GrayLightning
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Posts posted by GrayLightning
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Confirmed N.O. Too conservative, simple and not personalized enough for the standards.
Fun little mix though.
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I agree with Sixto, PT sucks (for me anyway). However, the main draw of it is access to either the PT hardware or the exclusive and amazing high end PT third party plugins.
I'll pass however, unless someone wants to buy it for me? If so, feel free to pm me.
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This is really nice stuff. One of roetaka's best works yet.
I think the arrangement is generally good and arguably there. Roe finally does a good job with those ritardandos. Nice surprise there. I'd like to see a little more polish in the vein of the structure and some tweaking with the violin sequencing to clean it up.
Drums sound ugly in the way you processed it and overly loud. It sounds over eq'd especially the hats. I think you can use another snare or layer the snare with another snare tone. Good use of supplementing percussion like the panning bell trees, sleighbells are a nice touch too.
Generally good sequencing of the piano and guitar.
I don't like the production. Everything sounds cluttered in one little small space. Everything sounds pasted together with no dimension. I think you can use small doses of reverb to place your instruments and give it more space, width and breathing room. I would like to see this implemented so it doesn't sound like one big wall of sound coming from one dimension.
I'm almost yes on this, but I'd like to request a possible resub from you. Just a little more polish! very borderline NO.
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Another tough one.
The background material is very questionable. I don't like the pan placement, it's like you have 15+ string players all coming from the same spot. I think this could have benefitted from better placement on your soundstage and be a little more spread out. If you were using smaller section sizes and more of a pop sounding string group fine, but in this case you have big sounding strings coming from almost a single point.
I also felt the spicatto-esque passages were fake and ugly sounding, especially without any round-robin/alternating samples.
Great use of tempo changes!
I was ready to NO this, but the sax work is too nice and luckily it's the star role here. The background material while problematic, is sufficient. Now that it has reverb again, it sounds better. Though I would have pushed the strings a bit further back, especially during the solo harp section and the string pizz/spic where they are exposed and very thin sounding. I really don't know what you can do to make this substantially better with your given expertise/sample set/lack of know how. So the question is is this good enough? I think there's enough creativity here, and execution to warrant a very borderline and reserved YES.
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This one was tough, because I completely agree with what vig just said. Too meandering at times, and at times just sloppy. But the voicings, the voicings!!! (Paraphrase)
I thought the cello portamento sections were a little ridiculous. Overused bends, but I will say you executed that part very well.
What puts me over the edge here is the creativity, the style, and all the nice subtleties. Good brush kit and hand percussion sequencing and the instrumentation is generally spot on. Some of the synth sections are a little bland for my taste, but they work.
I honestly could viably go either way on this mix, as this has enough issues that Vig mentioned to make me hesitant. But the creativity and overall thoughtfulness, coupled with the mix having some really great moments forces me to go the borderline YES route and not request a resub.
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Now a few words about the chiptune/quality debate... I have to say; if the mix of Sam's that was rejected was his Dueling Consoles - (mirror) cover of the Secret Of Mana Boss Theme (which I think it is) the judges are finally off their rockers. Mazedude's was about 70% chiptune 30% mutation and Sam's was closer to 80-20... Is that the only thing that kept it from passing? Sadly, I know this is likely not the case. Politics, as much as I'd like to pretend they weren't a factor, must've been.
I thought Dueling Consoles was, and I say this precautiously, his best work... The song captivated me so much I blogged SOLELY about it 'melting my brain through my ears' shortly after I first heard it. It's not short on arrangement, quality, originality, it's source, it's not repetitive, and it's filled with content. Keeping that mix hosted only on his much less visible angelfire site is a travesty. FLAT OUT: I think the fans of Shna that don't hear the track are missing out, and I would be suprised if fans of Shna weren't around for the duration of OCR.
No, that wasn't the mix in question. Also what politics are you talking about? Like 90% of shna's stuff in the last year passes the panel with almost universal and HIGH praising YES - that's even after his removal, he still gets ALL yes votes. Before attacking us and flat out calling us biased, do a bit of homework first, eh?
This isn't the thread to get into such discussions (PM us privately if you wish). This thread is to discuss Mazedude's new mix specifically.
Damn; thought that might've been the case. Sorry. I was pretty sure given the time frame...
You're all back on your rockers again...
...for now...
We try. -
Now a few words about the chiptune/quality debate... I have to say; if the mix of Sam's that was rejected was his Dueling Consoles - (mirror) cover of the Secret Of Mana Boss Theme (which I think it is) the judges are finally off their rockers. Mazedude's was about 70% chiptune 30% mutation and Sam's was closer to 80-20... Is that the only thing that kept it from passing? Sadly, I know this is likely not the case. Politics, as much as I'd like to pretend they weren't a factor, must've been.
I thought Dueling Consoles was, and I say this precautiously, his best work... The song captivated me so much I blogged SOLELY about it 'melting my brain through my ears' shortly after I first heard it. It's not short on arrangement, quality, originality, it's source, it's not repetitive, and it's filled with content. Keeping that mix hosted only on his much less visible angelfire site is a travesty. FLAT OUT: I think the fans of Shna that don't hear the track are missing out, and I would be suprised if fans of Shna weren't around for the duration of OCR.
