Liontamer

Remixer name: Bluelighter (ID 21240); Bowlerhat (ID 30366); Dewey Newt (https://ocremix.org/artist/18034/dewey-newt);Ian Martyn (ID 35158) Real Name: Guillaume SAUMANDE; Jorik BERGMAN; Matthew MOORE; Ian MARTYN Game & Songs: Child of Light & Aurora ; Down to a Dusty Plain Composer: Cœur de Pirate Credits: Bluelighter : arrangement, mixing, piano Bowlerhat: flute Dewey Newt: trombone Ian Martyn: acoustic Guitar, acoustic bass, hand drum (bendir) Hi OCR! Here is an acoustic arrangement of Child of Light, with some rock sonorities. The whole game marked me by its dreamy atmosphere, with some sadness in the OST. I’ve tried to keep this spirit in my arrangement. I’ve made a first attempt some years ago with piano solo. But I didn’t get sthg promising enough to advance. I’ve restarted later by playing some piano arpeggios, trying to imagine melody by other instruments in the same time (part 2). I only thought about flute and trombone at this step. I integrated other parts that I’ve yet thought with the piano version (parts 1 and 3). I yet wanted a culminant point at part 3. So I integrated guitar, bass and drum to make the rhythm. I developed like this. And I conclude the arrangement, by a dreamy part similar to the intro. I’m grateful to all instrument players who have collaborated with me. They real helped me to get this mix as I wanted! Enjoy! BREAKDOWN Part 1 : 0’00 -> Dusty plains 0 – 0’20 Part 2 : 0’50 -> Aurora 0 – 1’08 Part 3 : A 1’37 -> Dusty plains 0 – 1’00 B 2’00 -> Dusty plains 1’00 – 1’30 Part 4 : 2’30 -> Aurora 0 – 1’08 Part 5 : 2’40 -> Aurora 1’08 – 1’40 Part 6 : 3’08 -> Aurora 0 – 1’08

Interesting pointilist-style opening by Logan to start. Ah, OK, that's the gimmick throughout. Just enough delay on it to give the soundscape some ambiance. That's pretty much all that's needed here as far as the production touch. Nice arrangement concept as well. By about 3 minutes, I'm not tired of it, but I could see how others would be. I liked the tradeoffs between the two themes in the third part though, which helped Lucas's concept be something more than the performance gimmick. YES

This title makes me think of @XPRTNovice; he's a goof, and this title is his energy. Interesting slow down of this theme to start. Hopefully the instrumentation's sophisticated enough. Some beats with phasing effects brought in :32, noticing a gradual build. Lead at 1:04's buried, but it's a stylistic thing; I still feel it should be more in the foreground, but we'll see if anything else is going on, since the beats drop out at 1:52, leaving more room for everything else. 2 minutes in, it's a relatively minimal approach with simple textures. 2:41 had the phasing beats return; it's a good sound, but it's a retread, so I'm hoping the new writing ideas didn't stop at 2:41. 3:13 cut-and-pasted 1:04's section, shoot; wow, recyclables all the way until 4:18, more than a third of the track. Then 4:18 took the lead writing from 1:36 and replayed that mostly on its own instead of within the fuller texture. This is a nice, transformative take, just underdeveloped to the length of it given the massive copy-pasta from 2:41-4:18. Just varying up part-writing or instrumentation in spots along the way there could be enough to keep the repeated sections interesting and engaging throughout, without making any large writing or mood changes that would disturb the flow and energy of the track. Would love to hear a revision to this one to add in some variations in the writing or instrumentation within the repeated sections. Great mood here, Ben! NO (resubmit)

