GrayLightning

We're closing in on the last hurrah for VGF as we know it. It's time for a new poll to send off larry to places unknown (hopefully there's lysol/antibacterial cleanser there)!

I thought the exact same thing. I think if you tweaked the production of the various elements a bit to clean up the mixing and mastering and made your vocals more upfront, it should pass. This has too much possibilities to give up on. It is probably a lot to ask, but please consider one final resubmission DJCrono.

To me this mix falls in the line of a subjective mix. Decisions are made on the production side of things that I would call subjective from person to person. In some ways I do agree with the criticism, but overall, I don't really feel comfortable holding this mix back based on those - at least from my perspective. I have consistently praised Darangen's stuff, but this is probably his one mix that kind of passed me over. I felt it was a little too generic, bland for the genre. I've heard this style/performance/deliverly/drum sequencing style much too much lately in this community. I'm starting to wonder if people who do a lot of music in this vein are starting to share one head. My criticisms aside, while I do think this is less than a surprising effort from what I'm used to from Darangen, I think this is a passable mix. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts as far as I'm concerned. borderline Yes.

http://www.elementalaudio.com/products/inspectorxl/index.html That's one of the best. I personally just use the one in Cubase with the free version of Inspector - http://www.elementalaudio.com/products/inspector/index.html. As for your other question - Not always. SGX had this problem a few weeks ago where he was pushing his limiter too hard and the problems of it only manifested itself when he converted it to mp3.

More than just them. I've seen so much professional releases lately hitting 0db! It's becoming an epidemic across the board.

Not really a vote, just wanted to make a side comment: A lot of enigma's stuff tends to plateau into a state of constancy in that regard, and not really focused on climax. To me this mix and many of his mixes are very much inspired by enigma or similiar styles (consiously or subconsiously). My personal issue with this mix is similiar to that vein but also the issue with lack of development. The guitar part tends to feel like it's playing the same measures over and over. I'd like to hear evolution in the instrumentation/composition or rhythm as it progressed. Also you've gotten a lot better with your drums/processing usage. This might be your best one yet as far as I'm concerned in that aspect, enjoyed a lot of the subtle things you did with the drum/percussion lines and execution of it. I'm almost ready to dub you the groove king of OCR. (that was a compliment) I agree with jon - a lot of this was good, but there were some issues that hampered this one as mentioned by the other judges. Would have been great if you had access to this file, cause it would have made for a great resub.

Larry for the final show: for posterity's sake you need to please play Toyota Disco, Pigskin Power and .....drum roll..... Fowl Jive. Play these during the show, not afterhours shizz. If you don't do this, you're off the panel and paige will leave you. And folks, don't feel too bad. Larry, just as his namesake (Mr. Fro Mold) implies - you all know he's gonna be coming back, at least hopefully he'll be back somehow. We'll never be able to get rid of him, one way or another, like a bad case of mold infestation.

First of all please read our guidelines on submissions: http://www.ocremix.org/about/?artid=4 Only submit 1 mix at a time please. This is the first stage theme. Great to see a shinobi mix as this has been one of my favorite soundtracks in the last 16 years, but it's sad to see this is too conservative and not up to the bar at this point. There is some arrangement value here, but it is minimal. Most of the mix follows the structure of the original much too closely. There are a few sections and new transitional material added here and there that bring refreshing change ups. There's ending parts also add a new take, albeit conservative new direction to the mix. Most of the additions here are in the percussive side of things. I do like all the unique percussion parts of the mix. The castanets, the asian percussion all a nice touch. Production is very lacking and plain though. Everything sounds muffled and lo-fi. I'm not sure what you did here, were they like this to begin with or did you over eq your mix? To me sounds like the latter or a combination of both, but regardless, the result is very eh. This needs to be addressed in a major way. I don't think this is a straight out rip, as there's new material in the middle and ending (conservative as they are). This really needs an overhaul though in the arrangement department. Change your rhythms, change the structure, expand the melody or harmony more. Something to evolve the mix. I also think this needs some dynamic shifts, both in the volume and in the rhythm - some form of evolution. Then the production issues, big as they are, are secondary but important as well. In addition, maybe in the middle you could capitalize on all the percussive work you've done here and do a middle percussion break section and heighten, evolve your percussion, and build on that with more layers of exotic percussion? It's an idea to consider. I think you have a good framework to continue on working on this. It has potential. If you do decide to resubmit this, please use our OCR WIP/Completed to get more feedback before submitting. If you want to resubmit this mix, after careful work and polish made, you can pm one of our judges and we would post it directly to the panel for you without wait time. While I don't think this is NO Override material per se, as there are some additions here, it is still a close call in that regard, and I don't think you will get further input for this mix that will be different from my judgement. NO Override

