Liontamer

Whether an artist thinks the music untouchable or they can't hope to rise to the challenge of competently interpreting it, I love hearing artists compelled into arranging music that's seemingly sacrosanct. It's music and it's art, so it's not sacred. Dive in! Excellent job at changing the rhythms and mood of Delita's theme; very, very nice. The changeup at 1:58 to the world map theme was abrupt IMO, but the flow isn't badly broken. I agreed with Chimpazilla that more dynamic contrast somewhere would have been cool; for me, it's not even pointing out a flaw, rather just expressing a preference. I love how the tone and rhythms of this remind me a lot of Final Fantasy X's "Silence Before the Storm." Stevo's really grown since his more leathery [ ] attempts at music back in the day, and he's been killing it with his work for years now. That said, hearing him present this excellent 12-string arrangement, it's always great to hear him add new wrinkles to his game. Very nice work. YES

I'm glad you came around to reworking this after the decision, Austin. As we like to say, we're not here to tear you down, only build you up. No need to call this "v2," since we don't name files with revision numbers, and, like you said, this isn't much different from the structure of the first version, just tweaked and enhanced. The arrangement was generally good before, so I'm glad you didn't try to overhaul it, because you didn't need to do much to get this above the bar. Glad to hear the volume increased as well, all without harming the overall clarity of the piece. Nice work there. I still felt some of the synths used were plain (only some though), but it's not just about those sound choices, but how they're used. Now all of the textures click better and sound fuller in the middle, which also enhances everything else. This original version was already well on the way to passing but now the overall sound design is markedly more creative, and the middle section sounds excellent. With the middle section filled out and made more varied and interesting (e.g. 2:31-3:13), now you're playing with power. Good tasteful usage of SFX and pads; the dropoff still contrasts well from the beat-driven sections, but now the piece isn't too empty in the effort to create that dynamic shift. Also, using the phasing SFX only one time at 3:52 instead of multiple times was a good move; now it really serves as a strong transition point for the piece ramping back up. If you were going to keep it in one place, that was the right spot. I love mixes from games that haven't been represented on OCR before, so thank you also for bringing in the Lawnmower Man soundtrack to our attention. What else can I say? Excellent revisions. Welcome aboard, Austin! YES

Original Decision Remixer Name: APZX Real Name: Austin Simons User ID: 30429 Game Arranged: The Lawnmower Man (SNES) Song Arranged: The Streets/Suburbia Additional Game Information: The SNES version of the game, which is where I pulled the original composition from, had Allister Brimble as the composer. However, there are other versions of the game: DOS/Composer: Fergus McNeill, Sega CD/Composer: Unable to locate, Gameboy/Composer: Teque London (not able to find a specific person), and Genesis/Composer: Allister Brimble. Original Soundtrack for the SNES: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoxiH0fOTu4&list=PLAED9ADB3D10DCC4B The specific track for the remix can be found at the following link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJP_IswK4p4 Comments: Right so I'm resubmitting this under the ever so slightly different title of "Cyber Mower v2" because I feel it differs too much from my original vision of the track, which the panel had picked up on, but did not feel it worked for OCR. I completely understood where the panel was coming from honestly, and while originally irate I thought about it and ended up agreeing the with panel in the end. Now, the track is still very much Cyber Mower, just with "enhancements" (I hope). Other than revisiting the mix, which I always had personal complaints about, the primary focus was on the middle of the track. I spent a lot of time deliberating on how best to keep a nebulous middle that was more interesting to listen to. To that end I reworked the macro dynamics of that portion of the track quite a lot. Added in some more instrumentation primarily in the form of another layered pad, a lead that borrows mostly verbatim from the source, and some drums that while short lived I can only describe as cyber meets ambient, which really doesn't make any sense. Overall I have to say that I think the track is more energetic now with a more complex flow. Don't know what else to say.

