Liontamer

Could Wes or Jimmy please give me a estimated head count? I'll need to confirm a count with Dave today or tomorrow, then get the donated money transferred to me so I can pay for the tickets in full.

* Liontamer is listening to Nobuo Uematsu (arr. Hitoshi Sakimoto) - "Chocobo (FFXII Version)" [Final Fantasy XII OST] (02:03) <Liontamer> bastard! <Liontamer> didn't give this one a variation name! <Liontamer> bastard! <Liontamer> THIS SOUNDTRACK SUCKS ASS <zircon> haha <zircon> like Techno de Chocobo? <Liontamer> yeah, wtf <Liontamer> geeks like me live for that shit <Liontamer> THIS SOUNDTRACK SUCKS ASS <Liontamer> CLEARLY, TOP TO BOTTOM, THIS MAN IS A HACK!

I love my family and all, but I would join yours in exchange for one of the spare mega-flatscreens y'all are getting. You guys can't possibly need all 87 of 'em.

Nice track. But too liberal? Definitely one to analyze VERY closely. Will contact the artists for more information - LT Hey again, routine drill: Remixer Names: Tepid, AeroZ Real Names: Philip Schwan, Sebastian Freijman Email Address: phswan@gmail.com, sebastian_freij@hotmail.com Website: meh and www.myspace.com/freijman I'm ID'd now?: u=9600, u=12066 Game Remixed: Sonic the Hedgehog VG Song: Green Hill Zone (one might think) Comments: Well, a few ideas can go a long way. I had a little set of jazz chords on the piano which I matched to the Green Hill Zone theme. Soon after I had made a backing track and it escalated violently into a decent start to a mix. I knew after 'To Hot For Heatman' that Seb knew his Reason like Ray Charles knows his jazz, so I sent him the project file and he turned 2 minutes of ideas, into 5 neat organised minutes of mix. The guitar .REX loops (as Reason users may know them by) were created from scratch by myself through Cubase and ReCycle, and that was a lot of fun, and even more so the ability to rearrange the slices at ease. Seb did the complex stuff, and added the 8bit flair, and phat drums, and many, many fine detailed edits. Quoting from Seb: "I had so much bloody fun doing it. I was in a trance." His English, and knowledge of English expressions is far too good for a Swede...Also, I believe him to be the fastest Reason slinger in the North (of Europe), performing 978 controller changes in 2 hours. Fantastic. Anyway enjoy TO Edit: Further Explanation from Phil regarding the arrangement: 0:13 - source melody thoughout song, different chords, 1:06 another reference to the melody (0:14-0:26 in chiptune). 1:17 - intro chords from source in minor rather than major (0:01-0:13 in chiptune) 1:36 - equivalent to the break in the original texturally but an original melody (was listening to Spring Yard Zone at the time) (0:39 onwards) 2:34 - I seem to think it's from a Sonic theme, but it may be the synth, I'll go back t'ya on that one. 3:12 octaves play melody in from second part of source (coming in at 0:39 in chiptune but a different rhythm) And the whole 8bit feel with AeroZ's Sonic-esque riffs. The source is short, and I think I've covered about 80% of it with the main melody being 50%. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ From a production standpoint, this is solid. Why's there 4 1/2 seconds of silence at the beginning? Unless there's a creative reason behind it, trim it off. The note sequence of the "Green Hill Zone" melody at :13 sounded really...iffy on the first go, but you somewhat acclimate to it. I'm usually the leadoff on these headscratchers, since I'm masochistic enough to try and break the arrangement down. It's safe to say I'm down with liberal arrangements. But I have to be able to place the connections significantly. "The whole 8bit feel with AeroZ's Sonic-esque riffs" is all well and good, but "Sonic-esque" isn't good enough for these standards. You need "Sonic", and it should be clear enough that it's there when analyzing it (keep in mind I didn't say "when casually listening to it"). Thanks a lot to TO for getting in touch with Phil and getting his breakdown of the source tune usage. The mix still sounds pretty liberal, but if there's enough source usage (>50% being my threshold) then I'm down. At about 5:26-long (sans silent intro), this needs 2:43's worth of recognizable rearrangement to pass by my personal criteria. Let's get cold, unfeeling and statistical: http://project2612.org/download.php?id=36 - "Green Hill Zone" :13-:23, :36-1:00, 1:06-1:08, 4:12-4:29 - (based off main melody - :14-:26 of source) ~ 53 seconds 1:16-1:35 (1st idea based off intro - :01-:07 of source) ~ 19 seconds 1:35-1:54, 2:15-2:35, 4:46-5:06 - (1st idea based off chorus - :39-:49 of source) ~ 49 seconds 2:34-2:53, 5:07-5:24 - (2nd idea based off intro - :01-:07 of source) ~ 36 seconds 3:11-3:30, 3:48-4:07 - (2nd idea based off chorus - :39-:49 of source) ~ 38 seconds 2:53-3:12, 3:30-3:48 - No connection that I'm aware of Adding everything up, that's 3:15's worth of viable rearrangement of the source material, which is more than enough. Even hypothetically subtracting some time from a few of the more liberal-sounding riffs, the arrangement was still on the better side of 50%. There could be other aspects that I'm missing as well. This is a great piece of music, creative & sophisticated with the interpretation, but pretty far off the beaten path of rearrangement. From a fan perspective, I'd much rather prefer (and connect with) an arrangement that's more overt with the source usage, though that's irrelevant to my vote. I can still pass it, but I'd be lying if I didn't say I wasn't somewhat disappointed that it went this route. Other liberal pieces I've passed still feel more connected to their source material than this. It's "Sonic-esque", but not overtly resembling the source material for the casual listener most of the time. It dances on the borderline of recognizability, and it's proud of it. I think many people looking for the tired & true "Green Hill Zone" melody will end up disappointed that it plays such a small part, not even a minute's worth of the arrangement. Yet, as is always with the general public, many will love this despite not being able to easily place the connections. Y'all keep a eye on the Review thread for this one and see what I mean. YES(borderline)

