Liontamer

PM me the information, and I can look for it.

I hate them already!

DaMonz, Sir_NutS, and Gario! We also have a NEW Workshop evaluator, Amphibious, giving WIP feedback & advice! As I like to say, welcome them aboard, and/or express your anger and skepticism!

Without being prompted, I actually received a PM on March 12th from Air3s that he has a forthcoming update to this track. He's dealing with some frequency issues, so he told me on the 18th to hold up on dealing with the revised version, BUT it had some updates to leads and textures that I think might put it over the top. Also, the cutoff ending was a rendering error that he corrected. Rather than reject, I'll keep this open as he says he plans to have that update by Sunday. -------------------- https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzZ-TkKWy5oLZXBkc094V0tsVkE/view?usp=sharing ------------------------------------------------ EDIT (4/19): Sorry to Air3s for slacking on providing this update to the panel. New dad/baybeh times let this get away from me. That said, it was nice to get an update on this without any prompting, so I like that Adeseye had an open mind to go back to this one long after he subbed it. The structure is mostly the same, but there's: * compression reduced * some minor instrumentation changes * a little more dynamic contrast with the textural dropoffs * a little more ear candy (e.g. 1:45, 3:07) * pair of click/pops removed (1:43 & 3:20) * proper ending included (4:22; cutoff was a rendering error last time) There's some ducking at 1:29 during the fullest section of beats that Air3s was aware of and tried to mitigate, where it sounds like other parts drop in volume as the beats hit, but it didn't bother me enough. Everything I liked about the arrangement and subtle morphing of the track is intact, so I retain my (currently sole) YES and hope others reconsider their vote.

Good stuff per Brandon's usual. The piano sample needed more body and humanization to it, but it wasn't a huge deal. Love the textures here, and the electric guitar soloing, while performed with some perceived stiffness at times, filled a nice role here. Sweet resolution at 3:51 as well. Relaxing adaptation, cleanly mixed with every part able to be appreciated, and nicely executed! YES

The answer is likely no on takedowns OR having an explicit policy, but that said, don't monetize them. You can find plenty of YouTube arrangements of Atlus game soundtracks, so I'm not sure what you're worried about. Just do it.

Well, it's a tough break that the melody's obscured as the notes transition at 1:40 and 1:48 due to fading that lead in and out. That wouldn't change anything for me, but you have a point that it may just be the chords. I'll just say that not counting the transposed chords in the mix is, in effect, punishing the arrangement for the source tune's opening being simple, which doesn't make sense for me. OK, so instead of B-C, it's E-F, plus there's no credit given to the timing of it also matching the source, which is pretty important. He's still explicitly referencing it, and that's what counts.

Your ReMixer name: SlimyEmail:Website: https://soundcloud.com/slimy-4User ID: 30104Submission Information:Game: Double DragonName of Arrangement: Game Like It's 1988Name of Songs Arranged: Title Theme, Mission ScreenLinks to Originals:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M77093Txe-c&list=PL918478793D2E4C44&index=1https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XAvPSS9nTQ&list=PL918478793D2E4C44&index=2Comments: "Make a Double Dragon remix and avoid the horrendous waiting period for judging? I'll make one in five minutes." Thus motivated by greed, I scoured YouTube for the perfect track for remixing. After many hours of searching, I found the one - the first one I had come across, to be precise."Maybe the intro of the song would sound good on vibes or something," and suddenly, 37 seconds of the remix were finished. So far, so good. Then I was faced with the prospect of writing more than 37 seconds of music.Out of sheer desperation, I decided to just copy the chord progression from Raiden II and butcher the source melody so that it could fit over the new chords. An 80's vibe loomed threateningly overhead.After a whole 30 seconds I arbitrarily decided to shoehorn in the mission select theme as a completely different style because "it would sound cool." The song sort of wrote itself after that.____The pulse wave at 1:09 is meant to sound similar to the 8-bit pulse wave in the original, like it was ripped straight out of the original, albeit in a different key and with some reverb and vibrato. I like the contrast it brings.I'm not really familiar with arranging for this kind of genre, so I owe a huge thanks to everyone who critiqued this in the workshop, ridding it of my ineptitude.One last comment, does the title of this remix sound dumb? I asked in the workshop, but no one told me if it's acceptable to use "game" as a verb. --------

I passed on the panel's votes onto Robert, who actually sent 2 new versions on February 12th, but liked his second revision more after mulling it over. The compression's pulled back some, there's more EQ work, AND there's more dynamic contrast with the synth choices & textures. All in all, this makes a good thing even better!