Try to come up with an actual creative title for your arrangement, just to have it stand apart a little from the original song. The opening was cool. Lead synths at :12 were vanilla despite the effects surrounding it. The arrangement's pretty plain aside from the adaptation to this instrument set & genre. Already at :47, the verses are being looped wholesale. By 1:05, the beatwork was getting pretty boring. There needs to be more interesting, varied things going on with it; offbeats, rhythmic or sound changeups. Geez, then a simple key change at 1:27, but the same overall writing ideas being repeated. 1:44 did change the instruments for the chorus and not just the key, but the arrangement remained very straightforward. Mixing-wise though, this sounded pretty solid. Everything was at reasonable levels, and I could hear all the parts clearly. Good job there! Overall though, this is just very underdeveloped & repetitive, both in the arrangement of the source tune itself, and the drum writing, which needed variation to keep things evolving and interesting. Decent start, but it's only at a work-in-progress level of development, not a fully fleshed out concept. NO

Yeah, immediately on starting this track, the level of white noise disqualifies this on account of poor production. Props for doing something outside of your usual zone, but the execution still needs to be of a reasonably good quality. Arrangement-wise, the interpretation was good. Loved the slowed down introduction and flourishes here to start things off. The transition at :50 was awkward, I'll agree, but it was nothing to stop the show over. At 1:29, when the piano became more forceful, it seemed like it should have been even more powerful. The left-hand timing from 2:05-2:12 was pretty stiff, even for a live performance; not a big deal, just noting it. Even within a more minimalist piece with less pronounced peaks & valleys, I felt the writing implied more power and dynamic contrast than what was presented here after 1:29. It basically peaked at 1:53, with some very brief intense moments, but that was it. So consider 1) tweaking the structure, if you think it could improve the presentation, and 2) and tightening up the performance, but I agreed with the others that 3) the white noise was the big issue. In any case, you're an awesome musician, so hopefully you don't let this piece not making it get you down. You get our respect for sure in doing a piano piece, and I hope you send more arrangements like this in the future. NO (resubmit)

Not a perfect production revision, but 90% of the way there. The important thing was that now you can actually hear the parts distinctly. The mixing could have used some more sharpness and higher frequencies; right now, it feels like all the highs got cut. The overall volume now seemed below other songs I compared it with, so there's too much empty space despite the power of the performance. That said, nothing was mudding together anymore, and this is MUCH better as far as being able to hear the various parts. Great job on cutting the "frequency fat," so to speak, and finally letting the part-writing breathe here. Arrangement was strong stuff to begin with, so I'm still on board with that. Very nice job pulling this back from the brink, Mak! YES EDIT (8/14): Just adding a note that Mak was able to bump up the volume after his last set of touch-ups, so everything's firing on all cylinders now.

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Just linking this information on the CU Amiga magazine coverdisk release of the game where the source is used, verifying that it's a piece of music composed for the game, even though it did not get used in the final commercial version: http://amr.abime.net/issue_595 https://archive.org/stream/cuamiga-magazine-029/CUAmiga_029_Jul_1992#page/n21/mode/2up

BTW, Wes, the ending cuts off abruptly. Need a fix for that with a new WAV.

You can only link an image hosted elsewhere, not upload it.

I didn't agree with Chimpa on the lead being in the uncanny valley. The way it modulates (e.g. :15-:17, :19-:21, :23-:25), it just sounds like a keyboard patch or synth. Didn't bother me at all, I loved it. Good funky supporting writing to help add something different to the picture for an otherwise relatively straightforward take on the melody. At 1:24, I thought the backing percussion would go to more different places and create more dynamic contrast, so there was some disappointment there on a personal level, but the level of interpretation was still solid. 2:20 moved over into some soloing over the source's chord progressions. I agreed with Chimpa that the guitar work was a touch too loud, so I see where the "pasted on top" comment came from, since it could have sat with the other instrumentation a little better. That said, I can live with how it's mixed there, and it wasn't a dealbreaker at all. Chimpa mentioned it bothered her that the track didn't overtly circle back to the source tune, and I understand that, but IMO it shouldn't affect my vote. For me, 2:19's worth of source usage in the front was already more than half of the track (4:28-long), so I myself don't have a problem with the source usage being front-loaded like that, and then going toward wholly original material for the second half. Ideally, this would have explicitly circled back to the "Chrono Trigger" theme, but to me that has 0 to do with whether the source material was "identifiable and dominant" according to the standards. To me, voting it down on lacking an A-B-A structure or extended soloing would be more of a personal preference on how we'd like to hear an arrangement structured; it's not something that's stated in the Submission Standards. At the end of the day, the wholly original section pieced together fine with the first half due to the shared backing instrumentation. The source tune was conservatively structured but personalized in the arrangement, and everything flowed together fine when moving over into the second half. I'm comfortable with Sean's take here. YES