Not just in the beginning. The entire mix suffers from sounding too sparse. Might have worked if there was a little more reverb, a la 80s style, but at this point, I'd like to hear some more things going on. Bingo. I do enjoy this mix, but that's because I love Space Harrier, but from an objective standpoint, this really needs more arrangement ideas brought to the table to integrate with the mix as it is. Compositionally I'd like to see more additions done underlying the melody. Production is fine, but it's vanilla. I'd like to hear some fx processing here, or delays, something to spice things up. If I were you, I would post this in our OCR WIP/Completed forum for further general feedback and continue to rework this mix for a resubmission. But, this needs quite a bit of work in my view before you should consider that. NO

The mixing is all over the place, lots of instruments/drums clashing with each other. This is in dire need of attention paid to panning and eq to carve out specific spaces between all the elements. For music in this genre, distinction is important. The synths at the very least, if they are indeed presets (I don't use sytrus) need at least more automation, fx processing to spice things up. So this needs more attention paid to the above issues, but also I'd like to see more expansion and liberties taken with the arrangement here. Add your own melody, harmony or change the structure to give it your own spin. It is a little on the conservative side in that regard for me. I can see a lot of people enjoying this, I think you should post this in the OCR WIP/Completed forum to share your work. I'm sure there would be some that will dig this. As is though, it's a NO I'm afraid. Keep at it.

The repetition in this mix sinks this one for me. At some parts I felt it was repeating the same measures over and over and over again. This felt so redundant at times. This needs quite a bit of variation both in the groove, drum/bass lines, harmonic structure, etc. Lots of dance/electronic genres tend to like the repeating factor, but there is a line regardless, here it just felt like at times you copied one measure into several others. I'd like to see variation, more expansion with the source material. The synth sax part was indeed cheap sounding. I think the synths, while basic were acceptable. My favorite part of the mix is the strings/disco strings. I actually would not change a thing with the strings, they work. Might beef up the harmonic aspect of that perhaps? The mix got progressively better as it got to the end parts. There's a lot of promise in the mix, but right now the repetition, simplicity factor needs to be worked on more. Loved the ending by the way. The latter half isn't strong enough to push it over the edge for me, given my concerns with the first half and the pros vs cons here. NO but consider resubmitting, this has good potential to pass with work done.

It's been a while since I've heard a mix from you. I do like the beat and percussions - I think you overused the flams personally at the beginning, not to mention it was too predictable in how that was used. The fills and variations were a great touch though. Your hard work did pay off with the drums. You've improved immensely in that regard. The rest of the material I'm a little ify on. I think the arrangement could have been worked on more, especially with supporting material. At times it felt rather basic with simple piano, then the bassline and drums with not much fullness in the overall sound. I'd like to hear this with some more instrumentation, heck, even a pad playing the chords. Sax parts were ok, but admirable. But like the piano both parts were incredibly mechanical, lacking dynamics and humanization. Those parts need to be addressed quite a bit. I do want to give you props for the bass parts though. Nice work there as well, the slides added a cool authenticity factor. It's good to see you back in the game. You've improved a lot, but at this point, I too feels a little incomplete due to the mechanical/dynamics issues and more supporting matterial requirements. Keep at it. You should continue to submit new work or rework this. NO

Tappy annoying beat, what's going on here? The drum line needs to be reworked from the ground up. Sounds like you're using some filter on the or it's horribly recorded. Either way the result sounds cheap, it sounds like those annoying metronomes. I could never stand those either. I understand you probably wanted it for time keeping purposes, but this has got to be reworked. Everything here is way too quiet too. Bring up the levels some. I think the performance is adequate, and you have some nice ideas here compositionally, particularly by the end. I do think the arrangement is a little abstract and feels a little underdeveloped. This has a very live/unplugged feel which is a plus or minus depending on what you're doing. I feel also the piece is very sparse sounding. But that metronome-esque timekeeping tapping, yikes. I was going crazy by the end. This has potential for a resubmission, but it would require a good deal of time invested. I'd like to hear more from you though, you have some very interesting ideas. But a NO for me.

