, but I won't reject it for that. I didn't have a problem with the balance of the parts; your mileage may vary, but it's nothing messing up the listening experience. It would be a shame to reject this on arrangement grounds just because it took an unorthodox approach. This isn't how we should be doing things. YES

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Pretty dated at this point with pretty exposed & stiff-sounding samples; would love to hear Wingy give this one another go; he could craft something that sounded smoother, because the interpretation itself is strong.

Nice slowdown of the theme with a more pensive style. An arrangement doesn't have to be overcomplicated to work, and I'm fine with a flatter dynamic curve as long as there are dynamic things going on within that narrower range, which this has, IMO. By 1:12 in, it did drag on first blush if you focus on the main pattern, but other smaller details were going on from the very beginning. At 2:03 with another section of the theme, you hear more pronounced inclusion of gentle SFX, padding, and ornamentation, which helped spice things up along with some part doubling; good subtle stuff there. DragonAvenger's not wrong about that main pattern repeating a lot, and it being purposeful doesn't automatically mitigate that criticism. But to some extent it's a your-mileage-may-vary thing; to me, though the foundation was repetitive, it was interpretive and still served as a solid base that other subtler, evolving writing was built around, so I didn't have a problem with it as long as the other writing was varied. To me, ReMixes come in a lot of different forms, and I'm very open to something structured like this. YES

The synths coming in at 1:00 were pretty vanilla, but we'll see if the energy level or textures develop further. Bigger drums arrived around 1:24, but the overall energy was still very flat due to the lead. Melodically, there's not much going on different with this compared to the source, so there's more pressure, IMO, for the instrumentation to be fully clicking. Even at 2:49, there's a bit of a swell, but ultimately nothing fresh going on with the textures or the writing for the finish. I agreed with DragonAvenger that this is an excellent base, but some combination of more interpretive/varied treatment of the melody, changes or variations in the lead sound, and some more pronounced dynamic contrast over time would put this over the top. Good stuff so far, Phillip, please don't drop this one. Whatever you think works for you in terms of applying the criticisms to some revisions, that may be enough to put it over the top. NO (resubmit)

Would have liked a cleaner sound to this for sure, especially towards the second half when things got boomier. That said, loads of personality with this rendition of the title theme. Great energy here, something Ryan's always delivered.

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The track was 2:54-long, so I needed at least 87 seconds of source usage for the VGM to dominate the arrangement: 12.5-30.5, 1:10.5-1:49.75, 2:10-2:30, 2:39.5-2:54.5 = 92.25 seconds or 53.01% overt source usage Going for a pretty apparent (but legally different enough) soundalike of Afrosound's "El Pesebre" was interesting; I do wish the homage were more interpretive than mostly the note changes. I definitely see where DragonAvenger was coming from with her vote. Dynamically, there could have been more going on, and the dynamic curve was narrow, but for me there were enough subtle changes in the texture and energy level due to the different instrument timbres and combinations for some different sections. Being inspired by the samey structure & sound of "El Pesebre" explains what Daniel was going for there, not that that lowers the bar. To me, there was enough of an alteration in the style of the source tune here that I thought mitigated the downside of the flatter dynamic curve and repetitive sections. Even in the sections whether the writing repeated, the performances actually weren't cut-and-pasted, and that needs to be acknowledged. Smaller thing, but props to the bassline for always having a good presense. I agree that it should have been more varied, but it did its part as an additive part of the background; I actually listened to the HD version of "Dragon Roost Island" first that Daniel linked in his sub letter before going back to the original version of the song, and one YouTube comment that struck me was how the HD version -- for whatever reason -- eliminated the bassline from the song, an important detail that a lot of people would miss. There certainly could have been more pronounced dynamics and variation, but they were in fact there, and the arrangement was sufficiently interpretive. The "El Pesebre"' inspired sections did initially stick out as disconnected from the VGM arrangement side once you listen to that song, but everything ultimately pieces together just fine when you get used to the flow of the track. Good stuff with the final section around 2:30, which the track could have used more of besides that one quick original flourish. All that said, I can roll with this as is. YES

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Yep, the sound design was lacking, mainly for the electrosynths, and you also had realism issues with the timing of stuff like the bowed strings, and then most of the textures were too empty. But you did some good stuff with the available instrumentation in terms of creating your own sound. The arrangement did stand apart from the original source tune, even if the arrangement was melodically conversative. The way the textures feel so empty though, the percussion definitely doesn't drive the track forward. Definitely agreed on the lack of low-end hurting this. I did not get a sense of stagnation from the writing, just emptiness and the overall soundscape feeling too thin and the percussion production not adequately filling out the piece. Definitely get more feedback on this from the ReMixes area of the Workshop forums, because you show off a lot of promise. Good stuff so far, Zach, it lacks production polish to give your instrumentation more heft, and you'd also need to bring back in the low-end presense, but this was at least moving well in the right direction in terms of your arrangement/writing. I definitely hope you'll continue submitting here, even if it's not a revision of this one. Nice source tune choice, BTW. NO (resubmit)

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I gave a little more credit that Gario based on some of the brief 4-note variations clearly taken from the source that were sprinkled in beyond the two main arrangement sections. For me, they were enough to put the source usage over 50% of the track and make the VGM the dominant part of the arrangement. The track was 2:09-long, so I needed at least 64.5 seconds of overt source usage for the VGM usage to be dominant: :16.75-:45, 48.75-49.75, 52.75-53.75, 56.75-57.75, 1:00.5-1:02.5, 1:12.75-1:41, 1:44.75-1:45.75, 148.75-1:49.75, 1:52.5-1:53.5, 1:56-1:58 = 66.5 seconds or 51.55% overt source usage The arrangement is repetitive in terms of the sections, but the interpretation and integration with original writing were strong enough to mitigate that issue, so I'm OK with this as is. I didn't agree with MindWanderer at all on his production criticisms and felt it missed the forest for the trees in terms of the arrangement strength. There wasn't anything problematic in terms of any of the instrumentation, IMO, but we'll see what others think. Count me in on all levels, including the source usage squeaking by in terms of being enough. YES