Opening guitar synth sounded super fake, like FL Slayer, so we'll see where this goes. Opening groove was static. Opening verse at :31 was spartan, with flimsy drums & flimsy synths for the lead and countermelody. On the plus side, the cymbal work sounded much more realistic, as well as full of energy. If only the rest of the instruments sounded as full. The backing writing seriously needs some sophistication; the writing's too simplistic and the sound is too thin, so there's no energy here. The arrangement isn't meaningfully interpretive beyond adapting it to a new instrument set. Original section at 1:58-2:09 over the bassline was meandering; 2:10's section was more interesting, but the sounds chosen aren't great. I liked the rhythmic changeup from 2:43-2:44; more interesting ideas like that would have been interesting instead of the close cover route most of the way here. I agree with Chimpazilla in that you need to decide if this track is supposed to sound zany or not, but you also need richer, fuller textures, less more creative drum writing, and (most importantly) a more creative & personalized approach on the source tune. The arrangement's repetitive and underdeveloped. NO

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Sounds like the intro may be directly sampling the original audio, not just the melody but the ambiance. I'm definitely frowning on this so far, because this doesn't readily display enough original ideas/contributions to stand apart enough from the original song, and it's leaning on the direct audio sampling hard, but we'll see where this goes. OK, so this is definitely sampling the original audio very heavily, just with some of the SPC channels turned off and the speed slowed down. Finally at :59, we get some original instrumentation added to supplement all that. The various new parts added in at 1:00 are fighting to be heard until 1:40, so the mixing doesn't make much sense. Also, the lead from :59-1:40 is arranged, but it's repeating a lot, like there are no other ideas for the melody. Next section at 1:40's just more sampling from the original audio, plus beats. The dry kick/clap pattern quickly became monotonous, so I was glad when it dropped around 2:11. Weird, abrupt transition at 2:21, but we'll see where this goes as well. 2:50 shifted back to the source melody, finally for the first time without direct audio sampling behind it. The increase in intensity at 2:50 was noted, but the soundscape never sounds sharp and the various synths just aren't mixed well; the lead is just abrasive and loud, yet also somewhat struggling to be fully heard vs. the other parts here, just like from 1:00-1:40. The effects tended to muddy up the soundscape, and while the surrounding writing did change around the lead, the lead just repeated over and over again from :59-1:40 and 2:50-3:51, and it got old. Production-wise, clean up the soundscape some and properly balance the parts so the lead is truly the lead and the supporting writing supplements that instead of mushing together with the lead in the same frequency range. Arrangement-wise, reduce the sampling of the original audio and see if there are other ways to explore the theme, since there was too much leaning on that one 9-second loop of the melody. Interesting approach, Lion, it's just not cohesive yet. NO

In the attempt to give the piano sound some depth and room ambiance, I thought the soundscape sounded needlessly muffly; it wasn't a dealbreaker on its own. During the flourish, the higher notes from :34-:39 were the first big indication that the sequencing was too rigid. :56-1:07, 1:19-1:36 & 1:50-2:14 in particular sounded very blocky, and really exposed the sample. Actually, 2:18-2:33's exposed as well, 2:50-2:54 is egregious.... OK, so basically the entirely of the track suffers from this, as I listen on. Anything softer like 3:01-3:12 ends up sounding less exposed, but really the whole thing's way too tightly timed. Well, the arrangement is structurally conservative, but certainly interpretive; easy pass on that level. However, we'll never pass something with rigid timing like this vis a vis our current production standards. MikeDubs, my man, this sounds like a mess. Some YouTube n00b commenter with no ear could claim this sounds great, and get swept up in the nostalgia, but this sounds robotic and devoid of life, which undermines a strong arrangement. The piano lacks body and realism, the dynamics are much flatter than the writing intended. Sorry to seem curt, that's just how internet comments look when you can't hear any emotional context. The arrangement is strong, but the sequencing/timing kills this dead, and you're much more talented than that just based on the Mega Man Harry Potter-esque arrangement of yours that we approved. Like Chimpa and Emu have said, you need to adjust timings here to achieve a reasonably realistic/humanized feel to this. On the orchestration side, you've seemingly got things on lock as far as achieving a reasonably realistic sound. You're need that same standard when it comes to solo piano. It's been a while since you've submitted this, so if you haven't improved how you use these samples since then, create a thread in the Music Composition & Production forum, name it "NEED HELP: Realistic sound using Cinesamples Piano in Blue", link this arrangement as an example, and see if anyone can give you more targeted advice. NO (resubmit)

