Liontamer

I'm with Chimpa. The timing of the opening string attacks seemed slightly behind, but the main issue is that the articulations sounded pretty fake. Cool transition to the metal at :28, though the strings might as well have been removed because they were mixed so softly compared to the guitars & drums during that transition. When the strings come back as accents at :57, they again sound practically inaudible like they might as well not be there. I liked the string writing from 1:11-1:31, which was audible. The machine gun drums from 1:32-2:00 completely drowned out the xylo/chromatic percussion; again, the ideas are good, but what's the point of layering stuff if one part can't be heard anyway? I love the expansiveness, creativity, and energy of the arrangement and performance overall, and that aspect was an easy pass. I'm not even a strong NO because the case can easily be made that, on balance, the production is OK. For me, I think this was almost at the line, but there should be some adjustments to get the bowed strings sounding more humanized and, more importantly, re-balancing this so that some of your supporting instrumentation isn't completely squashed out by the face-melting guitar & drum work. Chimpa pointed out over-compression was hurting this, and her "NO (more like a conditional on non-squashed render)" is basically where I'm at as well. It's a close call. If we got a tweaked version that toned down the compression a bit, that might be all we need to flip some NOs to YESs. Good luck with the rest of the vote though, Meirone, this is awesome, and I definitely want to see this posted in some form. NO (refine/resubmit)

Here's a more specific link: http://www.npr.org/programs/morning-edition/2016/09/20/494684657/morning-edition-for-september-20-2016?showDate=2016-09-20 It's near the bottom after the Europe segment. We dunno who's involved in selecting the transition music, but we've also had a few pieces from our Mega Man X community album Maverick Rising used on NPR in the past also, so we'd love to know who to credit for that. Always down with VGM on NPR!

On the production side, I actually didn't have a significant problem with the mixing; I agree that this could sound brighter, but what's here was OK. The part-writing was distinct enough to be heard, and I felt like the mixing didn't hugely undermine the presentation. That said, if you're going to have a track that's only 2:11-long, there's less room for error with stuff like the strings very obviously lacking in humanization, IMO. The releases in particular sounded very exposed, and it just sounds like a composition-focused WIP where the final polishing steps weren't done yet. On the plus side with the arrangement, nothing repeated verbatim and the piece evolved nicely. This may make it as is, but I know Slimy will hate the execution of those strings in the future. If this doesn't make it yet, I'd vote YES just off of the strings sounding more humanized. Good base, but tighten this up. NO (refine/resubmit)

Fun stuff! Just co-signing that the source was dominant here, particularly because the chords being used are explicitly in the original track rather than a drastic simplification of anything. YES I'd be interested in Anton giving specifics on the other theme cameos he alluded to.

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djp's been busy/sick. So I'm doing some themed runs of mixes this month. Perhaps we'll have more activity later in the month.

Everything sounded distant, but increasing the volume a touch made it OK relative to the levels of a typical track. Agreed on the sax placement and energy feeling underwhelming, but that felt more like a balance issue. Didn't feel the key change into "Hopes and Dreams" at 2:53 flowed as well as it could have, but the combination of themes still worked fine. So I agreed with the others that the production wasn't ideal, but everything's solidly over the line with the arrangement creativity and overall mixing. Gimme dat chocolate! YES

There's certainly notable additive writing going on here, but on the whole it feels too similar in tone and structure to the original song without ENOUGH additive components. The wholly original stuff from 1:36-1:50 was nice albeit very brief. At only 2:18-long, there needs to be much, much more demonstrated in the way of development and interpretation for a piece this short. It's a cool sound upgrade approach, and Rebecca's tracks are well-made and enjoyable whether they follow OCR standards or not, but this doesn't pass on arrangement grounds. NO

Comment on each version together in one vote; try to find out the differences; I assume they aren't major. Then we can combine the two threads into one and have 3 NO votes.

Assuming you mean the intro song, I have no idea what it is, but it sounds great.

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Wow, that FL Slayer guitar sample ain't getting it done. The beats at :20 were thin, plainly-written, and droning, and the lead synth was super vanilla. Basically, all of the sound design was weak. At 1:38, the arrangement sounded like a cut-and-paste of :20's section. There was no synnergy or cohesiveness as far as these sound working together. To the extent that I was digging your Kingdom Hearts "Dearly Beloved" arrangement, I thought this was poor all-around and didn't have enough effort put into creative sound choices or a developed arrangement. Maybe this genre is outside of your wheelhouse, but there's just 0 polish or sophistication to the execution here. Sorry I don't have any praise for it, but I know you're capable of much more than this, Joey. NO

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Cool to hear this theme done in a such a bouncy style. Good use of the CV 2 GB and NES themes as the introductions to the Dracula X version of "Beginning." The textures were a bit busy for me personally, but the mixing was solid and the elements all sounded sharp. Won't be everyone's cup of tea, but I drink transformative tea. YES

Nice soundscape to open things up; a touch muddy, but purposeful. Some of the instrumentation tilted towards the generic side, but the overall treatment and production of these sounds was solid. Smaller detail, but it's nice to hear breakbeats with a different style of drum samples (first used at :35 with filtering that gradually dropped by :53). I liked how, even softly, there was almost always a line playing both the source melody and countermelody; the instrumentation and textures evolved constantly here, so there was never a dull moment. Very creative arranging, Daniel, and way to get a good deal of creative mileage with such a limited source! Welcome aboard! YES

Just noting that I've only heard the revised version. I was worried about the opening being so similar in instrumentation and tone to the original song, but it differentiates itself a lot once things kick in, as the others said. Loved the section using the more chippy elements the most, first isolated at 2:16. Later, at 3:16, I thought the opportunity was there for a more pronounced dynamic shift for the finish, but the wind-down at 3:44 worked nicely to mirror the close with the opening. Nice work, Brett! Short and sweet, count it. YES

Surprising arrangement approach, but I've been on the panel long enough to know that textural reduction is considered a very valid one. The interpretive aspect isn't lost at all either, which was just as important. Good use of the bubbling SFX, which fit very nicely in the soundscape both in the introduction and close, so I completely disagreed with Gario there; don't really care if it fits a beach vibe just because the word "surf" is in the submission letter. The subtle ramp-up at 2:12 and turn at 2:42 toward a different guitar rhythm and additional line in the background was well overdue, so I'm glad it all finally arrived; I would have felt compelled to reject this for a lack of development if the piece had hovered at the initial energy level and instrument set with a flat dynamic curve for 5 minutes. Everything after 2:42 continued to work well, including the dropoff back to the initial energy level at 3:41 but joined by the bubbling SFX and a more active lead. I could have gone for even more twists in this arrangement, but what's here works for the standards. Good job, Von! YES

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