Rozovian

The joke is not funny if I have to explain it. btw... It's a joke. With a serious point, or several, behind it. Larry seemed to get it. Skryp got it also. Kyle too. Darke and The Vagrance apparently didn't... tho I don't mind if it has the effect Vagrance seems to think I intended for it to have. Native Jovian got hung up on capitalization lol. Didn't see that one coming.

Just a quick listen, but... The intro already sounds better. The second instrument used for the lead cuts the sound on the 5th and 6th note, that bothers me. It's kind'a minimalistic, could use a bassline, pads, something to make it more than melody+drums. Sounds better with the fat snare and lead used closer to 3:00, but it's still just melody+drums. I imagine a simple e-piano/bell rhythm on the same key a few octaves up could work, tho imo melody+harmony+bass+drums is still the simplest way to get a full sound out of it. Good improvement. Keep at it.

Maybe I made you think you wanted to do it, indirectly making you do it. ...and now it has a name.

Interesting. Maybe ppl here have never heard of the ds-10.

Starts off beautifully, and progresses nicely through different soundscapes of big and awesome without ceasing to be beautiful. It has some movie soundtrack vibes, it's easy to visualize stuff, I can easily imagine a cityscape in an epic fantasy movie when hearing this. djp's right about this being reminiscent of SMG's score. Awsome work, Blake... I mean TheDeath.

An open letter to the Judges' Panel, Head Submissions Evaluator Liontamer and Judges Another Soundscape and Palpable excepted from parts of the letter. Dear Judges, You may have found Your task intimidating, the public unappreciative of Your efforts, Your critics abundant and Your supporters few. Perhaps the direct posts and the ever-increasing "to be posted"-queue make Your task seem meaningless, or the rapid flow of new submissions overwhelming. I would not be surprised if Your conscience made you reluctant to reject further submissions. It would also not surprise me if You find Yourself jealous of the adoration fellow Judges Another Soundscape and Palpable receive, or the robotic persistance by which they and especially Head Submissions Evaluator Liontamer judge and reject with little commotion whereas You may feel You are vilified at the first utterance of Your vote or critique. Perhaps You have come to fear the angry mobs of the community and are therefor reluctant, even frantically opposed to reject a submission. That would explain why Your votes seldom appear in the Decision threads of rejections. The reason I'm writing this to You is that I wish to tell You that what You were appointed to do is not solely reviled, nor does it go unappreciated. Your work is looked upon by remixers awaiting their submissions to be evaluated — be those submissions accepted or not — as a step for them to improve as artists. I wish You the best as You resume Your task. You are important. Kind regards, Rozovian

Damned, go have a listen to my updated track. With an ending.

I suggest marking those remixes so ppl who have been somewhat incommunicado (or whom the Js have forgotten to contact) can see why their remix hasn't been posted after a year in the queue. e.g. 2007-XX-XX FreeSpace 2 'Dang Those Dragons' *awaiting response from remixer*

Your first lead (or lead-ish part) doesn't have enough highs. Second (2:00) lead is better. Snare has weird panning. Bass could use some subtle cuts to its high range and a bass boost somewhere 50-200 Hz. Something often overlooked and unmentioned is the sytnh/sampler settings. Opening the filter or making it weaker, increasing or decreasing the resonance value, change the filter envelope... those things can be very useful when you've got an instrument that doesn't sound the way you want to. The volume envelope is also important, tweaking those can rid you of annoying licks when the note is triggered or released, give an instrument more or less punch, stuff like that. practice playing with those as well (turn off the other effects so you hear what you're doing). Your drum sounds are terrible. You should also use hihats and crashes, possibly other high range drums depending on the style and sound you want. You should probably add a pad, both to practice writing chords for the melodies and bassline you've got, and to practice mixing a pad. Also, compare this to other ppl's remixes. Listen for how the bass sounds, try to process and mix yours similarly. Listen to how the lead, drums (etc) sounds, try to tweak and mix those similarly. Don't expect to succeed in imitating them, rather try to produce something of the same mixing quality. That's the goal, right? Practice makes pancakes, the more the better.

Blaker, FireSlash, should there be multiple area-specific tracks? That's the impression I get from the "compliment the zone". i.e. Area, Battle, Boss, for each area?

Message me on IRC, AIM or MSN, I'll send you the midi of my track. You can use whatever you feel is theme-worthy.