IMO, the vocal performance is solid enough; I get where Chimpa's coming from, but I didn't feel they were too pitchy or nasally in any major way. I did agree though that the vocals are just way too dry at :17. You don't have to produce your vocals like Malukah, but the vocals have no body to them, so the track sounds empty. Nice sound to the guitar at :51. The whole instrumental performance is good, and the overall interpretation of the source is fun, like a bar song (though it doesn't have that ambiance). The airier sound to the vocals at :09 & 1:34 was better, and though I hear what you're going for in terms of them sounding far away, I felt the placement was TOO distant and should have been louder there. Yeah, gotta agree with the others that the dryness leaves this feeling spartan. I don't think you necessarily need to add any other instrumentation, but you do need to fill out the soundscape fully. Good stuff so far though, Riccardo. I unfortunately don't have vocal production experience, but if you post your track at the Workshop forums, you may be able to get some more feedback and direct advice on that level. If you're willing to revisit this after so long, perhaps you can tweak this to where everything has more body to it. NO (resubmit)

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Nice sound to start; good guitar tone, and good pads. Kick drums at :19 certainly have a lot of punch; maybe too much. Really loving the relaxed feel of this genre adaptation already. Texture got cluttered at :57 with the electric guitar coming in. IMO, the guitar from :57-1:34 (while it's performed excellently) was mixed too loudly when it was clearly a supporting item that was adding body and should have played second fiddle to the melody. The mixing made more sense when the lead guitar actually took over as lead at 1:34 for the wholly original section. I wrote these criticisms before reading Chimpa's comments, so I'm glad we're on the same page. It's nothing that put the piece in any danger of not passing, so it's just an observation. The energy and soloing from 1:33-2:18 was beast, and it could be a lot of folks favorite part within an abundance of great sections. Nice dropoff at 2:12 back to the more ethereal soundscape; the transitions flow so smoothly and click so well here. I thought around 2:40 things should have started picking up a little quicker, but it's certainly no big deal; I see exactly how James is working this, giving the sparse section room to breathe and enough time to create dynamic contrast with the rebuild after it. Same mixing issue as :57-1:34 from 3:46-4:24 where the backing guitar is too upfront and creates mud/clutter; everything would have been clicking on all cylinders if that aspect was tweaked. Also, some more high-end clarity across the piece would have let this shine more, so that's unfortunate. Otherwise, good intensity, dynamic contrast, and performances! Like Chimpa, I would have like some mixing adjustments to this, but it's solid nonetheless; just an excellent, personalized rock cover. I know that Ben Prunty's wanted someone to get FTL represented here for a while, so after all of the awesome things Ben said about OCR with his Metroid Prime submission, I'm glad we could finally have his original work represented on the site. I'm sure he's heard & enjoyed this great piece from the great music video, so it's fitting to have him represented as a composer with an excellent interpretation like Little V's. Welcome aboard, James! YES

Life does not work that way. Anyway, folks, definitely feel free to help out Air3s, he's extremely talented. If he doesn't deserve your vote, just don't give it to him, but show some love if he deserves it within the pool of what you're voting on.

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Just sanity-checking the source tune usage: 04.5-:44.5, 1:29.5-2:09.5 = 80 seconds or 54.4% overt source usage The mixing's rough in that you can't distinguish much of the supporting instrumentation (except the percussion, which sounds solid). There's string writing in there... somewhere... in the background, but it's trampled on by the guitar chugs. The string articulations sounded pretty unrealistic from what I could make out, so it's possble cleaning this up would expose the samples more, but you're going to have to improve the string realism if that's the case. When the source melody arrived again at 1:29, I wish the presentation had been more differentiated from the first time around; for example, the (extremely muddy, barely audible) string accents were exactly the same. Regardless though, even though the track was short, the treatment of the source tune was personalized well enough with the added part-writing and live guitar performance. Even if more melodic interpretation could have been included, the expansion of the parts surrounding the melody helped, plus the original sections connected seamlessly with the Wily theme. You just need to reduce the background clutter here while preserving the power, so that this isn't mainly just the lead guitar and background chugs. And just noting I didn't even read the other votes until I wrote everything above, so we're all hearing the same issues and praising the same things. Hopefully, you choose to come back to this one and give it the production tweaks it needs so we can post it. Great start, Juha! Even if this mix doesn't go up in some form, you definitely have what it takes to get a piece approved, so don't give up! NO (resubmit)

