Emunator

Yay! I'm always happy to see another Katethegreat submission cross our panel Admittedly I've had this one downloaded for a long time but haven't truly paid attention to it with any sort of critical ear, so let's see what we've got here... This is a fairly minimalist arrangement, but given the brevity of the source I feel like you still managed to squeeze a lot of mileage out of your remix. At the end, I found myself still wanting more, perhaps some sort of reprise of one of your initial instruments/melodies. Still, I must say that you certainly make the most of the 2 minute runtime, and each individual instrument makes a memorable impression. Honestly, not much to say here. This feels like a pretty easy call - while there's not really much melodic expansion going on with the Silent Hill melody itself, there's plenty of auxiliary melodies being added, and a great deal of personalization coming through the instrument choices and performance. Another lovely sub from Kate, keep throwing more stuff our way! YES

This is so fucking cool. Your rapping chops are fantastic and the lyrics are extremely well written. Your lyrics and performance style remind me like a much better version of the Knuckles stage music from Sonic Adventure 2. The record scratches are sweeeet, too. You're continuing to showcase talents I never would have guessed that you had, and with each submission I feel like you're raising the bar for yourself The beat itself has a few minor problems, such as the Temple of Time melody lead being a little bit dry and the rhodes piano feeling rather small and reserved. A sample with some more stereo width and more resonance would have worked better, IMO, but I can also respect it as a stylistic choice. My other critique is that I think some of the soloing from the first minute and a half would have fit better at the end of the track instead of clustering it all toward the beginning. Right now, it takes so long for the raps to come in that I sort of lose interest in the track. I don't foresee that being a problem, but just something to consider! Very easy YES YES

Ugh... I want to pass this so badly, but honestly I don't think there's enough development in this song until the piano soloing comes in about 2/3rds of the way through. From there, everything is golden, but before that I feel like this never reached its true potential. You need more layers, more dynamic writing, creative sound design... SOMETHING to help spice up the first section of the track, or cut down on the length somewhat. It's not solely the conservativeness that I think is an issue, but rather the overall lack of musical expansion and going on until the piano break. Honestly, the sections need to transition better too, in my opinion. For the last few bars of your D&B section, you could gradually build up your drums more and then add some sort of crash/boom to end off that section more conclusively, instead of juts dropping into the piano part with no warning. Your production is great, sound choices are fantastic, drum sounds are great and the soloing at the end is amazing, but I know you can improve this and make something truly awesome. Right now it feels like you're playing it pretty safe for the first 4 minutes of your track, and there's a ton of room to make that part as memorable as the last 2:40. I hope you don't think I'm coming down on you hard because I dislike the track; on the contrary, I IMPLORE you to revisit this and resubmit if this ends up being rejected. I recognize a lot of potential in here but I don't think it's quite at the bar at this point in time. Good luck either way! NO (resubmit!!)

I'm starting to really appreciate the amount of effort that you put into selecting sources for your remixes. It feels like, with each new remix, it's almost like you've composed an entirely new song by patching together existing melodies from vastly different sources. I think, melodically-speaking, this is one of your most successful outings yet - that DKC2 melody really goes well with anything! Your sound choices are really pleasing to hear, on the whole. There's a few leads (like the one that enters at :43) that I wasn't full sold on, but overall you've pulled a lot of very recognizable, nostalgic 80's sounds together into a rather seamless package... None of it ever sounds TOO cheesy though, and you've got your fair share of modern production techniques going on to bring these sounds into a more modern context. I don't think I fully appreciated the style on mix one until I sat down and realized how much textural variety there is going on here. Like all of your other songs, you've got a huge amount of individual sounds each playing some part in the mix overall. Some highlights include the very-retro sounding piano chords in the background at :43, and the synth flute sample at 2:25. Overall, I'm very impressed with that aspect of your mixing here, and it's definitely one of your most cohesive soundscapes to date. If I had to suggest anything to you to help improve in the future, I'd recommend getting a little more complex with your melodies at certain sections in order to highlight them a bit more. Structurally, the mix is very much a sequence of melodies presented without ever really defining anything in terms of verses, choruses, etc. The end result is that the arrangement feels static, and I'm never really sure where the energy level is supposed to be at. I think you could really help create more of a climax with this track if one of the melodies was adapted to sound more like a solo, with more complex writing and some improvisation, at a key point in the track. Keeping an eye on your backing track and being more deliberate with the energy level throughout your arrangements might help make your arrangements a lot more dynamic in the future. Overall though, this is very clearly over my bar, despite a slightly-plodding arrangement and a few questionable leads. There's a lot of heart here and I think the strong points in your music making process (vibrant sound choices, seamless source blending, and emotive melodic writing) are improving with each submission. Hopefully you find some of my suggestions useful (or, at least coherent!) YES

Right on man Best of luck in your future endeavors. If you ever want an extra ear for your new tunes or have any material that you just want to share, feel free to send anything new my way and I can critique/give feedback/whatever, if you'd like.

This is so much fun I liked it back when you put up your first version, I like it even more now that it's been cleaned up. I thought the drop at 4:30 was a bit of a disappointment but that's not a big deal. Sub it!

Love it dude Btw, what happened to your website? Is there anywhere I can find the rest of your tunes online at the moment?