Not gonna share the whole thing, but here's a cool little segment from it. If someone actually working on this project is interested in incorporating some rhythm, chord progression or melody from my track, I've got a midi for you. PM/IM me and I'll give you the link. Also, it would be cool if the boss track for each level would sound a bit more like the level. I imagine it wouldn't be hard for someone to make a boss track midi, then let the area musicians use the area sound for it. That's if everyone's on board, it'll otherwise sound a little inconsistent.

This might be of interest to you.

BDE. Can't decide. A little bit of everything.

Bass drum is weak, seems like it should be stronger in the intro where it's more dancey-y. Then again, once the track gets going, it's sounding like it's just lacking lows. Note that the snare is taking some of the boom from the kick when they're both struck. If you're not using a multiband compressor on this... do it. I'll keep mid stuff from taking the boom from the low stuff. Drum writing is a bit uninteresting, but some ppl get their tracks YESed anyway. basically, drums are the biggest problem with this, tho some of the transitions feel a bit arbitrary. 2:35, 2:59, to name a couple of examples. The lead is also a bit weak and whiny. Once again, some ppl get their tracks posted anyway, but it's best to see if you can do something about it. A bit more lows in the leads might work, octaves, distortion, overdrive, delays, stuff like that spice it up and make it fatter... which it probably needs to be. Also, that dhe detuned... thing (0:05) sound too far out of tune. Ending is a little sudden, probably feels that way because of the lack of a transition/big boom finish at 4:26. Just a kick and a crash there might be enough. Drums, leads, transitions. Beyond that, it's pretty cool. Oh, I seem to have impressed someone. Seriously, EYOD is a few inches from what I'd want to to be, so don't use that too much as reference, Gario. But yes, backup=good.

Glad I could help. Also glad I'll finally get to hear some of those songs now. The weird thing is that the remix in my example works fine in Quicktime, but iTunes refuses to import it. Any ETA on the updated torrent?

You should probably run an mp3 validation also if you haven't already. I can't import this song to iTunes. I'd rather not convert it, then try to find all the other tracks possibly missing. The easiest solution to finding all remixes with the same problem and fixing them would be if you run an mp3 validation on them all before releasing the new torrents.

That's the right attitude, and I recognize it in myself. Challenges make you improve. Wasn't long ago since I could have written much of that myself. I've, acccording to the oldest project file I could find, been making music since 2002, but really didn't care about production until I got here. D'oh. I had gotten some remixes in 2006 or so, was waiting for vgmix to come back up (d'oh) so I could sub something of mine, but then got tired of waiting and joined here to sub it (and then subbed another one instead). I should have joined way back. I recall there being be a "my first song" thread somewhere that I should post the aforementioned song in.

Three things: 1) This goes here. Mods... 2) YES Decisions aren't posted (publically) until the remix is. It says so here. Newbs.. 3) Speaking of months, there hasn't been a Currently in the Judging Process update in one month. Judges...

A used "candy bar" was still bought by someone, and "candy bars" distributed for free should also have been bought from somewhere. Illegally obtained "candy bars", be they downloaded or bootleg "candy bars" aren't bought, so the company that make and sell "candy bars" get no money for it. Company gets no money -> "candy bar" programmers/producers/whatever get no money for their work when the company goes down due to poor sales -> you're stealing their money and their jobs and sabotaging their company.

Talking about piration is not allowed!!!

Lack of reverb a problem? I find it more expressive this way, you hear the instruments better, their own tone and timbre. How does one jump from playful to dramatic like is done so successfully here? Part of the time listening to this is spent just smiling at how rapidly it changes in mood, yet it all flows smoothly. Lovely might be a word well used to describe this. Impulsive might be another. I'm using both.

As amazing as the instrumentation is, I seem to end up focusing on listening to the drums a lot of the time in this. Some nice synth usage here as well, and I think the guitar speaks for itself. I mean, it's Sixto at his... usual, maybe? or best? The piano intro isn't to be overlooked. What would this track be without the piano setting the tone and emotion before the guitar comes in? It'd be awesome, but not quite pwnsome. And pwnsome isn't a word I use lightly. This track is pwnsome.

Sweet stuff indeed. I wonder if the piano is a little too quiet (or the sax too loud), but beyond that, I'm just loving this. It also serves as a reminder how expressive real sax is. Nice and calming feel throughout, definitely going on my calm stuff playlists.