Liontamer

Well, Will could always join VGF. Anybody that's passionate about VGM can always join. But no hate if he wants to fly solo. BTW, my thunder is not moldy or mouldy. As for the blog, "IRL" has been killing me lately. I can't wait to get back into things like VGF and the panel, but this has definitely been the most trying time yet in terms of having any time for the site.

At least lately, Alex has been browsing the forums, and I know he submitted something that I've yet to get to in the OCR inbox (sorry, real life is awful), so I wanted to check out "Cursed Piano." The recording quality certainly was hurting, and I think the piano playing could have been more impactful, fluid, and expressive, but what's here is nonetheless solid, both for its time and now. Changes in the flow like 2:30-2:38 & 4:30-4:39 were beautiful in their simplicity and grace, as well as how comfortably they pieced together with the writing before and after. The Sorcerian soundtrack has a much better reputation in Japan than stateside, which is a shame given the potential this mix shows the soundtrack to have.

This is a 6 minute track that the panel judged 3 times before it passed. So I was definitely surprised by djp's writeup criticism of this mix back when it went up, because it was only then that I noticed that the tempo indeed never changed throughout the course of the track. But instead of being put off by that, or feeling that I missed a significant flaw in the arrangement, I only sat back and smiled at how impressed I was with the dynamics of the piece. IMO, the various changes in the instrumentation were extremely effective in making the piece feel fresh throughout. I'm not saying this should be studied like Beethoven, but Kenneth's piece is nonetheless a great example of how to create a fluid, energetic piece despite fixing the tempo in place. Great stuff.

Back in 2004 when I first heard this, DarkeSword passed me the track to play on VG Frequency because it extremely impressed djpretzel and the judges panel, and I was the radio host connected with most of the OCR staff back when I was still on the outside. And it's still the only track I ever encored on the same show; I just liked it that much, and so did the listeners. Since I'm now gotten to meet and hang with José, I hope he doesn't take it the wrong way as me now being demystified or anything like that. But at the time, José came off to me like a somewhat mythical figure, because IMO this track was just light years ahead of anything else on OC ReMix. I'm a real sucker for the details of this track. The production was crisp, I loved the fusion of lyrics and arrangement ideas from both versions of "Unknown from M.E.", Sonic Adventure 1 and 2, the original portions of the lyrics that were relevant to the character lyrics, as well as the seamless usage of sampled sounds from the Sonic series on the Sega Genesis. All that, and it was a hip-hop mix, something that OCR had nothing remotely like at the time. A lot of great ideas came together here. At a site where the artists pride themselves on creating the unique, this one's always going to be one of the pieces that simply stands out from the rest as one of the most unique of the unique.

Recalling Vinnie talking about how disjointed the OCR submissions process is when it comes to letting someone know the status of their mix, I can't help but think of how much awesome stuff we could be missing out on like this. (I dunno how long it'll take, but real-time contact with artists on judges decisions is something we'll eventually have thanks to Vinnie's invaluable insight.) djpretzel will be jealous when I admit that it was this track (and not his take on the same theme) that made me take notice of the "Legend of the Mystical Ninja" soundtrack. Personally I went though the entire soundtrack looking for something as catchy as Odeo Town and didn't really find anything that resonated with me. But perhaps Vinnie, Dave or another mixer out there can prove me wrong with another exceptional, attention-grabbing mix like this one!

Still one of my absolutely favorites on OCR and among video game arrangements period. Personally, I don't know how well the sequencing pulls off being realistic. Bryan certainly did a good enough job for me. The sound of the bow movements and the string harmonies were extremely emotive. I would love to hear this on an official arrangement album, without the losiness of the 112kbps encoding. It's that good. Given further fine tuning with the sound quality, it could have easily closed out a dramatic battle in an blockbuster Hollywood film.

Awesome intelligent ambient. The instrumentation and sound effects blended together for a very fitting tribute to the Ecco II soundtrack. And later on, of course Danny has it down pat when it comes to the fusion of orchestral and electronic elements. The synths feel like they've aged a slight bit, but it doesn't make a significant impact in terms of how solid this piece is. I couldn't see Spencer Nilsen being anything but flattered and impressed with the creativity and execution here.

A game I never played, but I definitely have that theme stuck in my head thanks to this mix. I dunno what subset of electronica this falls under (though I'm sure someone else does), but the power and the groove here make this mix a big winner. There have been bumps in the road in terms of getting some other collabs of theirs past the panel, while some others have made it. But no matter what, I haven't heard anything from these two in a while, which is definitely the community's loss when they bring it this strong.

It may simply be due to not having received any subs for a while from Ben, but this is a guy who hasn't gotten his due yet as being one on OCR's most talented members. I voted on this back in the day (naturally), but the strength and energy of the arrangement, and the top-notch production are simply unmistakeable. I was surprised reading those old 2005 posts by some of the more outspoken/blowhard critics, as I had totally forgetten about their comments. Not worth the time they took to type 'em. I certainly hope we hear more from Ben.