Funny that "The Measure of His Reach" is really unmemorable to me, while "Beyond the Wall" is so incredibly catchy, to me at least. Maybe it's "The Measure of His Reach" being a choral cacophony (which has a fun story behind it), but I liked your treatment here, and it was interesting hearing this take a more somber tone with the instrumentation of "Beyond the Wall". Good groove here too, and fun to hear the "Prelude" used as transitional glue. Was disappointed to hear 3:33 & 4:15's sections sound like a cut-and-paste, but the writing and level of interpretation there are good enough to bear the repetition, and 3:54's doubled leads helped vary things up within the middle of that. Nice fadeout section at 4:58 revisiting ideas from around 1:58 that legit made me want the track to continue longer; great technique to keep the finish interesting and make a fade-out click. Great inspiration for this one, Shariq! Here's to the kiddos that encourage us to be our best selves. YES

ReMixer Name: - DarkeSword Game Arranged: - FINAL FANTASY XIV: Stormblood Name of Arrangement: - In Mountains We Will Sleep Names of Individual Songs Arranged: - The Measure of His Reach (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJm7ad2tJw8) - Beyond the Wall (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWQfvnLyvxU) Additional Information: - Stormblood is an expansion for FFXIV, available for PS3, PS4, PS5, PC and Mac. - Both source tracks are composed by Masayoshi Soken Comments: This one is perhaps one of the most personal remixes I've ever written. In late 2022, my wife was expecting. We'd already suffered a loss at the end of 2020, so there was a lot of stuff going through my mind this time around. I started thinking a lot about what kind of dad I was going to be, and what kind of dad I wanted to be, which got me thinking about my own dad. My dad played a lot of music in the house growing up, and on top of all of the VGM I listened to as a kid, the Bollywood music he played was burned into my brain. In the past year or so I'd been re-listening and rediscovering Indian music; a lot of the stuff from movies I watched as a teenager by great composers like Jatin-Lalit, Shankar Ehsaan and Loy, and of course, A.R. Rahman. I listen to and appreciate it differently now, because I've got 20+ years of being a musician in me. So I thought a lot about that and how I wanted to share that with my son, because music is (along with food) one of the big two ways you can really connect with your heritage. Final Fantasy XIV's Stormblood expansion is a game that centers colonial and post-colonial trauma in its handling of Ala Mhigo and Doma, about how an empire (Garlemald) steals what they have and leaves them broken, poor, and angry. Stormblood is often thought of as the East Asian expansion; there's quite a lot Japanese and Chinese aesthetic in there. But for me, when you look at the themes of imperialism and colonialism in the narrative, that says "India." India is a country that still deals with post-colonial trauma because an empire (Great Britain) stole what they had and left them broken, poor, and angry. "The Measure of His Reach," in the fiction of the game, is a song that is stolen by the empire but is ultimately reclaimed by the people. The motif is everywhere in the game, and its usage feels off until you understand the empire's thievery and who it really belongs to. There's a phenomenal Bollywood movie from 2001 called "Lagaan." It means "tax," and it's about a village that makes a bet with the British Empire that if they win a cricket match against a team of British officers, they don't have to pay taxes for 3 years. It's an incredible, high budget movie that was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. The village in the movie has a real desert-and-mountains aesthetic, which reminds me a lot of the villages you find in some of Stormblood's areas. The music in this movie is by A.R. Rahman, and it's one of his finest works, and a massive influence on my own writing. I was thinking a lot about all of this, and what "The Measure of His Reach" means and how it's used, and I wanted to try something. So I dug around and picked out some sample libraries I have from buying Komplete a few years ago. There's some synth stuff and a bed of cymbals from a jazz kit and the Una Corda piano, but mostly everything else is from the Spotlight: India collection. I did some big drums and a big percussive santur and contrasted it with the airy bansuri. "The Measure of His Reach" doesn't have a lot of material to work with, so shifted to "Beyond the Wall" for a bit in the middle for variety. I played around a little with the rhythm of the melody, putting upbeats on downbeats and vice-versa. I thought a lot about A.R. Rahman's music from "Lagaan." I wanted to evoke the joy of a big blue sky over dusty mountains. The title of this track is "In Mountains We Will Sleep." I hope you all enjoy it. Link to the file (WAV):

Love to hear a source tune like this, which is that late 90s Capcom fighting game style, a la Street Fighter III and DarkStalkers. Ah man, it was disappointing to hear this sound so similar to the original song; it's basically the exact same structure, but with a faster tempo and some more intensity (and a little muddiness). It doesn't do anything to particularly distinguish itself from the original song. If the primary objective was a creative exercise in recreation, more power to you; we're looking for a more interpretive arrangement approach, so while this is cool in and of itself, it's basically the same as the source tune. NO

I hate this track, but if you submit this, I'll pretend I enjoy it!

