halc

ah yes. this is brandon, wanting to be more like me, at his finest. ;D in all seriousness, this is a really varied and personalized arrangement, and the dubstep elements were tastefully executed. a few glibs with the production, as others mentioned, but nothing dealbreaking; nice work here. YES

really digging this source tune. there's some cool ideas in this, but without going into too much detail (I find it hard to with this piece ), I'm not comfortable passing this. the mixing, regardless of what aesthetic you were going for, just sounds like a mess to me. the vocal processing was interesting, but everything's so washed out, it's hard for me to enjoy this much on an objective or personal level when I can hardly make out any of the instruments over all the noise. NO

ick, can't say I loved that source tune, but props for hitting up some more relatively unknown game music. your take on it is a lot more refreshing. like the other J's mentioned, there are some smaller issues with the mixing (definitely agree that those drums are overcompressed), and some repetitiveness in the arrangement, but overall I didn't think there were any dealbreakers here. YES

nothing to add here, this is quite a pleasant track, and an unexpected but excellent take on the source. nice job. YES

wow, you've made a pretty expansive arrangement out of a pretty limited source. lots of thoughts here, positive and negative, so.. bullet-time GO -not personally a fan of the first lead at :36, but there's nothing necessarily wrong with it. -by then, I'm also already kinda eh on the drums. kinda random mix of samples you have there, maybe it's just the tom patterns layered with the club hi-hat. dunno, they just don't feel cohesive in terms of timbre, placement, reverb/fx, etc.. -1:52, excellent breakdown, and great a great piano solo, but the sequencing is a bit stiff in terms of timing and note velocities. -LOVE the bells at 2:32, this whole section is great. I love that weird processed build up in the background too. -the rest of the song is pretty good. nice synth solo. anyway, really digging this song overall, and the arrangement is fantastic, but I'm not quite comfortable passing this yet. like OA, improving the drums a bit would probably sway me, but I think this could use a bit of polish in other aspects as well. hope to hear a resub! NO(resub)

took a while for the arrangement to spread it's wings, but once you layered in the Jenova melody, I was all over this. I gotta agree that the samples here aren't gonna blow anyone away (not particularly any more interesting than some of the original samples, just a little higher in quality) but I thought they were tastefully mixed and well sequenced for the most part. I'll agree that this is a close call but I don't think there are any NO-worthy issues with the samples besides them being just average sounding. 2:52-3:35-ish felt like it was missing something, the melodic focus there just wasn't very strong compared to the rest of the piece. however the mix felt pretty polished to me as a whole. nice work. YES

thanks man, I wish you many good chill sessions in the future.

haha, definitely true, and thanks. it worked well for Zero-G, so I thought I'd try that again, but in the end it's about reaching as many ears as possible.

last self-bump for this, copypasting from my FB page: alright. sorry to those people who did purchase the album, but I'm switching Zero-G2 over to free already. not sure if trying to sell my music is the best strategy to go with at the moment. It worked for Zero-G, but this was kind of a flop. or maybe everyone's too busy listening to Maverick Rising and NES Jams. ;D regardless, it's free now. download it, listen to it, enjoy it. and tell all your friends about it. http://halc.bandcamp.com/album/zero-g2-supernova

self-gratuitous bump for this. many thanks for the comments so far.

this is a tough one. gonna have to agree OA, these performances probably sound nice on their own, but as an ensemble, it's not too tight. the mixing and arrangement are fine, and as a whole I definitely enjoyed the song, regardless of the timing issues. curious to see what other judges would say, but I'm gonna go ahead and close this one out for the sake of getting this feedback to the remixer before his performers COMPLETELY forget how to play this song. this is so close to a YES for me. I really hope we can hear another version sometime. NO(resub)

haha, got the same crew voting on this as last time. like the others, I definitely think the sequencing was largely improved here. nice work, I have no reservations with passing this. YES

