Nubioso

Struggle - Sounds pretty good, not a bad beat at all. The whole thing seems a little muddy however due to a pretty powerful low end in your bass as well as the kick drum. Also, I'm almost positive that I'm hearing your kick knock the entire mix back and then swell back in like a slow release on a compressor. Definitely back that kick and bass off a little bit if you're knockin the compressor/limiter which is causing the whole thing to kind of swell in and out a little bit. Golden Serenade - The kick and bass go a lot better together in this one opposed to the last one, meaning they aren't fighting for low end control. I like the stuttering vocals, but as you may have noticed in my other music/other threads, I am a total stutter whore! =P Definitely like golden serenade better. One tip for control some low end is hi-passing the kick and bass up to around 27 or 30hz, reason I say this is because honestly, hardly anyone is going to have good enough equipment to even hear 30Hz in the first place, but it gets rid of some mud that's absolutely not needed. A kick drum can be boosted around 60-80Hz and you don't really need a whole lot below the 50Hz range. The fat bass with its really low harmonics is better suited to tackle the 30-40Hz range and can kind of 'ride' below a nice kick. Anywho, nice songs man, those are my suggestions/tips, take em, leave em, mix and match, all that good stuff.

because of the way I make the vocoded part stutter. The full thing says "I Wonder" but I made it so it respectively pans right, left, then center and does "I, I, I, Wonder" =P As I said in another thread, my naming schemes suuuuuuck. I usually just throw on some random title, they almost never actually mean anything to me. Also, I can totally understand how it'll seem to busy to some people, hell maybe a lot of people, however, on this particular one (of course since I made it), I can follow along right with it and I just totally like this one =D Thanks for the comment and the listen!

Awesome work man. I know I could never have the skills to make anything into a nice jazz piece so major kudos for that. I know you just said on this latest update you said you found a nice bass patch that you like, but maaaan, I gotta say it's just a little too weak for me. Now, I'm no connoisseur of jazz, but I can't help but think of a nice full sounding stand up bass with a nice round low end that totally supports the rest of the instruments and I'm just not hearing it here. I guess, considering it's jazz and the way it sounds, is that my ear is listening for that most common sounding walking bass line. don't know. Either way, good work thus far.

Thanks man, I appreciate your positive comments!

"Honestly, I have no idea what any of that is... ; Everything I know about music is basically self-taught or learned from examining other people's music..." When someone refers to the dynamics of the song, they are essentially referring to the lulls and swells of a song. If you listen to orchestral music it's VERY dynamic in that some parts are very quiet with maybe a flute and violin playing something sweet and then it builds into something dramatic, loud, and very present in the mix like when all instruments come together for the "Oomph" of the song. Most new songs, however, are so overly compressed and just smashed like the dickins through mastering that there is absolutely no dynamics left to the song. (Compression in a nutshell is basically bringing your sound floor up...meaning all your quiet things will be brought up louder to match the louder things to give it a more 'even' feel to it) You'd probably really benefit from reading up on DSP, or Dynamic Signal Processing. I know they have some tutorials on this website, so check out some info on compression and EQ, limiters, things of that nature to also help bring out some sparkle in your mix.

There isn't actually a name for the song, it's just when I first started making it I wanted it to sound epic like a lot of jesper kyds songs sound. I suck at naming my songs with a title that actually represents the song lol. I think it's epic anyway! =P but yeah, I hardly ever sing on anything, so I definitely need vocal practice =/

Man, you're looking at it from a completely "F you all" defensive stand point. No one is saying "go shell out $1000 for better samples"....if you look hard enough, you can find great samples on the internet for free. They even have a whole thread on here helping you to find synths, plugins, samples, etc..etc... right here: http://www.ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=4556&page=15 As for the "Is it a generalization I wonder?" Hmm, probably not man. You're getting critiques from people who've listened to a ton of remixes on here, have heard what's considered passing by judges and what's not and they are basing their opinion on that. So why your preach about tastes and what defines people is.....ehh...poetic I guess....it still sounds like you're just being defensive instead of open to response. but whatever.......like everyone has said, send it to the judges and good luck to you. I'm not gonna deny that I've heard some (what I consider) bad remixes that the judges have passed, so go for it.