Always a pleasure to hear from timaeus, the only person more meticulous with source usage timestamping than I am (which is always very appreciated, thanks!). Everything was clean, clear, and lush. The time sig changes were nice, and this had a mature and expanded sound palette, while still having some bright sounds that didn't feel inauthentic to the energy and imagery of Pokémon. Let's go! YES

I already checked this out on June 9th, when Wes begged and pleaded for my feedback during a crisis of confidence. He's since added some more to it, but my POV's still the same: Hell NO, we can't reject this. YES

The "Main Theme" section felt plodding, and I think it's something having to do with the rigid timing of the synths (definitely not Siolfor's guitar performance). That's not to say the arrangement doesn't get it done, particularly with effective dynamic contrast by way of the evolving textures. But I liked more energy emerging in the piece once things transitioned to "Missing Perspective" at 2:35. Parasite Eve's been loooooooooooooooooooooooooong overdue for some good coverage around here! YES

Your ReMixer name : Hemophiliac Your real name : Chris Roman Your email address : Your userid : 4838 Name of game(s) arranged : Parasite Eve Name of arrangement : Charred and Cauterized Name of individual song(s) arranged : Main theme, Missing Perspective Featuring Siolfor the Jackal Userid : 34171 Siolfor website : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUMdUmcR9O9d6u4k0lYZ3uw Honestly can't remember the exact impetus of this one. I think Siolfor and I were on voice chat on discord and he was mentioning something about people not writing heavy stuff for him. I probably thought to myself, "I should try that!" He also mentioned the Pixel Mixer's monthly contest was starting up and the theme was "Generation 5 consoles". I've been wanting to get involved with other VGM communities as well, so I took a shot. So here I am again with back-to-back submissions on Yoko Shimomura sources, I did not plan that. Also a neat coincidence that my last few tracks have all been in different time signatures (6/8, 4/4, 5/4). This one starts out in 3/4 and in the final section at the end goes into 4/4. This track was a blast to work on and i'm proud of it, I would not have thought I would be able to write in this style years ago. I'm particularly proud of the part writing for the drums. Drums were something that I really struggled to understand, and over the years have been building up my confidence in working with them. Siolfor really went along with everything and just kept saying to write more, i'm so grateful that he was willing to let me experiment and try things out. Thank you so much for recording the guitars and bass. Comments from Siolfor: "We'd been hanging out on voice chat in the OCR discord a lot recently so I've been getting to know Hemophiliac and Liontamer better. After talking about the current Pixel Mixers contest theme at the time(Generation 5 consoles) I remember getting a message from Hemo with a 20 second audio clip and the message "YOU IN?". Those 20 seconds sounded like a lot of fun for me, so I was. It was really cool seeing the track develop over the month, especially in real time when Hemo would share his screen as he worked. It's always fun when someone else writes guitars for me to play, especially when they don't play themselves. Thanks for having me on the track!"

