Theory of N

Finally, after escaping the eternal pit of stagnation and procrastination, my first EP! From basic chiptunes to beatboxing accompaniment to sexy saxophone, there's quite a variety of jazz and chip-inspired music in here. And it's only $1 (though any more is EXTREMELY appreciated)! Just click the picture above and enjoy! Special thanks to Audio Fidelity for all of his help on track 5.

So I pretty much hate Blaze Heatnix's theme (no offense Gario). Though I'm really liking what's coming out of it. Doesn't look like I'll have near as much time as I did last week, but I still plan on getting something good out. I'm noticing the hardest part about this is realizing your own theme in different ways each round. As of right now, mine is a Blaze Heatnix remix with a slight hint to Sting Chameleon.

No, I voted. I'm confused because I thought it was supposed to end 10 hours ago. When I visit the group, the threads still say voting's open.

Voting's still open?

Only about 1:22 out of 3:51 of my track I would really consider funk. Maybe 1:45 if you're being generous, but that's still less than half the track. If it was 4 minutes of funk, I don't think I would have as many votes, to be honest. A lot of the ideas would have been lost.

The intro synth from my entry is the string pad from MMX

Clever. Very clever.

It sounds like Snow Overworld from Super Mario 3D Land.

I figured it was more tasteful than "Sting Chameleon Will Destroy Bubble Crab's Entire Being and Use His Very Essence as a Cheap Bathroom Product".

I have long wanted to arrange something from this game. The problem is that my style involves tons of chip elements so I'm afraid it would sound too similar, but...I think I may attempt something here soon. Most likely the theme from the first level. That song haunts me.

Well, it's not quite the same, but I recently started a Blue Resort remix

jnWake - Dude, the beginning of this is sexy as hell. I think the melody at 1:25 could be brought out a bit more. It's kind of drowning in rhythm guitar. For that matter, the lead at 1:50 could be brought out a tiny bit more too. Both might benefit from some cleaning up in the lower end parts (bass/rhythm guitar. Mostly bass). Again, more sex in that EPiano. Reminds me of Bomberman Hero <3. I definitely like this, dude. Please work this up. Also, nice wordplay in your title. Forever...Infinity...clever.

Btw, my girlfriend will be coming too. So one more for the group reg.

Ectogemia - I love that vintage feeling from the crackliness. When the super fast drums come in at 0:38, I'm super disoriented. I don't know what it is, I've heard that beat plenty of times before but something about it in this context confuses me. I think maybe the rhythmic figure in the bass should be slightly less legato to help with time? Drums could use a bit more humanization as well. Or balance. Something about it sounds very mechanical. 1:19 - best part of the song in my opinion. Love the contrast and the sexy smooth keyboard. Is that actual recorded guitar or a distorted synth? If that's guitar, it's pretty impressive lol. As far as arrangement goes, it kind of just...went. Meaning like the intro and beginning was made and then you moved on to the next section. As soon as that was made, you moved on to the NEXT section, etc. It doesn't feel very organized to me. I'm not quite sure how to explain it. The ideas and source usage were awesome, for sure. The nightmare carnival type theme is pretty kickass. As a whole, though, I couldn't really get it to feel cohesive. This might seem harsh or whatnot and maybe I analyzed this a bit more than other tracks because you're my opponent, but this critique is in no way biased and I would expect the same from you anyway. Good luck, man!