Oh my god I can't wait to listen to this when I get home Thanks for taking the crits to heart and getting some live performances on this, I'm sure it'll be amazing!

Absolutely exquisite. This really follows in the footsteps of Disco Dan's "Green Amnesia" in the way the instrumentation starts out very subdued and low-key, but eventually works up to a more energetic D&B pace while never sacrificing the relaxing, lush vibe that it started with. I'm absolutely in love with the approach and I think you pulled it off excellently. This is an instant classic for me. Glad to see you back in the community again

Hey all, just wanted to drop a line and let everybody know that I've been talking with Kristina and I'm gonna be hijacking this track again and hopefully bringing the production/sequencing up to par so this can hopefully pass the panel. I'm super-excited to be working on this track, I love the arrangement to death and hopefully I'll be able to bring the production up to standards Among the edits I have planned are redoing the string/oboe samples, potentially working with the drums, adding an acoustic bassline, and maybe tweaking with the overall production a little bit more too. Can't wait to get started!!

Well, *I* thought it was good!

Haha, as someone who has a pending solo mixpost but still has no clue what he is doing, I can vouch for the "dumb luck" part of that equation

Typical halc remix. YES ... Ok, seriously, this is a really pleasant combination that I didn't think would have worked as well as it did. The acoustic strumming adds a very warm tone to the mix and softens up the more tonally-abrasive chiptune samples. It's very nice to listen to, and a great change-up from the usual halc/Strader collabs where Drew picks up one of Brandon's WIPs and polishes it to completion. You guys collab well together no matter who starts the process YES

I can't say I'm personally a fan of the actual bassline here. I find it kind of repetitive and detached from the rest of the song, and it personally distracts me as a listener from all the other cool stuff going on in the arrangement. I probably won't be keeping this one on any of my playlists because of that, but honestly I can recognize that it's a matter of personal taste more than anything. Your handling of the rest of the theme was exquisite (I would honestly love to hear a wub-less version of this arrangement) and the modifications you made to the theme itself are great. I think people will probably dig this on the whole. Sorry for spending most of this vote ragging on your track, it's still objectively a pass, as far as I'm concerned

Very little here that I can add to what Larry said. He covered all of the points nicely, but to reiterate, the lack of any dynamics in the arrangement was probably the biggest issue here. I am definitely a fan of your part writing in this track, the arpeggios with the chiptune synth are particularly pleasant. However, I agree that the way the track is arranged as a whole just doesn't do justice to the individual sections, since there's lots of great material there. NO (resub!)

Alright, first off, I'm very happy to see Pot Hocket breaking out of the norm and trying some different stuff. Production-wise, this reminds me very much of Nutritious' old work, which I feel is more than over the bar. The mixing/sample quality has lots of room for improvement, but this is clearly aiming for a more subdued sound and I feel your particular production style works well here. There's a few sore spots that stick out, such as the oboe/clarinet leads, which I feel are sequenced pretty stiffly with some weird attack on them. The snare fills that come in later in the song also sound extremely mechanical and almost electronic in nature. I really wish those just weren't in the song, personally, but I can live with it. Also, the source usage doesn't even come in until :50, which is a bit of a concern but fortunately, there's source all over the rest of the song so I can sign off on this. I've got several reservations but overall I feel like the emotion in the arrangement itself is enough to outweigh the average production. Keep working and improving, you've obviously got some great talent hidden away that none of us knew you had. YES (borderline)

Oh wait, is very important? Great haste! Project of completion!

Looooooooool You guys are funny. Stay patient, I haven't forgotten about anything. We're in the process of polishing up one last critical track to make sure the album is as strong as possible. In the meantime, please feel free to continue idly speculating and bickering about the release date, your suffering makes me happy >:] No, seriously. The good news is coming and the time we're spending on these last few updates will be worth it in the long run. When you consider the number of tracks on this project vs. its lifespan, it's likely one of the fastest projects in OCR's history so you all don't have it *that* bad

This has fast become my favorite halc album to date. I love how you've embraced the chill with this one, while still keeping the glitchy, futuristic flavor that you introduced in your Zero-G series of albums. Retro Machines is definitely my favorite, but this is a great listen all the way through. <3

I'll hop on whatever car/plane/boat/etc. you're taking, I just need to figure out how to get back in time for classes, since they start the day after Mag for me... I'm not missing this again, though. I'll work something out.

Hi there, fellow Phoenix dweller Sorry I don't really have much time to leave a full-on review (I'm just listening to this on cheapo speakers on my lunch break) but this is REALLY nice Your soloing around the theme is just fantastic and you have a nice hybrid of sounds here. I could totally imagine sitting back in a nice lawn chair with a cold drink in hand, letting this song loop for hours and just drifting off into bliss. I feel like the first half would benefit from an acoustic hand percussion/shaker set instead of the electronic fills you've got now, and honestly I think you would be better off redoing the percussion overall. I think you've got a great opportunity to keep the organic vibe strong even when it goes into a dance groove by using an acoustic hand percussion kit, and I personally would love to hear how that would sound. Also, sorry for the derailment here, but kudos to Eradicate for the very amazing feedback that you've been leaving on WIPs lately. I don't comment on stuff around here as much as I used to since I've begun judging, but I really appreciate people like you taking the time out of your day to keep this forum moving You rock!