Definitely very noticeable hiss and also some little pops (e.g. :08, :17) with the intro, though the hiss became less in your face from :16-on. What was that part added in there from :32-:47? Man, that's some weird looseness there; brief as it was, that part didn't fit at all, plus the piano sounded odd too. At :47, the performances had no synergy. Then at 1:02, the guitar came in (another crackle at 1:06) and muddied up the soundscape. Strange combination of the guitar work and the synth line at 1:18. The drums don't have synergy wuth the other parts either, due to very bland writing, and texture feels thin until 1:47 in spite of the volume. Then an organ lead at 1:47 (with some nice doubling by the synth), but the guitar chugs alongside it were too loud (though well-performed), IMO. Some kind of click/pop at 2:10, just noting it, then another instance from 2:20-2:55 where the drum writing again doesn't fit well with the other parts. Lots of buzziness behind the guitar line at 2:34 that was a bad contrast with the clean, quiet texture right before it; didn't sound intentional that the guitar would be adding that much mud. Sounded like a sour note at 2:46 as well. Admittedly surprised at the lack of cohesiveness thus far. Super fake-sounding string line at 3:07, then pivoted to an out-of-tune (with slightly lagged timing), non sequitur reference to the Back to the Future melody at 3:09. I don't know Unknown Pseudoartist at all, so their dadaist handle may just be giving me the wrong impression that they're an anonymous troll that we've all heard of under another handle. If not, UP's probably going to hate me for saying this -- it's moments like this looseness at 3:07 that feels more like a tongue-in-cheek troll job than a sincere effort; that doesn't compute given who else is involved in this, but that's still the takeaway I was having. I liked the acoustic guitar at 4:14, but then the wind line at 4:28 was shrill had some iffy notes (including the very last note at 4:43 for a headscratching finish), along with low-quality sounding rain SFX. There's so much Obama-shrug GIF energy here, I genuinely dunno what to make of it. It'll sound like I'm frustrated, when really I'm just confused and disappointed that some good potential wasn't realized here. Every time an electric guitar was in play, there was a lot of mud behind it. And while I generally like the instrumentation and performances when I listen to one part at a time, there's a disjointed sound to the whole thing, so many times where timing feels loose or combinations of instruments don't fit well together. It seems like as far as this track goes, the cake is baked, as I don't know how easy it would be to revise this given the amount of performers. I've seen so many artists over the years in a similar spot. The arrangement concept itself is strong, the theme's arranged in very interpretive and creative way, there's lots of good moments of dynamic contrast that keep the presentation interesting and ambitious. It's rare to see a unanimous NO decision have lengthy commentary from the judges, and that speaks to a meaningful level of promise here. However, there's lots (and lots) of smaller issues of writing, performance, and mixing that added up to an overall lack of cohesion. Keep up the good work; your arrangement quality already shows you can put together something creative, UP, so I would love to hear another pass to see how far you can bring it along though. Or, at the very least hear strong efforts at cohesion applied to different, future subs. We'd love to have you use the Workshop forums and #workshop Discord channel for some additonal sets of ears and feedback on your work. Even if you don't become an OCR community regular (which you're always welcome to become, we're here for you), please keep solicitng tons of feedback on your DoD subs & other work and keep striving for more polish and improvement. NO (resubmit)

The track was 4:40-long, so I needed to hear the source tune in effect for at least 140 seconds for the source material to be dominant. :00-1:49, 2:33-2:54, 3:39-4:27 = 178 seconds or 63.57% overt source usage Such a weird story of accidentally backwards parking into realizing you made a VGM arrangement, which is fun! Started getting cramped at :33, then really cramped at :44 when some sort of sustained string line was thrown in, then some thick bass was added at :54... alright, everything dropped out to give the bass some space at 1:04, and that was much better. Source melody arrived at 1:16, surrounded by the heavy bass drops and some breakbeats until 1:49, then the source references disappeared for now. Good energy and clarity with the sounds around the 2-minute mark. The supporting line from the source was brought back in from 2:33 to 2:54; it's more a quieter component of an otherwise original track with all of the other writing, though that's a valid approach. Source melody returned at 3:39 and had good presence once again. Man, those bass drops never get old; always a good, weighty sound. Cool to hear the source's final section referenced at 4:01 to provide a fresh idea toward the close; though the dissonance with the string sustains was odd, it didn't sound jacked up, and was brief enough to give some tension for a few brief moments before a nice close at 4:24 with the fade out providing a bookened similar to the intro. Thanks a lot for telling me about this one; I'm very glad you sent this over! Good old gold from EAR with big early 2000s energy that packs a lot of power! YES EDIT (6/21): I can see why MW was disoriented by the intro, though I didn't have a problem with the stereo effects/panning when listening on my headphones. Did take another listen though to be sure I didn't gloss over that point. My original vote qualified when the source tune started and stopped, but I've added in a source breakdown up top to make it clearer.