Dear OCReMix, This following remix was done as a request on vgmix. I never played the games but through studying the music I learned to enjoy it very much. Well, here is the info. Remix name: DarkMessenger Real name: Niels van der Leest E-mail: info@nielsvanderleest.nl Website : www.nielsvanderleest.nl UserID: 19586 Games remixed: Myst I, IV, V Songs remixed: Myst I "Myst theme", Myst IV "Darkness", Myst V "Descent" Remix name: Unraveling the Mystery Gr., Niels van der Leest ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Myst - Soundtrack - (01) "Myst Theme" [:00-2:10] Myst V End of Ages Soundtrack - (01) "Descent" [2:17-3:11] MYST IV -REVELATION- Soundtrack - (04) "Darkness" [3:11-5:16] Production-wise, this was a bit rough around the edges. There were a number of things that could have been tightened up. The strings sustains in the back starting at 1:00 sounded pretty unnatural; any louder and they would have been way too exposed. As is, they're decent, but struggle at carrying the melody without distracting. Better job with the string layering at 2:17 to make the most out of the samples and not expose them. Nice job getting over 2 minutes of mileage off the Myst 1 theme. I loved the transition at 2:10 to Myst 5's "Descent" at 2:17. The bassline was a bit muddied in the background but beefed up the background enough and lent movement to the piece. The strings until 3:11 felt too low, much like the 1:00-2:08 section, and could have used more presence. Moves into Myst 4's "Darkness" at 3:11. The strings still strained for credibility, and it was a bit difficult not focusing on their unnatural-sounding movement when there was a lot of other great stuff going on with the bassline writing, drumwork and mallet percussion. There's a minor piano issue at 4:53 where the note fades in and out. The ending also sputters out abruptly at 5:16; not sure if that was intentional or not, but that (and the 7 seconds of silence at the end) needs to be fixed. Cool premise to go for a series-wide mix. The sophistication of the arrangement carries this a ways. I'd love to see some of the production (string realism) and balance (string and bassline audibility) issues worked on a bit, as well as a slightly higher bitrate, but I'm rooting for substance. Smart, sophisticated arranging, Niels. Good luck with the rest of the vote. YES