Funny you mention that, I had actually thought about the fact it might be better to have a female sing the "Like to make a call, reachin all..." part instead of having my vocals vocoded for it....mainly because it'd be easier to tell what she's saying more than likely....However, same reason the beginning vox aren't done, she hasn't been able to sing so that's why I haven't tried it. HOWEVER!! Today!! We are going to attempt to get her some of her vocals down! (Right before we start FFX =P ) as for the strings level you mentioned...yeah, honestly, I've gone back and forth between thinking they were too loud or just right. Honestly, I may drop it by about 1db, 1.5 or something like that to perhaps take just a tiny little 'edge' off it.

Thanks man, yeah....I know it just kind of totally lops off right now, but more guitars are definitely somethin that I had been wanting to do.

This is probably one of my favorite songs of mine. It is a completed song, but I still would like to get peoples input on it and what they think. Also, for some weird reason, I have this whole action sequence in my head that I could see happening in a movie with this song behind it, but that's just my own little thing in my head =P I'm just trying to expose my music to others like most of the people are here to do. Please give it a listen and let me know what you think!

I like it man! One question though, are you using reason and is that main synth in the beginning using the Thor patch "Trance Seq Pad" with some added delay on top of it? Reason I ask is because I'm using that same patch in one of my older songs lol, and I thought it sounded very familiar. Of course, it's not like there's only one and only one synth pad with arppegiator in it =P But yeah, I use it around the 1:28 mark and again at 2:28 in this one of mine: DJ Bubble Face - Nuerayyy.mp3 I dig your style man, sounds like something I'd make....you can't tell from this song I just linked you, but my other ones are more upbeat. Perhaps a collab in the future?

Maybe I'm stepping out on a limb here but essentially the answer to your question is yes....there's basically two things that will make something like a piano sound human. That's velocity in the fact that a human will NEVER play a note consecutively with exact pressure, so those ever slight changes in the volume make a huge difference...especially with dramatic swells, a piano player may play one part softer then build up and strike the keys harder. The second thing is the fact that no human will ever hit the note exactly on every beat. The old "Eb and flow" of a piano movement is very important. Now, I'm not telling you to go throw your notes off the beat lol, and personally I just quantize mine, and I'm sure a lot of other people do to, but realistically that slight differences of the notes not going "mathematically exactly" on the note also add to humanization. Just my input on your question =P

Yup, for you was the one I was talking about. (Which BTW, is an excellent song) Thank you! I like to use DSP as I write the parts. I think it makes me take longer on songs, opposed to just composing the whole thing, then going back through and mixing, EQ'ing, compressing, etc... but maaan, I get OCD on it sometimes and I just feel like I need to EQ and compress right after I write a line just because for some reason, even if I've only created 10 seconds of a song, I want that 10 seconds to be the best quality possible =P Funny you mention Zircon, because the first song I ever heard from this site, and the whole reason I found this website was because of Zircons Super mario world remix which is damned AMAZING in my opinion. I think it's just absolutely fantastic and I honestly have used it as a reference to the level of quality and skill I need to aspire to. The stuttering vocals being an example =P (however, if you hear the rest of my music, I'm kind of a stutter whore) Again, thank you all for the real input, this is what I needed and was looking forward to. It's the reason I signed up to this place after seeing the community of musicians, composers, and artists and for a second there I was almost let down. Now if I can just get my girl to stop coughing for 10 mins to lay down some vocals!