This was one, IMO, one of my few mistaken votes that I've made out of nearly 2,000 votes. I'd say maybe 4 or 5 I would change given the chance. Pretty much all of them in my first couple of months on the panel. One of the things this mix later underscored to me was that, IMO, you should never vote down a track because it only deals with a limited portion of the source tune being used. There's no obligation to base a mix on most or all of the ideas presented in a source tune. This piece worked with the main verses of "Koopa's Road" extremely well with a lot of interpretation and personalization, mostly in the instrumentation and mood, but also in the compositional quality of the original sections added. So thanks a lot to Jermain for helping me broaden my thinking and improve my open-mindedness as a judge.

The sequencing on the woodwind lead was a bit stiff, and the sound quality on it was a bit too muddy. After the track picked up a bit at :50, I felt the backing instrumentation sounded too thin and untreated, particularly the percussion. I did enjoy the tempo slowdown at 1:29; it was a solid lead-in to the more straightforward orchestral sections of the arrangement that closed things out. The finish ended up pretty strong and made up for some of the weaknesses from earlier on; always preferable to leave a good last impression.

I just noticed the light guitar feedback present in the first half-second of the track. Unintentional or not, it was quirky and I was feeling it. weed's come out with some awesome stuff since this mix, but this is still one of my personal favorites from his collection!

This mix got posted shortly before I joined the panel, and thus survived Lockdown for OCR01250. IMO, the arrangement wasn't significantly interpretive compared to the original Amiga MOD. But since it was already posted and had some substantive interpretation due to the original vocals and some structural changes, it wasn't enough of a violation to be considered. Stepping away from all that, however, this one is still one of my favorite arrangements. The vocal homage to Phil Collins fused seamlessly with the Lost Patrol source tune, and is yet another example that shows off the depth of Marcus's skills when compared with the other songs in his career. It's no shot against Mazedude (and honestly, it's apples and oranges), but especially for those familiar with Makke's works at Remix.Kwed.Org, AMIGAremix and C64Audio.com, Makke may arguably be the most heterogenously genre-talented musician in the scene.

I don't regret my vote against this track, as I still felt it could have stood apart from the original more. But it's one of my NO votes that I've greatly enjoyed nonetheless. Gray added some great touches with his available sounds to add much more realism and expression to the sound quality of the piano. I certainly miss the influence and camaraderie he added to the community. But more importantly, David's composition was simply a sure-fire winner no matter what standard you look at it from. Whether it's a piece like this, EarthBound "Nirvana," or others, he's been excellent while keeping the pace demure and deliberate.

Can't help but be reminded of a simpler time in my days at OCR. I've been around so long that I can think of the days of mix #1251 as being that way, as I was still in my formative days as a judge. The stereo separation seemed a bit too distinct at times, but otherwise I greatly enjoyed the piece. I thought Young did a great job giving this a new voice compared to the original, and the overhaul he gave it sticks with me as a great example of how to really give a pre-existing work of arrangement yet another dose of new life.

Yeah, the power in this one was pretty sick. Excellent arrangement and awesome production, Matt! Really can't wait for what's next from you if you're still planning to refurbish some older pieces of yours. You've really taken your game to another level in the past 2 years, and it shows!

We were in Game Informer? Do you have any more info on that; can't say I've heard of it, but that sounds pretty cool!

djp and I went, and Arrowned was there as well to chill. If you didn't go, you missed out on some good times. The performance had some shaky parts, but the Portal "Still Alive" close earned the standing ovation it got. Anyone who was close by, you should have went for $0! FREEEEEEE!

Nah, y'all should finish things up! If anything, the strength of this album should illustrate that people should be going after this soundtrack. It's got a lot of potential.

That being said, the instrument choices were purposeful, and everything was clicking together nicely, so great jorb!

He's submitted to OCR several times before (the last time being early '07 where he got 2Y/5N), but there's certainly no problem with him trying again. But just clarifying that he knows of OCR.

Of course there's Super Metroid in there. How did you download this without reading the writeup? Read the writeup!

With "Overture Variations", we collectively had some production criticisms on that piece that we were hoping to have addressed before it was posted, as the arrangement was hot, but some of the samples were a bit too thin and some of the sequencing could have felt smoother. To achieve the fix he wants, trickwaters wants to have the bassoon part played live, but can't get that going until the end of his grad school stuff later this month. Also, PayPal us a lot of money. It won't get you anything in terms of favors from the site on passing or posting your music, but it will pay for bandwidth and support the site!

Download some of their past performances free! Some VGMdb pimps for the albums as well: http://www.vgmdb.net/db/albums.php?id=8331 http://www.vgmdb.net/db/albums.php?id=8330

Apparently you missed: I'm saying, we have a consistent tagging standard in place for what's newly posted. Look through the most recent stuff to check that out, then give criticisms/suggestions based on what you see from those tags, not tags from stuff before, say, OCR01650. Obviously that works. But why would we want someone to reach the site in 2 steps (Google it, then go to the result) rather than 1 step (copy-pasta the URL directly)? I can guarantee that using the URL rather than the words "OverClocked ReMix" as the Album listing has been more effective in generating curiosity and directing traffic here. And we're not stupid, so we're gonna keep it that way.