No, that wasn't the mix in question. Also what politics are you talking about? Like 90% of shna's stuff in the last year passes the panel with almost universal and HIGH praising YES - that's even after his removal, he still gets ALL yes votes. Before attacking us and flat out calling us biased, do a bit of homework first, eh?
This isn't the thread to get into such discussions (PM us privately if you wish). This thread is to discuss Mazedude's new mix specifically.
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I have to agree with the criticisms on this mix.
Generally both sections just don't seem to have enough variation and expansion from an arrangement and composition department. There's not much in the way of genre adaptation either.
I agree with larry where the first part was more conservative than the second part.
I disagree with the above criticism on the Taiko sound quality. That's the way they sound like by nature and are good.
One point that was stand out was the ending, you did a fantastic job there.
I do like Reu's mixes quite a bit, but at one point there has to be more out there available than just having the chinese flute on melody, piano and string playing harmony with the taikos in the background. Not really relevant to the point here. But while I hear some good ornamentation here that makes me very borderline on this mix, ultimately it's the lack of arrangement/expansion/change of structure/genre adaptation that makes me hesitant here.
NO
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Heh. Vengeance Essential Club Sounds is actually coming my way soon
.I googled this and came up with a bunch of junk websites that lead me nowhere. Where can I get more info on this/demos/pricing/etc.? Link please.
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Reu Fallthrough
remixer name: Reu
real name: Reuben Kee
email: Reuy@email.com
website: http://www.reubenkee.com
remix info:
Name of game: Chrono cross
Songs: Reminiscence, time of the dream watch
Comment about mix:
A piano solo sets the mood of reminiscence, then an exciting ethnic orchestra combination provides the excitement of the hope of the future.
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So the engineer has more to do than the one who wrote the track.
That may very well be true in many cases, I don't know. To me, though, it would be at least partly indicative of an undervaluation of composition. If someone can do the composition of a mix in a couple of hours then unless that person is a genius, he's probably greatly shortchanging the process.
Composition, good composition, is darn hard. It really ought to be given more attention, IMO.
Ah, the voice of reason.
I've deleted several posts made in this thread.
Anyway, now that zircon has had his say and compyfox as well did earlier. Let's all get back to the point of the thread shall we? Any further posts arguing or acting as spectators (like previously deleted posts going LOL or
) without any positive contribution will be deleted - this applies to zircon and compyfox as well. -
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This one took a while due to my really busy schedule so I could only work on it in bits and pieces, much to Rexy's chagrin.
I'm personally very pleased on how this turned out. Collaborating with Rexy was really fun and I'm glad that chance took place. Hopefully it won't be our last.Thanks to everyone for the comments and your time.
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Quick vote. More comments later.
Jon asked me to listen to this a few days ago and I personally loved this.
Unique, well, well above the bar stuff. Actually this might be my favorite work of Jon's on a collective level.
YES
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by the way, i also use
protools
gigastudio
kompakt 2
cubase
reason
sonar
acid
Symphony of Voices
Voices of the Apocalypse
GuitarRig
Drumkit from Hell
No you don't, stop ROFLing with the noobs.
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I have no moral issues with warez because no one gets hurt if you're not going to buy the software anyway. I won't specify anything on this list that may be warez'ed; I don't even think it's relevant; the software companies even get free advertising if I like their software (and I'll probably buy it all eventually).
Most people do not buy it. That's the problem. When you have something in your possession there is less of an urgency and need to actually buy it - that would be reliant on your personal morals/ethics, which, is pretty lacking in our age group. There are so many people that pirate reason or FL when they first start out, and they eventually never buy it, instead they buy something else.
Plus it's an issue of rights. Just because you're not going to buy it, it doesn't give you the license or authority to steal/use something.
Not to mention the culture of piracy and warez is getting so out of hand, they even make threats to developers who go after them - I'm talking about the distrubution channels/the people who crack these software. If you pirate, you are supporting these people.
I do understand the need for some people to try things, and also that several people do need something to start out with if they are low on funds. However, there are too many people these days pirating thousands of dollars worth of stuff to the point where it's extremely disturbing. The worst of these people to me though are the people who use these things to try to make money out of. I know several people that do this - needless to say I have little respect for these kinds.
There's really no viable way of justifying it (other than if you've bought the exact same version # etc). But it still would lend support to these dangerous distrubution channels. Warez is stealing, pure and simple.
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Dave's busy with work lately, like we all are.
Weekend might be a more realistic period to expect some new mixes posted.
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Synth design in general is extremely basic ( I'm surprised Liontamer did not fawn over that aspect as he usually does with others. ahem. )
Bitch, plz. Voting auto-YES on retro sounds is just as stupid as you voting auto-NO (which you do).
Wrong. I explained when retro sounds can be used well. There's a difference between good retro sounds, and bad retro sounds. Some of my favorite game soundtracks and general music stems from 80s.