Yes, the final piece will be longer, cause at the moment, it's just shy of being acceptable by their standards. I've got a couple ideas I'm working on as far as incorporating more into the song "The style of the rapping reminds me of Del." - awesome that you mention that, because I thought the same thing too, I love deltron! "Maybe it's my headphones, but the song got kinda scratchy like it was too loud or somethin but my headphones are brand new so I don't know what to say about that lol." Hmmm, don't know, I've listened to it both on my headphones and my fostex monitors and wasn't really noticing any scratchiness, however, it could probably be due to the L3 limiter I threw on my master channel to just quickly give it a little compression overall. Mighta hit it too hard, but believe it or not, without the limiter, I mixed it pretty quietly, doesn't even come close to slamming my master fader. "Couldn't understand that vocoded voice during the hook, you should make that more clearer or provide the lyrics for the song" - I figured that might be an issue to be honest and I will be providing lyrics when it's all completed.....guess I shoulda done it now but it says "Like to make a call, reachin all...." then the clear part says "The four giants" Also regarding the strings, I think you're right about it being too loud, I've turned it down once, then brought it a little back up, and kept jacking with it, but I believe they do come in pretty hard. Thank you both for actually taking the time to give me a real comment. I greatly appreciate it

Don't you mean to tell him his lyrics are a buzz kill?

Are you kidding? Pretty sure there's a dude who wrote entire song of vocals for a megaman song on here and all anyone can say to that is "OMG, AMAZING!"... It's pretty stupid to say adding vocals is a buzzkill when pretty much 99% of the game music out there isn't going to have it in the first place. Beyond that, pretty sure this is about remixing.....a combination of the source plus your own original material and nowhere is it stated EVER that vocals are something that should be shunned like you're making it out to be. And not having the beginning vocals there shouldn't make any less possible to judge.....cause ya know....there is still all that music that's behind it that can be critiqued.

BUMP So can I get some actual comments and critique on this please? 52 downloads and all I've got is "The vocals were a bit of a surprise because I didn't read first" =/

It's all good, I took the "I'm an asshole" grenade for all of us =P

Good song man. Based on the suggestions of others, and the changes you've made as a result, here are a couple of my thoughts. Your kick drum starting at 1:12 where everything drops out at the crash sounds like it's distorting right there, of course when everythings in full swing you can't really hear it, but I'd watch your levels and avoid clipping that drum. The staccato piano notes that come in around the 2:30 mark just seem too dry and artificial to me. For some reason, when you play the legato chords before that, it doesn't really stick out to me as much as it does during the single notes so it doesn't seem as much of an issue. The tip that's always flying around for making it more human-like is playing with those velocities. Maybe, only during that section, you could also add a TOUCH of reverb...don't need so much as the tails are drowning out the next note, but just a little sumpin sumpin on it. Last thing, are your synth strings. The swell that's on those strings really stick out. During some parts of the song they fit in with the beat, while others it seems like it might be better to have a different string sample that. The first time the strings come in at :25 maybe try it with strings that don't swell as much. Then at the :48 second mark when you have that little piano trill and that synth lead going, bring back the swelling synths because, as I said earlier, there's some parts where it really swings with the beat. But again at 2:05 when you play the strings what sounds like it might be "quick" quarter notes (considering the speed of the song) and with a sample that has such a long swell it just kind of sounds off, so there might be another spot when they come in at 1:58 to use non-swelling, bring em back at 2:10......etc..etc...that sort of thing. Naturally......tis just my opinion, take some, take none, it's all good Either way, you got a nice song on your hands.

This is a song I've been working on for a while. I kind of consider it my Fear Factory meets Jesper Kyd (composer for the hitman games). Also, I'm not really much of a vocalist. Only about 10% of my songs actually have vocals on it so sorry if these aren't quite up to par. There's one part of the vocals in particular where I just didn't get the low note as solid as I'd like it, but I'll re-record that later. I still have quite a bit to add once the 2 minute mark hits and everything after that. For right now it just kind of.....finishes, but I still want to add much more to this song. I just wanted to get some other peoples thoughts. Thanks in advance

are you using an automated auto-tune on your vocals instead of perhaps manually correcting them (If that's what you are doing/wanting to achieve) ? Only reason I ask is because I swear sometimes during your vocals I can hear the autotune working to throw the note on the right pitch which lends to a lot of distracting bending of your voice and such. I can hear it really bend around in the middle of the song, especially when you use a little vibrato on your voice. I'd really watch out for that, and honestly, if you are using auto-tune I'm surprised that no one has commented on the bending vocals and instead have all just been "OMG, most amazing vocals ever!" cause that effect REALLY detracts from your vocal work. That's really my only major complaint about this song, cause other than that, you got it goin on man. I'm trying to add vocals to my remix I'm working on as well, but......well to put it bluntly, I just plain suck at singing lol. Good work and keep on rockin

nice yo, sounds like your kick drum has some more punch to it opposed to the last once which sounds a little flat in comparison. Sounds like you did some nice things to the snare too. Can't tell if maybe you changed your snare samples or the fact that you did add a little room to the drums? Either way, to me the drums sound a bit better. Coming along nicely

