Eino Keskitalo

Bracket images are looking really good now (poor Garpo). Hunf, Kuja. Somehow, I feel stumped right now. I admit it's good, but somehow.. Well, I guess I was already heariing a style/arrangement in my head and Kuja's theme doesn't quite fit! But that's just what makes this fun. It's similar to Tyranno Castle music in CT which is a source I've wanted to tackle for some time. Also.. That "pre-final match-up", reading it actually made my heart rate go up. I hope we get good competition in this Darkness round! --Eino

I love Wonder Boy 3 to bits, and the source is great. I think you did a fantastic job with transforming the music to 6/8, and the 80s feel of the sound is also very enjoyable. The only thing - and a big thing - I'm thinking is that the structure isn't anywhere near finished. The proper start (at 0:28 ) feels like it begins from about the last third of the song. You still have the two first thirds to write! Or so it seems to me. I really, really like what you have here, and I'm very much looking forward to updates! --Eino

Hmh, I'm not hearing that much now, except for the second guitar coming in at 0:21 is eating up the other guitar a bit. It also feels it has a bit too much low end in it. That's a floor tom, right? Not even sure if it's a single sample. Something was sticking out about it to me. Oh well. Damn, it's criminally short. --Eino

I feel bad for not giving any feedback especially after getting so much useful comments myself. Just haven't had the time (and I really should be critiquing BA3 tracks when I have it) but here are some short comments for the round 4 tracks: Ivory The playing is really communicative and emotional, which I enjoy a lot. The transformation of Hope's theme from guitar to piano works very well. I actually had a bit of trouble recognizing Lulu's theme first, but that speaks entirely of the quality of my listening. I think the treatment of it is quite brilliant. The arrangement is a indeed bit of a sketch. The transitions from part to another are somewhat tight turns, and could use some "glue" kind of writing, to weave the sources together a bit better too. Tight turns can be good though. Some of the sudden transitions could work great with just a small pause between them, to create anticipation and then surprise with just going directly to the next part. I lack the theory vocabulary to explain this, but I also felt that the piece sticks too much to the "first chord" or root of the scale, which makes for a sort of one-dimensional impression, especially emotionally. Now if this sounds harsh, I only mean to say that there is a lot, lot of potential in the arrangement. The "glue" part could well be something that contrast the "first chord" feel of all the other parts. Sheesh, I hope you can make some sense out of that. The ending also leaves a feeling of not being developed nearly as far as it could be. That all said, what is there is pretty great - especially the treatment of sources. They could be better woven together, but I already thought that the first transition from Hope to Lulu worked quite well despite being quite straightforward (just one played after another, except the latter changed to 3/4). I really, really hope to hear this developed further. Edward Zorn Gets a Haircut Two things I consider brilliant in this arrangement: the genre choice (both in idea & execution) and the treatment of Edwards theme. It's so different (at least to me) but completely recognizable! On the other hand, I wasn't able to hear any Zorn & Thorn apart from the intro (but maybe that's just my listening again). The rhythm team is quite stiff & mechanical. The voices sound surprisingly good, and the trumpet also sounds good, gives it a Beatlesque vibe (at least to me). The final reprise of the, I'll call it verse, felt a bit samey to what went on from before, which might be unfair as it OTOH seems altered to give it a feeling it's leading to the end, but that sameyness was my initial impression. The overall structure felt complete. Enjoyed the piece a lot! The Gogo Cat Experience I was expecting boombastic orchestral pieces from Chernabogue, and this jazzy vein he's been exploring is a really pleasant surprise. There's a great feeling of a small, smoky, very very decadent club that's probably a front to some sinister organization.. but nobody cares. The very deliberate, relaxed (but still tense) tempo/ryhthmic feel does a lot to create this atmosphere. The material feels cohesively put together. The piano especially sounds good, the rest of it could be humanized better. Get XPRTNovice on the clarinet obviously. Right, couldn't keep it that short after all. That's why you don't see any comments from me, always ends up taking too long. --Eino

I'm a huge fan of DI's Pinball games & their music so I was excited to just see this thread. I enjoyed your take, too! I thought you had made it sound your own, which I always appreciate. As for hopefully constructive critisism, it seemed that the guitar was burying the backing, and that when there were two guitars simultaneously, they were burying each other. So the mixing levels and especially EQ could be improved. I'm on pretty bad listening gear at the moment, which may contribute though. I'll see if I can have another listen in better environment. The other thing I thought was that the timpani/kettle drum suffered from being a single sample. I also would love to hear you expand the arrangement; give it more lenght, and perhaps write some variations of the lead melody. --Eino

Congrats Trism for the win! Thanks guys for the comments. I agree, the mixing needs work so many thanks for the pointers MindWanderer and Esperado. Very useful constructive critisism there! --Eino

Ha ha, I just realized that the voting stage isn't even over and I'm already talking about what I'm going to do next round. What a dick this guy. --Eino