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/megaman1.zip - Track 12 Track opens up with a REALLY lo-fi feel, and indeed the high pitched sound plays a shitload of bad notes. It's actually so far in the back though that it really doesn't stand out too bad. Some sections, it's clearly more exposed though (e.g. :59-1:13, 2:57-3:11). Definitely agreed with Vigilante that you need to push up the volume of the melody a bit relative to the rest of the sounds in play. The only meaningful variation I'm hearing is additive and subtractive stuff with the backing tracks, and nothing with the melodic content. 3:12 does a little something different with the source, but it's mainly a slowing down of the tempo until 3:41, not anything interpretive. Thus, we're left with something that's ultimately underdeveloped and repetitive. Absolutely crappy "I give up" ending at 4:40. At least write a real ending. The source tune indeed does have a good hook, and you acknowledge that the source makes for a good loop. But why isn't the arrangement developed further, with more substantial melodic variation over the long haul? NO

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/metroid.zip - Track 5 I haven't seen a breakdown that good (in terms of me agreeing with every point) in a while. Reread zircon's entire vote. I agreed with Vigilante in the sense that sometimes the beat structure seems tacked on underneath, and that any melody could fit on top of it, making the beatwork not seem integral to the arrangement of the source material. An issue, IMO, but not an issue the whole way through. In any case, you've got your laundry list of issues from zirc, and addressing most of his concerns would get this above the bar for sure. Good luck. NO (rework/resubmit)

I'll agree with that. Not simply on an "it sounds good basis", but I believe you're right that there may be enough ambiguity in the picture that we may need to rethink that policy. We may have to state that copyright holders of the original material need to contact the ReMixers in cases where they would like to commercially use the arrangements. AFAIK, it's what Tommy Tallarico did with the ReMixers whose tracks are on the Earthworm Jim Anthology album. Going that route would be, in effect, washing our hands of that whole process since we don't own the ReMixes anyway. I'm interested in other POVs.

http://ocremix.org/info/Submission_Standards_and_Instructions#Can_I_submit_a_revision_of_an_existing.2C_posted_ReMix.3F Even if the track is no longer posted, my interpretation in this scenario would be that to "bring back" the track to the site it would still have to be different enough from the original arrangement (see: Zitwra's "Blue" vs. "Blue (Shooting Star Mix)", which was the situation that finally caused this policy to be put in writing). If the fixes were minor, it would probably not be allowed back on. But ultimately any choice of reposting a track would be up to the discretion of djpretzel. If djp could forsee scenarios where a mixer would be allowed to bring back material in good faith, he may not want a "gone is gone" policy. It's not frequent, but honestly, removal requests have happened often enough. Often enough where having a policy became important enough for discussion. The choice was made years ago to retain a policy of denying a removal request when the request seemed impulsive. With the current policy in place now (i.e. NOT the content policy we're discussing in this thread), we'd rather talk to whoever's involved and decidedly make sure that they're set on removal for the long haul and that there's no misunderstanding. Only after a reasonable period of time, when it becomes clear there that removal is a choice that has been thought through without misunderstandings/misgivings, we'd go ahead and remove whatever material. We'd still like to retain this flexability even with a more formal policy, while keeping in mind that we don't mean to imply any ownership of the music.

Absolutely. In all likelihood, I would think that's the policy we'd settle on, provided that we can't work out something better. I agree. I think what we would need to do is revise the wording so that we can "deny continued usage of the OC ReMix NAME", rather than the tracks themselves. For the tracks themselves, we don't own them, but we definitely own the name of OCR and that's the main thing we're trying to protect from being used without permission, for profit, or in a fraudulent way.