With the new forums in place, I updated the forum links and also clarified the statement on how voting works: Decisions on submissions forwarded to the panel are reached by a majority of a panel quorum; a unanimous vote will be closed after three negative votes or four positive votes. A split decision will be closed after a difference of three votes (e.g. 5 YES's vs. 2 NO's), or extended to a majority vote at the request of a judge. In addition to his power to veto any submission regardless of the panel's decision, djpretzel may also serve as a tiebreaker during particularly divisive decisions. Generally speaking, the order in which the panel hears a piece shouldn't matter too much, because There have been times where decisions initially going one way have flipped to the other result, but usually by the time 3 judges have heard something, if someone was going to dissent, they would have. For some unanimous decisions, I've sometimes asked for an extra vote due to not being sure if someone else would dissent or not. If a vote is very close, we can have most or all of the judges vote, in case there are enough votes remaining to change the decision; If an artist or the community strongly disagrees with a NO decision and feels it went the wrong way, we'll revisit it. By being willing to take all of those steps, we try to have a system where the order of voting shouldn't affect the outcome, and if a mistake appears to be made, we'll re-assess it.

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I would call your track an original piece with a similar style and instrumentation to "Europe" from Terranigma. A "remix" typically samples the audio of the original song. An "arrangement" or "cover" are the same thing, which is an adaptation of a composition to new instrumentation and/or a new genre, regardless of the level of interpretation, and typically does not rely upon the use of the original song's audio. Arrangements/covers can be conservative OR liberal. Very conservative arrangements retain the notes, tempo, rhythm, key and/or mood as the original song. Arrangements that are more liberal/transformative change several or all of those aspects, often drastically, and also can include new original part-writing not found in the original composition. e.g. Coldplay's "Talk" (2005) ...is an arrangement of... Kraftwerk's "Computer Love" (1981) When we say "OC ReMix", they're actually not "remixes" (lowercase), it's just a brand name for "transformative video game music arrangement". Some OC ReMixes are more conservative than others when it comes to the level of interpretation, but many OC ReMixes are liberal arrangements, which is on purpose. We don't require our arrangements to be "true to the original"; they can be, but it's not necessary, and we feel it's creatively limiting. Nowadays, "remix" has incorrectly become shorthand for any different version of a song, so most people just call anything that is an arrangement/cover a "remix". Even here, we do it. (Capitalizing "ReMix" takes effort we're not all willing to give. ) But if there's no original audio being sampled, it's actually an arrangement and not a remix.

No need for a source breakdown on this, it's all very straightforward usage of the two themes, with "Waterfall" basically everywhere except "Jungle" used from 1:42-2:21. Soundscape was already pretty cluttered at :11, but little did I know... I'll just be honest, a lot of this sounded like mud. For example, the accenting string work got buried in the background from :37-:47 & 1:06-1:39; it might as well have not been there. I can pick out the bassline, but that's also pretty buried. The lead brass from 1:17-1:37 should have stood out more, but it's competing with the strings, electric guitar, and bassline, and nothing stands out as a result. Nice "Jungle" theme usage from 1:42-2:21 to change the tone and energy level of the piece, before going back to "Waterfall" at 2:21. What can you say, the arrangement is intense, the instrumentation was very expansive, and the delivery was very personalized. Small detail but the way the final note faded out at 3:11 was WAY TOO FAST, c'mon. I literally said "What are you doing?" at my screen. Bah. :-/ If you can fix that, do it. OK, so when I walked into this decision thread, this had a lot of things going for it. Not that I'm walking into with bias, but just acknowledging that this had... 1) one YES vote already laid down 2) Hakštok and Sixto involved 3) it's Contra ... I was primed to think this was a pass. If this were JUST about arrangement and not about reasonable production, I would have went YES. But this mixing is definitely very muddy, with 1:17-1:37 & 2:13-3:10 being the worst offenders. There's just too many areas where instruments bleed together and wash out. Basically, you need to go back to this, rework every section that has electric guitar in it and clean up the densest sections. Awesome arrangement that needs another pass at the mixing. I may be the outlier, but if it passes as is, it'll definitely be something where Jorrith looks back later on and realizes this mixing job underminded this otherwise-impressive, hard-hitting collaboration. NO (refine/resubmit)