Flexstyle's Starcraft mix got rejected for not enough source usage. I really liked it, so I'd love to see it get through. Any plans for it, Mike? --Eino

I think the vs-style tracks ( and medleys) are a neat idea to cover more source material per album track. You guys are right about worrying about album size while wanting to cover the whole series, I'm starting to understand that now. --Eino

I for my part should have a good part of Wednesday for arranging and good parts of Thursday and Friday recording (taking out the electric this time), and then some of the weekend for mixing and stuff. Well see how that goes! Last two rounds I couldn't have done anything without staying up a night, and I'll want to avoid doing that now. Pretty excited to see what the boss source will be! --Eino

Congrats.. and thanks to all of you for doing this! --Eino

Gotta think of something for this round, maybe some track I always wanted to do but haven't gotten around to.Wow 10 years, that's indeed really somehing! I've been participating for five years I think. --Eino

From the Road Rage tracklist, I remember thinking it didn't have the stuff I'd wanted to arrange. Setting tight constrains may help getting a more focused album together, but at the same time it's not landing into everyone's interests. Funny actually, I don't think I've really played any of the games of the projects I've finished tracks for. But in his case where I've played a lot of the DS version, getting to pick the source you really want from there instead of a sorter list seems more important. --Eino

I have submitted my piece! --Eino

I've playd the DS version quite a bit, and might well be up for covering a track if the project gets off the ground. --Eino

I should be able to finish mine today. Edit: arranged & recorded to a satisfactory extent, needs some mixing time. Hopefully tonight. --Eino

I've started something as well. --Eino

1. Finish studies 2. Get a job, support family 3. Enjoy downtime with family 4. Stop stressing so much 5. Still find time for music making 5.1. Fully arrange & record my VGM lullabies 5.2. Finish some of the 10-20 unfinished game arrangements I've started (and intend to finish) since 2008 5.3. Finish the soundtrack to a friend's game 5.4. Code, compose & arrange music for Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup (yeah right) ..or really, just number 4. --Eino

Technically I have five more But all I have is the melody + lyrics I'm singing to my daughter at the moment. I have a vague plan to fully arrange & record them next year. --Eino

Ok, here's finally the lyrics to Toteutukoon toiveesi. toteutukoon toiveesi mahdottomatkin sait tähdenlennon kiinni tyhjyydessä matkanneen sekunneissa mursi tuhkaks' ilmakehä sen vuosimiljardeja matkanneen talven taivaalla tähdet tuikkia saa nouse hämärän syliin keinumaan se vie sinut kuuhun vie sinut tähtiin vie sinut kauas ja lähellä pitää yö on ystäväsi yksinäisyyksineen laula paremmaksi sen huonot puoletkin yö on ystäväsi taikoineen, unineen täysikuukin paistaa talven taivaalla.. se vie sinut kuuhun.. So what does it say? Here's a literal translation and when I say literal, it's almost google translate literal, i.e. it very much loses it's lyricalness and what not. may your wishes come true even the impossible ones you caught a falling star that travelled in the void in seconds, it was broken by the atmosphere it travelled billions of years in the night sky, the stars may shine climb to the lap of darkness for a rock-a-by it will take you to the moon take you to the stars take you far away and keep you close by the night is your friend with its lonelinesses sing to make it better the bad sides, too the night is your friend with its spells and dreams the full moon is shining too Man, that's awkward. Much better & more meaningful in Finnish, please believe me. As you can tell I did start with the first line from Serrah's theme for the lyrics but went from there to the falling star & lullaby direction. So you probably gathered that this is a lullaby. It's an actual functional lullaby in that our daughter (soon three years old) likes it very much. It's her current favourite of the VGM lullabies I've made for her. It's also the first I've recorded (I made it in this competition). I was able to work the lyrics & singing away from the computer and also sang it a bit to her before recording (which was great for the workflow, since I didn't have much time on the computer) but she really only started enjoying it after hearing the recorded version. I guess that's that. --Eino

That's a freaking magnificent box of stuff. Oomph. --Eino

Thanks for great comments Avaris & Chimpazilla! I think I'll do some tweaks right now. --Eino

If anyone is up for a collab, I could play some modest guitar to the Batman source tune. edit: Wow, the Assassin's Creed source is really really nice, and very remixable to boot. I can do that too! (but *very* modestly) --Eino

Thanks for the review RiverSound! I agree with everything you said. Thanks especially for pointing out the dissonant parts. I felt I didn't get the harmony quite right. Hope's theme has been transposed up a little to the same key as Lulu's; the mode (modality, somethingsomething) is also changed to fit, and the melody is changed to to fit the chord changes in Lulu's A part. It's not nearly as recognizable as I'd have liked (plus, the dissonance..), but I hope it at least a little bit Hope-ful. Yeah, there was much copy-paste. I do intend to continue working on the piece, so there shall be varying up the beat to a satisfying degree. The structure also needs some more work, the last section doesn't quite flow as well as it should. Thanks again for the criticism + the compliments as well! --Eino