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

Quick vote. Good source. Checked out. Mixing was smoove. Let's go. YES

The "Hey, Listen!" voice clip at :09 was a pretty lame transition, and made the mixing of the overall track sound off because the clip sounded so clean, unlike the actual music. WAY too much delay on this, with the delay flooding the soundfield; super muddy. At least the other voice clips (2:02, 2:31, 2:46, 3:00, 3:26) had more delay effects and sounded comparably distant like the music, but they're cheesy and corny. The percussion writing was pretty low-key, but fit the track well, particularly the cymbal work; however, the one downside there is that the percussion writing didn't evolve for the most part, which caused the track to drag over time. I didn't have as much of the problem with the other theme cameos here feeling tacked on, as they were reasonably integrated, IMO; I felt the muddy mixing and the lack of dynamic contrast in the arrangement ultimately were enough to drag this down to a NO. I'd suggest 1) reduce the mud while preserving the dreamy soundscape, 2) either ice the tacky voice clips or better integrate them into the soundscape, and 3) vary the percussion textures & energy to create more dynamic contrast. You show potential, Joo; keep at it! NO

I liked that opening for changing the rhythm of the source. At :29 with the beats coming in, the bass is too loud yet the claps were flimsy, which was an odd texture, but nothing horrible. If anything the bass thumping so loudly was causing what appeared to sound like a slight volume ducking effect, at least for me; hopefully a musician/producer J can clarify what may be happening there. Nice lil' bubbly original countermelody filled in at :45; it's not too noticeable unless you're outright looking for it, but it's present and showed nice attention to detail work in the writing. Whoa, the melody at 1:30 sounds super jacked up. First, why is it, as the lead melody, placed behind the beats in the soundfield? Second, why is the timing staggered in a way that sounds so sloppy? At 2:00, the briefly added line in the left channel that doubled the melody was panned too widely. The dropoff at 3:00 wasn't bad at all; the original writing there continued to have a good rhythm, and the melody coming back at 3:30 had much better timing that clicked much more strongly with the altered rhythm. Good, subtle escalation of the energy level at 4:00 with the source tune's countermelody gradually rising in volume. The bass frequencies at 4:30-4:51 and again at 5:00 were creating mud again. At 5:00 also, there should have been something else going on with the arrangement, as the ideas, energy level, and textures were all feeling too repetitive. 6:00 did add one more plucked string line which had a good sound to it and focused on that for the winddown finish. For what substance is there, this piece overstayed its welcome by at least a minute or two; this is a great start in terms of the arrangement, and is definitely transformative and creative, but some of the repetition of the fullest sections dragged on. Other than that, cleaning up the mixing (particularly the bass/low end) on this would be the most important aspect to address, followed by (less importantly) adjusting that melody at 1:30 so its a more comfortable (yet not repetitive) fit. Really cool stuff so far, Deronde, this was a solid start, and I hope you consider revising it. Even if you don't, you clearly have potential as an arranger based on the creativity here, and hope this isn't your last OCR submission. NO (resubmit)

I didn't recognize any of "The Battle of the Island in the Void," but the "Last Battle" usage was substantial enough where source usage didn't seem to be a problem. At 1:17, the adaptation of the "Last Battle" verse to piano initially felt too plain, but things got a little more personalized from 1:33-on, showing off more flair and natural performance dynamics. Awkward drop of the note at 2:20, but a good recovery otherwise. Arrangement-wise, it's somewhat by the numbers, but interpretive enough IMO. I didn't mind the click noises entirely, and -- at the level they were -- wouldn't reject an otherwise strong arrangement with good production for that reason; it adds character. John, are you sure you sent the correct version? You could already hear some very light buzzing/distortion around :21, but it really showed from 1:01-1:16. From 1:45-on, there's just lots of distortion at varying degrees of invasiveness. Also, the recording should have been clearer and cleaner; a blowaway performance can prop up a less than ideal recording, but not with distortion all over the track. If the production's jacked, we send it back. NO (resubmit)