While not implying that I'm dumbing it down for you, but mainly to make it clear to everyone else, what you see before you is the discussion of how the policy is going to go. It's not finalized. I can't speak for others, but I'm not even against your call that not honoring removal requests can legally seem like an ownership situation. But clearly, we do not want any express or implied ownership of the works and I'm confident that whatever we put into place will make that 100% clear. If that has to involve honoring any removal request without fail, even if the person changes their mind hours or days later, then I feel like we would compromise to that policy. My personal point of view though is that we still need a policy in place to prevent artists from leaving specifically for fickle reasons. Some hate the site or the staff for whatever reason, but then change their mind. Some question their skills as a musician or how an older track holds up to the more recently posted material. While I don't agree with removing tracks, all are perfectly valid reasons to do so. We've had several artists through the years ask to remove their mixes, only for them to a) either subsequently withdraw the removal request because the request was impulsive in the first place or ask for the removed material to be put up again after it was already taken down. Because of the work djpretzel and the staff put into evaluating tracks, doing the writeups and providing free hosting, I understand why djp wants a system in place where removal requests can be turned down, if only because the overall track record has been that most people end up changing their minds and asking for the material to stay. There should be some way to address these issues of not immediately honoring what come across as impulsive removal requests while also making clear that OCR does not own or want to imply ownership of the tracks. So the issue I'd pose to you, AD, is whether you feel (in a non-legally binding capacity of course), that those aforementioned wants, both 0%-ownership/not approving all removal requests) are actually mutually exclusive goals. If not, is there a way to draw up terms that properly establish both scenarios?

I'll post in more detail later today. But people are starting to banter out the idea of OCR wanting to own all of the ReMixes. LuIzA seems scared about it and OverCoat used the word "ownership". I want to make it clear that OCR doesn't want to own any ReMixes. At all. In any way. We don't own them. We're not asking to own them. The policy stuff does not mean arists can't have their tracks elsewhere, like VGMix or OneUp Studios, on a personal CD, or a homemade release like housethegrate's "Houseworks". That's all gonna continue as usual. But it does mean that we ask not to distribute the files to make money with "OC_ReMix" in the name or "OC ReMix" in the MP3 tags. Once that stuff isn't in the filenames or tags, everything's fine if you're the artist that made the tracks. OCR doesn't want to be attached to any ownership or profit-making that involves using the OC ReMix name by either OCR itself, the artists, or third parties, because we are a non-profit organization. That's all.

Ormgas.com, our sister site and official radio stream, allows registered users to vote 1-5 on the mixes that are played on the stream. As for why OC ReMix proper does not and never will rank mixes: http://ocremix.org/info/Frequently_Asked_Questions#Why_aren.27t_the_ReMixes_ranked_by_popularity_or_numerical_ratings.3F

Ohhhhhhhhhhh snap! SgtRama! The baby-mama drama!

http://www.zophar.net/gbs/sobs.zip - Track 26 I only overtly recognized :26-:36 from the source being arranged in here from 1:15-1:53 (then later in the background). To be on the safe side, you need to clarify how you're incorporating the source material in your submission, otherwise we may have trouble making the connections. When in doubt, the burden is on you to prove how you've arranged your stated source tune. Yeah, I don't know why you sequenced the harp so tightly; it just sounds completely fake, plus the velocites being so similar from note-to-note only help to stifle the energy. The beatwork, when in play, is way too basic; at least there's some meat on the bass kicks, but the overall texture is too simple. I did like the strings and glassy arpeggiated notes serving to pad out the back. Simple but effective ideas, conceptually. Strings were too mechanical-sounding with the sequencing though. Same issues with the brass at 1:54 & 2:13; completely unnatural sounding with weird attacks. I think the overall structure is half-decent, moreso than Vigilante's giving it credit for. Despite more obvious issues like the rigid sequencing and boring/repetitive drums, there's a modicum of attention paid to dynamics and instrumental variation with the melody, so those are a step in the right direction. In my opinion, your primary short term goal should be to learn how to sequence your parts for a more natural sound. If you aren't doing so already, use the ReMixing and Works forums for questions and fan feedback before submitting in the future. NO

* Your ReMixer name - Kryptikon * Your email address - kryptikon@gmail.com [ edit] * Name of game(s) ReMixed - Star Ocean: Blue Sphere * Name of individual song(s) ReMixed - Myth of Fate

This has been up a for a little while. From this point on, I'll be PMing people regarding proper use of the Real Name field if necessary. Everyone should go ahead and take out anything unrelated to their real name out of that field. Otherwise, I'll be required to modify people's accounts myself and throw out some temporary bans.

