Liontamer   Judges ⚖️

September 11-13, 2015 Hilton Alexandria Mark Center, Arlington, VA http://classic.magfest.org Let's talk video game music! OC ReMix: Honoring (and Boom-Tss'ing) Video Game Music Since 1999! PANEL TIME TBD Panelists: djpretzel Arrow DarkeSword José the Bronx Rican

It's funny that my impartiality would be called into question for not being biased like you are against arrangements with lyrics, but sure, I'll take that bet. Like djpretzel mentioned, we're underway with a large project to add descriptors to all of the mixes which (on the negative side) should help picky people avoid stuff that spooks them, but (on the much more positive side) help folks find more of what they like and learn more about the artists in the process. If you had suggested a metadata approach in your previous comments -- which you didn't -- I would have said we're already working on this. I wasn't trying to "rudely pacify" you like you'd be some wilting flower. The original post doesn't say "Post your unassailable opinion." I was only flatly and forcefully rejecting the worst and -- by your own admission -- most hyperbolic of what you suggested, i.e. "I wish OCR would split off vocal remixes to another site or something," "lately it feels like lyrical new releases outnumber the instrumentals," and that vocals mixes are "tainted." Those things were said under the claim of somehow being good to the fans as a whole if we moved the vocal tracks, but would just stifle artistic creativity due to not getting equal exposure. I'll defend that for Dynamite Pleasure Chair or any other artist doing creative things with their music. My opinion, this track is not "tainted" and neither are any of the other vocal mixes just for having vocals.

Always have enjoyed this one. aluminum's one of the best arrangers we've had in terms of the creativity of his interpretations, and this first mix certainly set the table. All 4 of his tracks are worth grabbing, and I hope he keeps making music.

2:30-2:31. You sneaky bros.

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Opened up relatively sparse, but quickly filled out. I feel bad because Chimpa's so positive, but I've never been a fan of that FL Slayer guitar synth, first used at :20 here. It's almost always a poor, droning lead sound; the few times it works are when it (or the instruments around it) are produced so that it's very clear the Slayer lead isn't meant to imitate an electric guitar in any way. The timing & articulations on it sound very stiff. I also thought the core kick pattern sounded vanilla; even though there were good subtle/quieter aspects to the percussion writing, the kick is by far the loudest part of it, so when that pattern sounds plain, bland & plodding, it drags the track down. Those criticisms aside, the arrangement otherwise develops and evolves enough, so I didn't have a problem with that, even though I thought the FL Slayer stuff was a significant weak point. Listening to this at a softer volume, I see how someone could think this is allowable & passable. One thing that's important for me when checking out louder or cluttered tracks is using a control track that I'm very familiar with that mixed pretty well and is at a normal volume. For years, I've used djp's Revenge of Shinobi 'Consent (Make Me Dance)'. After listening to that, it feels obvious to me that the loudest parts of this are too loud. On the volume, I agree with the NOs about this being ridiculously loud. Even in a smaller aspect, for example, the sizzle at 1:03's percussion is too much. The overall levels are oppressively loud when you hear the densest stuff (:20-:50, 1:10-1:29, 1:42-2:10, 2:24-2:49). This was the kind of loud that causes ear damage, it's just absurd. During the thickest sections, all of the detail work in the supporting part-writing can't be distinguished, while the FL Slayer lead is buried, so the compression is over the top. You can pull this back without losing the overall power here, Twisteryn, but the current levels are unintentionally a joke; all the more obvious when doing a side-by-side comparison it to other music. The arrangement is solid, and I would change my vote if the levels were reined in. NO (resubmit)

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Coolio. It should be fixed on the live site after the next mix is posted.

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Will come back to this later, but I'm coming up a bit light. I need at least need 188.5 seconds of overt source usage for the source tunes to be dominant in the arrangement: :32-1:05.75, 1:53.75-2:38.5, 2:40.5-2:57 ("Bronco," quiet), 3:21.5-3:29, 3:35.5-3:38.5, 4:11.5-4:30, 4:33.5-4:35.5, 4:59-5:18, 5:19.5-5:41 = 165.5 seconds or 43.89% I get why Cain mentioned the similarity with "Lifestream"/"Opening Theme" from 5:55 until the end, but the 4-note pattern isn't the same or transposed, so I'm not counting it. It's pretty liberal, but it's worth checking with Ryan on what else may not have been obvious source use. I reserve judgement for now, but it's a NO if more explicit connections don't come to light. EDIT (12/9): Sorry for the holdup. Normally I just go NO, with the caveat that if it did in fact check out, I could revise my vote. But this sounded so great that I wasn't comfortable dropping a NO vote on it at the time, and hoped something more would be uncovered. That said, no one else is hearing the source theme used enough, and IMO, original "glue" writing being seamlessly written alongside an arranged source, isn't a compelling reason to approve something on actual source usage being dominant per the requirements of the Standards. While an obviously cool listen, this doesn't pass the arrangement standards on source usage. Again, if we're wrong, Ryan, point out the explicit A-to-B connections from source tune to arrangement that we're missing, and we can revisit this. Otherwise, if you're willing to revise it, more source tune usage would nudge this up to flipping all of these votes and getting it passed.