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

I definitely hope this video gains more attention for Ensemble Urbane, this was a fun listen and well made! The Zelda portion has the best application of weaving themes together by adding in the Dungeon theme at 3:58 and using the arranged main theme alongside it. There was a lot more substance put into the Zelda to Tetris transition with some original writing, and if the whole arrangement had flowed like that, with less of the abrupt theme changes for a composition that sounded like one song rather than a mega-medley, we'd definitely post this. It's not to sell the effort short, because there's beautiful performance dynamics in play here from the live performance and adaptation to quartet. However, arrangement-wise, much of the structure was play Theme A a bit, then go to Theme B a bit, then Theme C a bit, etc. I love the piece, it unfortunately just falls outside of our wheelhouse with medleys needing to flow like one fully developed composition rather than having brief pieces of multiple themes assembled together. I wish the recording's had some more clarity, but the room ambiance works without a doubt, and the performances and video are impeccable. We aren't inherently against medleys, and have a lot of them posted, but the glue and flow between the themes is usually a lot smoother that simply stopping one theme and going to the next, which is ingrained into our guidelines. It definitely doesn't mean anything's wrong with this great performance, it's just doesn't line up with those specific guidelines enough. If you guys had any other performances where the composition was less of a "A, then B, then C" burst of theme with more substantial transitions and flow or just an arrangement with fewer themes that allowed more extended arrangements of those themes, y'all would be a shoo-in. NO

Places where I recognized source - :35-2:37.5, 3:30.25-3:42.5, 3:46.5-4:55.5 (quiet) I didn't readily recognize "The Day the World Revived" much, but it didn't matter. I ain't tellin' this guy nothin'. Nice work, Wes. YES

I agreed with Chimpazilla's criticisms and had some of my own to include: The intro was anemic (:01-:10) and not melodious (:10-:21). Not sure what the point of it was, but in my opinion, it didn't add anything to the track. Anyway, when the rap came in, things were at least more interesting. On the production side, the instrumental was too quiet compared to the vocals, so the backing music feels sparse and empty (including when the bigger beat was brought in from 1:04-1:25). The vocal layering during the chorus was effective though. 1:26-1:46's section was the coolest in terms of the blippy instrumentation, although that was brief. All of the percussion stuff from the drum machine sounded very robotic and stilted; the samples are too exposed for it, and it shouldn't sound so bland and static. Yeah, there's basically no ending, the track just immediately wraps after a verse; oh well. I like the vocal delivery, but not much of the instrumentation behind it, because the vocals don't sit into the music at all, and the music itself was too sparse like Chimpa said. This was very promising, but needs more sophisticated production/mixing, and a real ending. NO

Yipes. There's no beat, so it ends up sounding empty as hell. The textures at :08 are just too empty, especially with no meaningful percussion driving anything forward. Everything sounds ultra thin. Structurally and in tone, there's not enough different than Danny B's original version until :47 finally changes the rhythms a little. Very blocky sequencing in particular of the lead at 1:03. There's just 0 meat on the body to this at all. On the plus side, I liked the speedy guitar synth sequencing from 1:43-1:51 & 1:58-2:00, which was such a rare case of me digging a faux-geetar synth, but even then this track's still a victim of thin, empty textures and very mechanical sequencing. Don't get me wrong, this isn't supposed to ape Danny B's version, but there's charm in his and none in this; you really need something to flesh out the piece, and that means crafting your own percussion writing. You also need more richness/body to this instrumentation through effects or better samples; it can't sound bone dry like this. Cool start, Avery, but get that detail work in, and, through that, do more to make your arrangement stand apart from the original version. NO