No submissions should be over 192kbps, so please do not submit something at 207kbps. http://www.zophar.net/gbs/pokemonb.zip - Track 36 Wow, that's an ugly source tune, I'll say. Interested to see where you go with it. ... Redux. The sound quality was half decent; you've got some meat on the individual sounds, but the texture's still empty. Mallet percussion at :08 sounds a bit flimsy. Synth lead at :18 is barren and ugly on its own. Heh, nice Genesis-style stuff from :25-:27 with the throwback sounds. What the hell is the deal from 1:51-2:01; there's nothing happening, bro. Piano chords starting at 2:18 were definitely swanky (though overly quantized), but the piano chords bled into the mallet percussion (gonna assume vibes), so you need to pay more attention to EQing to separate the parts. The textures here aren't nearly complex enough. The percussion grooves change on occasion, but they generally just drag on with repetition and don't effectively drive the arrangement forward. The composition here's simply not sophisticated and the sounds don't fill up the space well at all, both in the foreground and background. The arrangement drags pretty substantially as a result. Just keep on trying to improve, bro. NO

Beatdrizzle, my shizzle grizzle!

Contact Info * Showty * Dana Short * Shortstuff71@columbus.rr.com * 90257328 ReMix Info * Mega Man IV * Citadel (Dr. Cossack) stage 1 * http://members.fortunecity.com/kane5000/cs1and2.mid * For some reason, no one likes this song. I wish I knew why but I’ve always liked this song and so I decided to try and create a remix of it. Besides conserving the original melody, all additional parts of this song are new. This includes an obvious re-organization of the song and the addition of musical segments. This includes a harmonization of the original melody. I’ve played the piano since I was in kindergarten and I’ve become very good with improvising and composing. If you don’t remember, the first stage takes place in the snowy outskirts of the Citadel grounds. I guess that ice, snow, and Russians remind me of the Nutcracker. This explains the fast-paced “sugar plum fairy” electronic style here (that doesn’t mean it’s cheezy). I also have learned that when dealing with winter-related music, dark bass, lots of reverb and staccato are the way to go. If there is one thing that I am worried about, it is that I used Fruity Loops to make this mix. I really don’t like how a lot of the music created using that program sometimes gets a MIDI feel to it so I tried incredibly hard to avoid that. Whether you think this is OC worthy or not, thank you for your time and criticism. ----------------------------------------------------- http://www.zophar.net/nsf/megaman4.zip - Track 9 ("Dr. Cossack Stage 1") Yeah, I remember this track. SgtRama did a cool WIP mix of it for the Fresh Baked Remix Competition 1 back around '03 that made me familiar with the original. Let's see how you did. What immediately struck me was that the beatwork in the back was really simplistic & flimsy and the writing was generically structured, which bogged down the entire arrangement. Nothing like thin, generic-sounding beats & claps and vanilla boom-tss patterns on complete cruise control to make something sound too beginner-ish right out of the gate. Hopefully you're not cycling through a bunch of preset loops. In any case, layer up your percussion tracks for a richer feel that fills out the background more, and go for more creative writing/patterns. Melodically the track is pretty thin. The countermelody on bassline (prominent from 1:03-1:17) wasn't much of a factor. You definitely could have used the meat that the bass provided for the rest of the track. Things finally bolstered up around 1:31 with some additional writing under the melody, but it played a pretty minor part. 1:57 stuck with the verbatim treatment of the melody while throwing in some original stuff on top. The melodic textures still sounded really thin; you need more density here via addition parts. You really gotta give the actual MM4 source tune melody some actual interpretation; you usually play it way too straight and hope that your embellishments will personalize the approach enough, which they don't. Needs more interpretation, more work put into the percussion, and more instrumental depth before this would even be in remotely decent shape. What's in place is at a very work-in-progress level. NO