The string and woodwind samples were good, but they each had their brief moments where they strained for realism. Wasn't a big enough deal to timestamp, because it wasn't a big issue. Really wasn't feeling the mixing of the woodwind interplay from :49-1:05; the two parts were stepping on one another in the same frequency range. The string and light vox stuff at 1:05 was mixed much better. Other than those more minor criticisms, this was a straightforward but solid take on the Twilight Princess Light Spirit source, with the SoS and RoS cameos smoothly and tastefully woven in. Good job, Kyle! YES

The track was 2:57-long, so I needed at least 88.5 seconds' worth overt usage of the source for it to be dominant here: :19-:32, :39.5-:58.5, 1:00.5-1:23.5, 1:41.5-1:49, 1:51.5-2:00.5, 2:27-2:47.5 = 92 seconds or 51.97% There could be other minor things I'm overlooking, but I just needed to confirm the source use checked out given some of the longer stretches where things seemed wholly original. I think DarkeSword's right with his criticisms, but I didn't think they added up to a dealbreaker. Smallest thing first, the wind SFX does sound fake, so I understand why it was pointed out, but it's literally meant to sound similar to the wind SFX in the source, so I don't see the big deal there due to that connection. The timing being so stilted and exposing the piano sample was personally my biggest issue. The production and piano tone could be improved, but what's here is solid enough, with the arrangement carrying things. If this had a dryer sound, this would have been a NO based on DarkeSword's other crits, because those issues would have stood out much more. What's here gets it done enough. YES

We literally do not "consider the fans" at any stage of the judging process, because this isn't a popularity contest, this is a creativity contest. This site also is cool with diversity. We're not actively catering to anyone's personal taste. To actually hold DPC's track (or any vocal track) back or put it in a corner because "most people prefer instrumentals"/"think of meeeee, I may not like it" is really closed-minded. Of course, you can dislike whatever you want, but we don't care anyway vis-a-vis track selection or presentation. Separate but equal? Segregation of minorities? Really? Tracks aren't people, but to me your proposal is also silly. Let's not go there. Also, so far, we've only got 266 tracks with any type of lyrics out of 3,056 ReMixes, so 91% of the site is instrumental. But are the vocals TAKING OVER? 0001-1000: 28/885: 3.16% 1001-2000: 83/992: 8.37% 2001-3000: 128/999: 12.81% 3001-3180: 27/180: 15% Hey cool, the trend IS growing. 3 out of every 20 ReMixes lately have had lyrics. 17 out of every 20 tracks being instrumental means instrumentals aren't even close to outnumbered, and that you're needlessly fixating on lyrics. Maybe by the time we reach OCR04000, lyrics will (dangerously) bump up to 16% or 17%. Try not to get too hung up on it. VGM is mostly instrumental, OCR will tip towards instrumental for as long as we're doing this, that's just the numbers. Anyway, TL;DR, you can certainly dislike anything you want, but to tell us to consider some sort of change in how any style or genre of mixes are presented... it ain't happening.

"The intruder, a man named Lan Di" is much better than "the male intruder, Lan Di" How clunky are you trying to make this in the effort to consolidate it? LOL at "male intruder"

The intro was arguably a bit too buzzy, but it's not a big deal. When the track truly kicked off at :29, something about the mixing was pretty indistinct. It felt like there was a lot of mud in the background, perhaps caused by the chippy buzzing. From 4:00-4:15, the source melody was pushed WAY back and might as well not have been there. It was still pretty low after that, but loud enough to be heard more plainly, so no big deal. I get Chimpa's crit about there not being much of a driving melodic aspect to this, but it doesn't matter to me. The source wasn't made like that, and we don't require that of arrangements. This had good dynamic contrast throughout and managed to keep the basic loop of the source fairly interesting, which was a pleasant surprise. I thought the mixing and production was a bigger issue; perhaps some folks may NO on that level. IMO, the production's rough around the edges, but the part-writing was distinct ENOUGH that I'll live, even though it could gain some clarity while still maintaining most of the atmosphere they're going for. In any case, I'm on board. Solid fusion of geetar and chiptune by Mikhail and Jeff! YES

I see what you mean about the second para being a jarring change. Perhaps it's not the best grammar, but switching the 2nd para's first sentence around to something like: "Due in large part to Iwao's influence, Ryo epitomizes Japanese self-discipline and resourcefulness." This would improve the flow by mentioning Iwao that final time and then proceeding to Ryo's description. I see what Dafydd means about wanting more flow, but I wasn't bothered by it. I thought it was an effectively concise way to give Ryo's story and explain his personality. I believe it reads fine and flows well enough as is.

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Those suggestions sounds like a solid, informed base for an album. IMO, if you want to turn something out faster but still get a good focus of titles important to Iwata's career, leave it at those 7 or 8, don't go for more than that, and focus on matching artists to games. EDIT: This has my OK to be in Community.

While the production wasn't perfect, the muddyness did add body to the piano sound; things were OK overall. Arrangement-wise, the new supporting writing, while simple, wasn't taken from the source. Combining that with the adaptation to piano, changes to the source's bridge and slowed tempo for the finish at 2:33 was enough to consider this a pass. It's not a blowaway piece as far as twists with the source arrangement or dramatic dynamic shifts, but Daniel gets the job done with a solid subtractive approach to the source while adapting it for piano. YES

Game: Deus Ex Original track: DuClare Chateau Arrangement name: Only in Novels The arrangement is available on SoundCloud as an MP3. ReMixer name: Xae if one is required, otherwise real name is fine. Real name: Daniel Ran Email: Website: www.danielran.com User ID: 41883 I don't think I've got any comments. -----------------------------------------

I'm truly satisfied that you have 0 control over the selection process.

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Actually, the YouTube video for the second source was gone, so Chimpa didn't link to a different one. Now that I've heard the "Sumner's Tower" source, everything after 2:04 is just a cover of the second source, so there's very little interpretation there.

Yeah, I agreed with all of this. It's not what I'd call a submissions violation, because there was added original countermelodic writing here, and the effort was made with the new instrumentation to distinguish itself from the source tune. But when the structures match up that closely, it does feel like a MIDI-rip with garnish on it. Also, watch the brass articulations for 2:52's section, they're very stiffly timed and sound unrealistic. NO