You realize this section is for feedback and not just praise right? Seems like everything everyones told you to help you out you've just said "Nope, that's wrong" and won't have any of it. "I'm more of a melody person myself. I just focus on the music, not the sound." That's a pretty horrible way to look at it. You'll never go anywhere making music that more than just you yourself will want to listen to if you shoot down everyones constructive criticism and apparently don't care about sound.....don't care about the sound!? That just blows my mind away.

lol yeah, also, I forgot to entitle my thread "Zelda - Majoras Mask Rap" or something like that, that would let people know there's vocals on this one.

So this is my first remix for this website. I've known about this site for quite some time, but didn't join for a while, then even after I did, I never really did anything =P Anywho, this is the Call of the four giants from LoZ - Majoras Mask. I noticed that there was only one remix for this game and personally I really liked this one. One thing I must say though...is that currently I'm waiting for my girlfriend to lay down some Female Vox for "princess zelda" in the beginning of the song. So when you hear me speak at :56 and it seems to not really make sense at the moment, that's why...there's more "story" through the beginning that she'll sing. Unfortunately, she just got a soar throat a couple days ago =/ I realize it's just a tad bit short at the moment and I will be adding more, but as the section says, it's a WIP The song I chose to do is "Call of the Four Giants" Remix: Source: http://www.vgmusic.com/music/console/nintendo/n64/Oath_To_Order.mid UPDATE: 5/9 Version3(All Rap Vocals Finished) Version4 (All female vocals recorded!) Update 5/30 Judges Version Source (Four Giants): http://www.vgmusic.com/music/console/nintendo/n64/Oath_To_Order.mid Source (Stone Tower): http://www.vgmusic.com/music/console/nintendo/n64/Stone_Tower_Temple_v3.mid LYRICS: ZELDA: Link, oh please help me, and accept the, final task Oh, won't you retrieve my most precious mask From the falling moon you must rescue us None to soon before we're all turned to the dust Won't you please, won't you please, save the day -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- LINK: whaddya know, I gotta go...and call forth the giants numbers one through fo' When I play my ocarina it's a blast to the past but I put on my Majoras Mask handle the task and proceed down the path and let my aftermath Prove I am worthy, though I won't hurt thee Just wanna be the real me, until I get my hands on the force of 3, the holy trinity Struggling against the forces in my darkest hour, I'm still reachin for, the Courage, Wisdom, and Power Like to make a call, reachin all..........the four giants ::Narrator:: But the evil skull kid was up to his old tricks, and locked link in the Stone tower... Even though I don't know which way to go, that won't slow.....meeeee Doooooown , When I come through the front door, with my magic sword I'll strike a chord in accordance with the parameters of my ordinance I'll use to dispose of the darkness But hark this, my arrows of light will continue the fight, between wrong and the right despite your desire to smite me, I can't accept defeat, a punk like you could never beat the omnipotent link With the love of a princess in distress, is this the test? You've messed with the best and ........oh you know the rest. Lookin through the castle, Wanna know where the skull kid is Wanna get the mask back and attract the love of my princess Need a map and a compass and I got this Admist the mist I get the jist, but that kids on my list cause he's got me pissed Cause never in my life, has link been dissed Will the notes of my flute let the princess know of my presence let the essence of my song persuade her to continue on and play along BOOM, As I come in the main room Ready for the show-down at high-noon Got my fairy in a jar, keepin death afar Hope you're ready and your skills on par Doesn't even matter what you think you got plannin I'll put you down like a dog, same as ganon Cause the princess and me, will live happily until the end of time and the holy jubilee