I also never heard the original version. synths are a little generic, but not too bad. the overall mix is a bit harsh in the highs, especially some of the leads and the high-pitched arpeggios. I also agree with OA that some sections felt pretty sparse. the arrangement was fairly conservative but there was a lot of added arpeggios, rhythms and other minor modifications that helped keep it fresh. I think you need to take another pass at the mixing however, and work on beefing up the emptier parts of the soundscape. NO(resub)

i made my own birthday thread once. there's worse things you can do. happy birthday.

very MGS sounding vibe, especially the reverbed hand percussion and string pedals. production overall was solid, some of the staccato string articulations were a tad bit iffy but for the most part things were pretty well balanced and mixed. unfortunately I have to agree that the arrangement isn't quite there yet. it's definitely personalized in the way of instrumentation, but the composition needs to spread it's wings just a bit more more. my first impression was that I'd be passing this one, but I wanna hear you take one more pass at the arrangement. some more interpretation of the theme would really set this thing off. NO(borderline, resubmit!)

nothing too crazy about the mixing or arrangement, and I think things could have been a bit cleaner in terms of EQ, things got a little crowded at times but overall, an enjoyable production with really solid performances. nice job. YES

i do still <3 you, you know that, right? :]

so many amazing album releases right now, hopefully there's room for *at least* one more... ;P http://halc.bandcamp.com/album/zero-g2-supernova The follow-up to Zero-G (now available for free!), if you couldn't tell by the title. If you liked that, you'll like this. If you didn't like it, you might still like this. Oh, and if you listen to this, and you DO like it, click the like button! One click goes a long way. I'm very proud of this album and I hope you enjoy listening to it as much as I did making it. Total production time was approximately 2 months, for anyone curious. As always, all support is <3ingly appreciated. Hope you enjoy it!

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/search.php?s=s:ewqlhalf&utm_source=email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=eastwest-halfoff just wanted to mention this, as it's a really really good deal. you can nab EWQL Gold for only $250.

I made a song for this like a year ago

definitely throwing down a mix for this!

loving all the use of the term "9-bit" in this thread :]

I agree with the Oji, can't say this feels quite polished enough yet. the high-end was a bit weak however some of your arpy synths got a little harsh on certain high notes, such as :24.. it's not too overbearing, but it makes me blink. the busier sections Larry mentioned were quite cluttered but still managed to feel kinda sparse despite the wide stereo-spread and variety of synths. arrangement overall was working for me, but the mixing still needs a bit of a makeover. sorry for the vague mixing criticisms, it's just hard to pinpoint as there's not really any one big issue bringing this down, but just mixing and balance issues across the board. working with your EQ on your individual instruments might be a good place to start; cut out the frequencies you don't need and emphasize the ones you do, but let each instrument have it's own place in the spectrum. this should at least help with the crowding issues. NO(resub)

bit of a bump, I just wanted to let everyone know that the full 10-track album is now available for free/no-minimum download, so anyone who missed out or hasn't had the chance can grab the whole thing for free. my deepest thanks to everyone who purchased the album, spread the word, or even simply streamed the tracks in bandcamp. every bit of support means the world. Zero-G2 is on it's way! get the album: http://halc.bandcamp.com/album/zero-g preview a track from the upcoming "Zero-G2: Supernova": http://halc.bandcamp.com/track/other-drugs

hey everyone, sorry it's been so quiet around here. the album, as far as music goes, has been evaluated by OCR staff and approved for posting. Arek and A_Rival are still working on the artwork/animation part of the project, though I'm not sure how things have been progressing lately. Arek, we'll talk about this sometime soon, I've been thinking about it lately as well. ie NO WORRIES, the music is DONE and this project WILL COME OUT when it does. in the meantime, there's still plenty of stuff great stuff in the album and mixposting pipeline, so keep enjoying those. we appreciate all the patience and support you guys have shown for the album, and I promise it will be worth it when it finally drops.