Nice fusion of the style of "The Secret Song" with "Zelda's Lullaby". Was a bit worried the lyrics would stick more with the actual melody of "The Secret Song", but that worry was quickly put to rest, and 2:17's section even offered a sound that was simply its own thing, not a sendup of Frost, which was unexpected but cool just the same. No need to belabor the point, it's fun stuff here! It didn't end up being baby lullaby album material, but we're proud to have planted the seeds for this track's eventual growth as well. YES

Not sure if it's because it's a relatively recent track or because James C. Hoffman mastered it, but the mixing was better than many of the older submissions y'all have sent. I'd argue the soundscape should have been clearer, but I can live with this. I really enjoyed the rhythmic changes you've employed on the theme, and the way the leads, textures, and overall energy level were handled also sounded more varied and creative. At 2:24 though, areas were being recycled, so I would have liked to have heard a more overt difference, but there was a different lead at 2:55, and the overall repetition wasn't a dealbreaker. Something about the beats from 2:24-on didn't really drive this forward in the best way, but it was solid enough; again, likely another area where I felt writing ideas were getting recycled in a way where there could have been more variation. Regardless, the arrangement was very transformative, so, while I had some critiques, this was still well on the right side of the line in terms of the creativity and development, IMO. YES

Opening sounded lossy, and when I looked at WinAmp's spectral analyzer, there was nothing on the high end, but that at least changed at :41. The core beat at :56 had some of that tepid "sounds like hitting a plastic bucket" feel, but it's serviceable. I was definitely getting lead fatigue by 1:42, which I'm sure someone else can better explain why that was. Interesting that prophetik also invoked the word "fatigue" in another context as I hadn't read his vote before using the word myself; given the intensity of the saw lead, I think my usage of it is a fair point. That said, cool usage of the piano at 1:56 and interplay of the saw lead with other original writing bursts starting at 1:58 to finally vary up those sounds. Sharper mixing and some more variations/changes to the beats from 2:25-on would have lifted this up for me. Stuff like 2:56-3:10's section also felt too repetitive with 1:27's section before it; there was new writing added in for the latter, but there's other ways the textures could have been tweaked to not seem so cut-and-pasted, as the new writing didn't do enough in that respect. Even the YESs have "I wish" items for improvement, and I can definitely hear why this split the panel. The arrangement's a fairly solid concept, but the execution has just enough smaller issues adding up with the mixing, sound design and feelings of cut-and-paste repetition where it's not unreasonable to say this isn't quite ready. I'm in the NO (resubmit) camp, but desperately want this arrangement be posted in some form.

Sounded like the SMB2 ending theme chord progression being alluded to from :12-:24, which was a fun coincidence, though the timing of everything sounded clunky and mismatched until righting itself with the "Overworld" theme taking the foreground. Mixing seems jacked up to start, unfortunately, not just the panning Emu brought up. The bassline is too buzzy and was utimately louder than the melody and supporting faux-guitar line as well; it all just steps on each other instead of having synergy and sounding like they're sharing the same space. I liked initial the arrangement treatment though. By about 1:15, I was wondering when the rest of the track would arrive, because the textures were so basic and relatively empty. The sampled pizz strings sound so bad in terms of the fakeness of the sound being so exposed and the writing being too repetitive. Poor transition into the "Underground" theme at 2:25, and then arranged in a way that didn't feel melodious because of the original writing by the lead that was filling the gaps in between the pauses of the original theme. Then another abrupt theme transition back to the "Overworld" theme at 3:26 and it's all the same writing ideas as before just being repeated again aside from different bass and drum writing, albeit about the same level of intensity and complexity. There's so many different directions you could take this in to better develop this, and there's definitely nothing that could be done as it to pull it up above the bar here. I'd try though to apply whatever takeaways you can regarding mixing & textures, variations, and transitions. Some decent initial ideas -- and that shows promise in and of itself -- but there's 0 cohesion here right now. NO (resubmit)