Thanks a lot to DragonAvenger for her legwork in breaking this down, which helped me very much. I was telling her, it didn't help me that "Grahf" isn't a memorable theme for me, so I appreciate the extra attention to detail on the arrangement. The pattern starting at 1:14.5 is supposed to be a variation of the "Omen/Premonition" melodic rhythm, but it's different & non-melodious enough where I wouldn't count that as source usage. I also see how 1:29 related to :30 of the source and was something one could make a case for, but I felt like it was tweaked a bit too much compared to the source and didn't count that. Despite those liberal treatment issues in the first half, I was cool counting all of the second half and the source usage checked out just above dominant for what I'd count. For a 4:22-long track, there needed to be at least 131 seconds of overt source usage: 1:55.75-2:23 (:49 of source), 2:37.5-3:15.5 (:59 of source) - "Grahf" 2:23-2:36.5, 3:19.75-4:15.5 - "Omen" That came out to 134.5 seconds or 51.33% overt source usage, so the source material is dominant. Other than sanity checking the source tunes, this was on solid ground! There you go, Joe! YES

The piano sound was definitely making me want to go NO in spite of the performance and arrangement when I first heard this, but I don't have a vote yet. On production though, currently feeling NO. No vote from me until I formally evaluate it. EDIT (6/10): I haven't timestamped this on source usage grounds, but heard a fair amount of CV4 involved. If pressed, I'd be glad to time it out. Onto the production quality, some of the lower chords in particular sounded pretty lifeless, and I just feel the thin and stilted quality of the keyboard is ultimately too much of a negative sound quality choice. It sounds like a MIDI in places; there's not nearly enough velocity sensitivity here. Sam's performance dynamics are just undermined the entire way, so this is a case of the tools not adequately conveying the energy, humanity, and precision of the performance. I'm afraid I have to go NO on this version.

Now that I've heard this, just co-signing; this is good times. YES

Once the piece picked up around :26.75, the source tune was in play the entire time. The core groove was somewhat plodding, and I thought something less static would have increased the energy inherent in the writing and given more dynamic contrast. Bringing it back at 2:27 & 2:40 was pretty boring, but the rest of the arrangement was OK. It's good that it's fairly transformative to put it into this genre, because there's some repetition that drags it down. In particular, 3:07's use of the voice clip and then back into the melody at 3:20 felt like a total rehash of :40 voice work and :53's melody, but there was a touch more volume and minor additional writing to beef up the texture. I could see some NOs, but I'm not going to make the perfect the enemy of the good. Even though more substantial variations of the arranged theme would have made this a top-notch creative effort -- and I agreed with DragonAvenger that the quote was very overdone -- what's here from Andreas is substantially transformative with the theme, and reasonably mixed as well. Not a strong YES, but it gets it done. YES (borderline) EDIT (3/17): Reading the NOs, I agree on the production criticism on the soundscape sounding washed out, but it wasn't quite enough of a negative for me to go NO. It's "reasonably mixed" in the sense that it's not a dealbreaker for me, and I can make out the parts well enough. Still a YES, but added "borderline" to it to better emphasize it's not a strong one.

:08.5-:25.5, :37-1:51.5, 2:31.5-2:50.5, 3:37.75-3:54.5 = 127 seconds or 52.91% overt source usage (that I recognized) I'm hearing a ton of light crackling from 2:54-3:37; it's easy to miss or overlook, and wasn't a huge deal, but that's an unfortunate production issue. Otherwise, pretty solid arrangement and performance. I didn't hear the first version, but whatever held it back before isn't doing so now. The mixing was somewhat cluttered, but nothing that was below the bar since I could make out the various parts well enough. Let's go. YES

When the piece opened so quietly, I was initially put off because the accordions didn't sound like they were being played quietly as much as the master volume was reduced, so it sounded pretty unnatural. Thankfully, that was only a few seconds long and once things picked up, it was smooth sailing from there. I think DA's too risk-averse to voting YES. Nothing wrong with the structure being close as long as the approach is personalized and the overall presentation is substantially modified. This was great adaptation to orchestral with lots of smart original writing additions and ornamentation. The tempo slowdown and rise from :54-1:11 was well-written, and I'm impressed and appreciative with the arrangement not lazily retreading anything, since it was only 2:30-long. Fun source, and I'm surprised we're going to post a Bad Piggies arrangement before Angry Birds. And yet, here we are. Nice work, David! YES