There is one problem by some judges here who have not used retro synths/or who have lived through that time frame - the inability to make distinctions between retro sounds done by say a roland roland jx10, korg m1 or say oberheim or some crud from radio shack. These differences manifest themselves in today's software arena as well - even if they are trying to emulate retro sounds. You make it sound like all retro synths sound the same. They clearly do not. There are distinctions. Not all synths sound the same, period.
There's a difference to how synths sounded with even 80s synths. There are reasons why people paid $400 vs $3000 even back then, it wasn't all about feature sets either, but also sound quality/synth quality. That is the distinction I make. Sound/synth quality is what it is, no matter how you slice it.
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Good source material selection, this is one of my favorite SNES themes in the last decade or so.
To be honest, when I first heard this last week, I was going to NO this. But the mix has really grown on me.
First I have to say that bottom end synth you're using is so PHAT and lush.
I am digging the arrangement ideas brought to the table here. There's some quite creative stuff that I did not expect to hear on this type of arrangement. Drumwork is ok, but I like the sounds you used and how you used them.
I personally think the guitar is a definite low point. Now, I'm not one of those elitist people OMG FAKE GUITAR. I'd say I have listened to more music on the panel that uses synth/sample guitars than anyone due to my upbringing of 80s/90s game music - from KKC, Sega, Falcom and the hundreds of xyz arranged albums. But even in that context, I think the guitar here sounds bad. The sequencing of the guitar is just average at best, the production of it is plain. If you're going to use synth guitars, they need heavy processing to make them more pleasing. I think the sample here is fine personally. You'd be amazed what Japanese sequencers can do with guitar samples. So the question here isn't really the guitar sample in my opinion, it is how the sample is used/sequenced or the lack of technical skill to do so is also another factor. Which I should add is no easy feat anyway for most people. Solo guitar, sax, violin are probably the hardest, especially when exposed as a lead, as far as this aspect goes.
That being said, I don't think we should require people to have guitarists either, unless the synth/sample is so derogatory to the mix as a whole. Obviously a real guitar would have made this so much better.
Ultimately, how this was executed hurts the mix with said main issue, but as a whole I feel it's still passable, barely. Very borderline YES
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I agree with Vig that this is well put-together. That is one thing that I've consistently enjoyed with Fatty's mixes.
But Zircon's view pretty much echoes my vote here, as well as my issues with FA's previous mix.
The arrangement in my opinion is too straightforward. Plus mixing perhaps one of the greatest source tunes in all of game history is a heavy burden in my opinion. I think the result here is a mixed bag personally. I'd like to hear more variation and liberties taken, especially with some expansion in the melody at least here and there.
But more so, as with his previous mix, I think this is on the very simplistic side. There's a pervading sparse problem here. I think some more middle frequency pads could help balance things out. Also I felt the mix was a little stilted to the right side of the stereo field.
Synth design in general is extremely basic ( I'm surprised Liontamer did not fawn over that aspect as he usually does with others. ahem.
) Basic, loopish drums as well.I think the overall package is fine, but I don't see it as being above the bar either. There's nothing wrong here per se, but nothing that stands out for me either in arrangement/production/synth design or beatwork, the latter two elements of which are paramount in this style in my opinion. Also where's the typical Fatty Acid cool processing we've come to expect of you? Like cool gating, etc or automation?
It's a NO, I'm afraid.
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Larry asked me to weigh in on this mix.
Heh, this reminds me of the music in the Monk series... A very good thing.
I do agree this is a bit on the conservative side, I would say this is probably the limit I would go to. I think we've passed more cover-ish material personally in the last year (things that should not have passed). What pushes this over the edge for me is all the subtle variations added to expand this, especially in the harmony and the rhythm of the piece department.
Production isn't pristine, but it's definitely above average and passable.
Charming work. Borderline Yes.
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This definitely has way too much reverb, it's getting muddy.
Personally I think this is a little too out there. As the panel expert on Michiko Naruke
- I have to say a lot of the trademark aspects that make her music so great are a bit lacking due to the mixer's conceptual take on this mix - however I freely admit that this is a subjective point. The other aspect, I felt this mix was a bit underdeveloped.That being said, this is very creative. The chords are hot, and the bass writing is arguably some of the best I've ever heard in this community.
This music reminds me of a lot of keyboard players of the late 80s/early 90s. This reminds me a lot of the Korg M1 and T series demos.
Quality mix all around. YES
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where's the saxamaphone?
You've done it now! Ravi... RUN!
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Sure do! But we won't be in close contact with those aspects of OJI-ism anymore.
*NO* Final Fantasy 6 'Do the Owzer' *FT*
in Judges Decisions
Posted
I'll be brief as the other judges covered most of my concerns here, however...
I think the arrangement is being shortchanged, there's actually a lot of subtle changes going on here. Different rhythm, structure, timing, key.
That being said the execution is a mess. Some of the sounds just clash both compositionally and in the execution. The sequencing is incredibly mechanical too. Too on the spot, and quantized sounding.
Production is average, but there's quite a lot of clipping too.
This needs quite a bit of work per the comments I and the other judges made. NO