Opening sounds lush, I dig it. At :20, a more distorted/overdriven guitar faded in, and I had to prepare myself, since I'm not a fan of this flooded style and don't feel it's pleasent to listen to. Yep, at 1:06, there it is. Everything's super crowded and turns into a wall of sound until 2:43. Arrangement-wise, I love it; great transformation of the theme, strong instrumentation as well as sound design choices for the clearer sections. The flooded sections (e.g. 1:06-2:43, 3:47-6:30, 7:02-9:46) all have the supporting instrumentation sounding overdriven, which is obscuring the leads and detracting from the composition. I don't mind being in the minority, but at some point, I'll be viewed as being in the anti-black metal camp or biased against the genre. From what I've heard thus far, I currently can't get behind this style from Black SeeD as having reasonable/listenable enough production quality despite this being a known & intentional aesthetic. Perhaps that needs a broader discussion, perhaps not, though I'm open to it. Decluttering the denser sections would be great, IMO. I genuinely appreciate the arrangement, but feel the style of production hurts rather than helps. NO (resubmit)

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

Hmmm… I’m currently undecided while leaning towards a borderline YES. Though some of the sounds felt dated, the composition is fairly energetic, and the source usage and transformation aren’t in question. Somehow though, the textures felt too empty and like the proper components weren’t in place to drive this track forward. With the track not going past 2:15, it’s important to me that nearly everything is cohesive and clicking together. Would love to get other Js insights on whether this one didn’t sound fully baked just yet. ? EDIT (10/10): Listening again, I'm gonna go NO on account of this not feeling filled in enough. For example, the bass guitar registers, but the part's so subdued, it might as well not be there. I'm sorry that I don't have any suggestions to at least offer something more constructive, but I'm humble enough to know that, if others agree with me, they're equipped to better articulate what's missing and how that could be addressed. If this didn't make it as it and he were open to revisiting this, I have full confidence in Eino's musicianship.

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

Opened with an extended intro with simplified progression until the arranged melody arrived at 1:08. Nice meat to the beats, and good energy and drive with their composition. It's a fun take where the melody's not leaned on, but the writing from the source is still present. Nice spin on the chorus at 2:09. It can feel like the seesaw's tilted toward the production side because the emphasis isn't on the source melody being loud, proud, and upfront, but there's nothing saying that's the way you have to treat a melody; it's totally fine and cool that it's not prominent the whole way. Great sound design with a lush result. Could have even had more ideas brought in rather than what's a semi-abrupt finish, but what's there is still a fun end result. Very nice job, Ly! YES

Interesting interplay of fragments! What are you doing here? YES

Solid arrangement of the theme; I enjoyed the rhythmic changes. The textures could have been denser, but served the piece just fine. The SFX as ear candy was also a nice touch. There were moments when I felt this was dragging out, but ultimately there were enough ear candy moments sprinkled in through the second half to give you a feeling of something slightly different that would help out. The drop off at 3:53 was a fun idea that offered something new for the last moments. Could be more, but it has its groove and plays in that space well. YES

First little note thrown in at :03 seems sour but resolves OK enough; still, that definitely didn't start things off on the right foot. Very audible pop at :41 that can hopefully be fixed. Ooh, nice changeup at 1:02; very different character from the source tune, so that was cool and helped it stand apart from the original on a level besides adding in vocals. The vocals until 1:50 were mixed too quitely relative to the instrumental; not the easiest to understand, though there's no ding for that, since it's a style thing. Note from 2:01-2:02 was flat and should be autotuned, IMO, and probably could tweak some moments at 1:50 & 2:00. Great energy for the performances overall; I enjoyed Connor's vocal chorusing, and the higher notes in particular (e.g. 2:11) are so much fun. Loved the energy of 2:22's final chorus leading into the final big finish of wailing vocals. There are some moments where Connor could tweak some things to leave no holes in his game, and I'm sure other Js will have more insight on that front, but overall strong and fun stuff! YES