[OCR01456 - Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance "Behold the Winged Cathedral"]

Beautiful, absolutely beautiful. The parts seem to alternate so that a curtain after curtain is pulled to reveal a blissful, nearly incomprehensibly beautiful soundscape after another. I like the panning breakbeats. I love the cut-up vocal samples, they remind of me of some Steve Reich stuff I should really track down again. I feel they sort of, erm, ground the piece. I noticed the cough at 01:24 just before I read this thread, heh. Subtle, musical humour which shows how playful this piece actually is. Spoken voice is a kind of an "everyday" element in this track which connects it to the real world. That's what I mean with "grounding".

... a beautiful chaotic entity ... It meant to be mind candy, to tease the order in your life with the flavor of chaos.

Well put mr. Heart!

--Eino

[OCR01405 - Solstice "Pegasus Boots"]

I've never played Solstice, but this track was an instant hit for me. Some of it reminds me of the band Battles, which I've enjoyed recently.

The contrast between lo-fi drums and the brighter foreground instruments creates a lot of space in the mix, I think. Either way, the arrangement is/sounds deliciously sparse, even with all the many many notes played. I agree with other posters that the sax sounds a bit artificial, but after a few listens it has started to sound more like a "feature" than a flaw. (The most bothering thing about the sax to me is that sometimes there's a jarringly louder note in the middle of a run, it's a subtle effect but makes it sound like it was cut-and-pasted together from two takes or something.. well, to me at least.) But any way, that's a minor criticism on an otherwise fabulous track.

Yay, first post.

--Eino