Yami - Quite the minimalist approach. Everything kind of runs together. Maybe some percussive hits to help transition between sections? Ivan Hakštok - Very nice! Got my attention right off the bat. The only thing that really bothers me is the whamy. Might just be me, but I feel like maybe it's bending the wrong way at times? I don't know, it just sounds more like it's detuning rather than tastefully pitch bending to me. Otherwise excellent playing. ---------------------------------------------- zerothemaster - lol, it sounds like you're trying to force that chip sound through my speakers and it just won't fit. Trn dwn pls. The first couple minutes are incredibly disorienting lol. Around 2:40, bass overpowers background stuff. I think the biggest thing this mix is missing are mids. It's all drums, bass, and lead. That works in some cases, but I don't think so in this style. I think there are some neat ideas in here. The problem is in the execution. ---------------------------------------------- Theory of N - Dude. So good. Ectogemia - I'll let you decide if you want me to post my critique. I'll post afterwards regardless. ---------------------------------------------- Trism - WOOOOOOOSH! Clearly unfinished I'd like to hear this finished though. It's hard to critique something this wip-y. Nice job getting something down ProjectSpam - That plucky sample in the beginning sounds like a sample from a MMX game. Hmmm...I'm feeling a loooot of muddiness. 0:48 there's a relatively quiet piano note that is very sour. Does it again at 1:04. I think your biggest issue here is production. Aside from those sour notes, everything seems to work pretty well. ---------------------------------------------- Amphibious - Sexy. Finish this. Gario - Uh...badass. You need nothing from me. ---------------------------------------------- pixelwave - I love the retro style here. It's very quiet though. The drums sound like they're at the right level, but they sound pretty loud in comparison. I can hear parts of both sources, though very little. Sir NutS - holy shit loooooooooooooudddddddd. Balancing needs some serious work. The noises at 0:48 made me tilt my head in confusion. I thought I had a youtube video randomly run or something in the background lol. Despite the balance issues, I like how you implemented the sources and you definitely did some neat things, so this got my vote. ---------------------------------------------- Metal Man - I'm not the biggest fan of metal, but this sounds pretty solid. I think it would sound more 3D if you brought the lead up a little bit. The mix sounds a bit flat. SilvernixSP - bass is incredibly overpowering. The part that comes in at 0:40 is off tonally and rhythmically. More rhythmic splicing at 0:40. The way this is right now, The biggest thing I could tell you would be to EQ out some frequencies. Honestly, if you're not used to doing that, taking any frequencies out would help the mix I think. Make some room for a bg pad or something. You'd be surprised at how far that can take you. ---------------------------------------------- TheRexAsaurous - really interesting Castlevaniesque feel at first. Loving the bassline. This feels like it's missing a lot of mid as well. Ah, until the rhythmic pad comes in at like 1:40ish. Seriously, nice work everyone! I realize that a lot of these suffer from time constraints, but to that I say: NOW YOU'VE GOT FOREVER TO FINISH THIS SHIT UP.

That was what I was saying. If that is the case, then we'll get the mix when Darke posts it. It would be just like choosing to listen and vote at a later date. But everything points to it just being a mistake that it's not posted. On the first page, it looks like that part of the post was just forgotten. It definitely says voting is live. He hasn't taken voting down. EDIT: Also, I feel like if there was a reason he hasn't posted it yet, he would have said something.

I don't think there's any harm in posting what's there. If it turns out he's waiting to put in Hak's mix, then we'll get it when Darke posts it. If not, then the link really should be up right now. Because of that reasoning, I'll go ahead and post it until Darke updates the first page because he seems to be unavailable right now despite my attempts to contact him about it. [REMOVED]

So the voting is live but I think Darke forgot to post the link. The zip is definitely there. I found it. But I don't know if there's some reason he didn't post it yet.

Source breakdown for my tune: For the sake of this, I'm going to say that each source's melody has a part A and part B which should be pretty apparent from listening to them. 0:08-0:34 - Bubble Crab's (BC) intro modified for 4/4 time. Slightly more subtle at 0:16. 0:34-0:52 - Sting Chameleon's (SC) A 0:52-1:09 - BC's B 1:09-1:27 - SC's A fragmented 1:44-2:03 - BC's B 2:03-2:16 - BC's intro (modified) underneath a heavily modified SC-A for 6/8 time. 2:16-2:29 - BC-A 2:29-2:48 - SC-B 2:49-3:01 - SC-A and BC-A alternating 3:15-3:28 - SC-B and BC-B at the same time 3:28-3:41 - chords are from BC's theme after the melody

Oh sweet. I've flawlessly and intricately implemented every bit of each source and included a symbolic Maverick battle. Seriously, some bits are used in more than one way and I even managed to make them sound good playing simultaneously. In 6/8. Oh, and funk. For a second, I thought you were in the Zero Bracket and trolling.

Same. Rendering overnight and subbing in the morning. I'm hoping faces will be melted by mine as well, but more in a synth/chippy sort of way. T'will be a battle to remember, for sure.

You're right. I WILL MUSICALLY SMASH YOUR BRAINS IN UNTIL YOU BLEED BASS AND ARE LEFT WITH NOTHING BUT TREBLE.

This. Even if you get a 30 second intro or something, your opponent could possibly be struggling in the same way. You could still possibly win with that and then move on to something that just clicks.

Boy, are you in for a treat ;D

I just succeeded in creating a groove I have long wanted to pull off. And it sounds...amazing. Sorry, Ecto.