Hi, this is my second attempt with the Team Rocket source, and I figured Id go with producing more of a groove with it. Ive focused on making the mix more cohesive than my previous stuff....well, here it is: Contact Info Remixer Name: Dr. Rod Real Name: Rod Turpin EMail Address: LightningRT@gmail.com User ID: 19945 Source Info System: Game Boy Game: Pokemon R/B/Y Song: Team Rocket Hideout Remix Info Remix Title: Basement Funk

http://www.zophar.net/usf/lozusf.rar - 26 "Zelda's Theme", 28 "Lon Lon Ranch", 35 "Lost Woods", 44 "Temple of Time", 57 "Windmill Hut" & 32 "Hyrule Field Morning Theme" Thanks to pixietricks for the source breakdown. In the context of judging loads of OoT submissions, I've grown to know the tracks very well. I'm trying to read Vigilante's mind and guessing he'd think it suffers too greatly from medleyitis, but that's all it is - a guess. I'm certainly interested in his take. I think the trackname, while bland, is fine. I mean, it says what it is. Some of the theme transitions definitely felt jumpy and undeveloped (e.g. 1:27, 2:37), but the majority of them felt very natural and seamless. The hanging note at 1:36 seemed like a mistake, but it's negligible. Overall smooth playing and a nice atmosphere, which is all you can ask for with a solo piano arrangement. On that most basic level, it clearly brings the goods. I don't think it's a question at all as to how passable this is, only how far above the bar it is. With that said, this is enough over the bar to me where it's not quite a borderline vote. I wish each of the themes had more breathing room for expanded interpretation and personalization. After all, it's something we like to stress admist the lure of the mega-medley. But like pixietricks, I agree that the themes were all individually altered and embellished, which makes an up vote all the more comfortable. Welcome aboard, George. YES

I'll be honest, I just wanted some Lord of the Sword; Who's gonna stop me? You? - LT Hello Judge’s Panel from OC ReMix. I’m sending you my remix from Lord Of The Sword (Battle Theme). I used mainly Triton Classic sounds – only the real drums are from a soundbank I have here. Mixed on Audition 2.0. There’s not much remix/midi/etc from this game, hope you like this one. CONTACT INFO ReMixer name: Cosmonal Real Name: Eric Fraga Email: cosmonal@terra.com.br REMIX INFO Game Remixed: Lord Of The Sword Song: Battle Theme System: Sega Master System / Mark III See you, Cosmonal ---------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.smspower.org/music/vgm/unapproved/Lord_of_the_Sword_update.zip - "Battling" Decent intro, but it was downhill from there. The interplay between the sounds just isn't cohesive, especially once the drums come in. The timing between the instruments is out of synch, and everything's too mechanically sequenced. And once the drums arrived, the pattern looped over and over again, which was extremely boring to listen through. A brief glimmer of something fuller showed up at 1:17 but was over by 1:24, replaced by even more empty space. Same tease of fuller textures at 3:10 for the close. The strings first used at 1:30 were extremely mechanical. The changes in the dynamics at 1:24 and 2:20 were good ideas conceptually, but the textures were so spartan that the track merely sounded boring still. There were some minor expansive ideas as well as observable dynamic shifts, but the overall arrangement was too straightforward and not helped by the very simplistic and sparse textures. Needs more complexity, tighter timing, more interpretation and expansion. This is only a work-in-progress at this level, keep working on it. NO

LT: It is when I'm in charge. When you're in charge, you can add all the blurry, ugly avatars you want.

I've called Natasha at Group Sales once again, and I'm being conservative with upping our tickets as we're closer to the payment deadline. I've reserved 8 addition seats, and I'll be heading to the Kennedy Center after work tomorrow to sign the additional paperwork. Row S has 3 seats free behind Row R, then I also got 5 more seats in Row T that are immediately behind the 3 available seats in row S. In order to be fair, the original 25 reserved seats will go to those who paid first, and I will be going through with Dave to look through the PayPal records and treat the purchases on a FIFO basis. If we don't get any additional ticket reservations, we'll still have an incredible showing. Everyone make sure to have their OCR shirts handy! I'm going on Saturday as well, everyone else be damned! We just need to organize who else is attending the encore show in order to buy a group of tickets together, which I can also handle. Expect to pay full price with these though, $45 + additional charges, but let's see how many people we can wrangle first.