I don't know... It's really tough for most people to mix something of this nature where someone wants the kicks so present along with the fact that he used lots of delays and reverb, I can see why he fell into this "murky" trap that liontamer describes. Personally, I don't think it's a big deal, on headphones it sounds nice and atmospheric. I especially liked the bell synths and bell pads. I also liked the texture of this mix. The long and dense delays/reverb helped add a nice lush atmosphere to the mix. Anyway, for those good and ills, that part is a minor issue, given the lack of arrangement here. This basically needs more attention paid to arrangement, adding new material, your personal flavor and expansion. I didn't mind the basic drum pattern, but it would have been nice if this was aided by some more sophisticated synth design/automation and fx processing. Right now the whole thing comes off as rather vanilla. At this point it strikes me more of a very basic "remix" rather than a re-arrangement. Still, for all its problems, I enjoyed it - But it has more to do with the source material than the arrangement itself. Work on that main facet (arrangement issues) next time before submitting. Keep working at it. NO

Sweet sig rexy.

Well covered by zircon, so I have nothing to add. Man, talk about overcompression on these things though. The beginning parts do sound very degraded, lofi and messy, which means if it were on the panel, larry would YES it cause it supposedly sounds classic.

And then you get the problem that plagues beginner mixers... way too much reverb on your song. Reverb is a condiment, and this method is like drowning a meal in ketchup. Combine this with any type of mastering compression, and it sounds unbelievably ugly. Turn the reverb off. Mix your stuff dry. Add a tiny little bit of reverb on only the stuff that needs it; you should barely even notice it. It depends on the genre. A lot of genres from classical, orchestral, cinematic, new age, electronica, trance, 80s music have A LOT of reverb. Even contemporary works like some of BT's stuff is swamped with "80s style" heavy reverb. It is also personal taste. BT had an interview where he was talking about his penchant for using a lot of reverb, while a lot of the newer musicians he works with (like Justin Timberlake) don't like it. I don't know about you, but I could care less what people like JT who take credit for work done by dozens of "unnamed" professionals, but I digress. Going back on point, I would be careful about making strong, generalized comments personally. European style productions for orchestral are even wetter. It depends on what you are going for or trying to accomplish. The other points you raised have merit, but some of it is your personal taste rather than based on facts.

Not just JW, but a lot of Hollywood composers (one could say too many ) love and yes immitate/are inspired by/etc. Holst.

I leave for a week and come back to drama. Oh how I've missed these forums.

Ok, lets further discuss this one aspect that's dividing us again. I agree with Zircon. Lord, are we going to go through the chiptune debate all over again? I agree this mix has more to offer than the FF6 chiptune issue, there are some more advanced synths going on here, particularly by the end. But, to say that precedent doesn't apply here with such a blanket statement is more than a little misguided. This isn't simply about incorporating chiptune-based or dated sounds, this aspect makes up pretty much the entire mix. Your distinction does not apply for that reason. What's the point of having a panel and precedent if there's something this close in nature and we keep reinventing new rules and not following previous landmark decisions? I'd like Dave to weigh in here and to shed some guiding light on this tricky issue. I am not saying the precedent should apply, but I am challenging the view that it should not apply per Larry's vote. I believe it may/should apply. My main issues here are with the arrangement though as much as the production personally. The problem is the source tune is almost nonexistent in content - It has an odd melody, basic to nonexistent supporting material and drums. It's tough source material to work with by its nature. For me the arrangement almost follows that same pattern and has similar flaws particularly with harmony, although this is obviously a more built up version. This is probably one of the first mazedude mixes that I don't think is really aurally viable, but others are free to disagree with me on that one. I do like some of the the ideas and arrangement ideas brought into the table, but again for me this strikes me as one of Mazedude's less sophisticated expansions. The synths sound almost SNES quality, the lead actually reminds me of FF6's soundtrack. It simply isn't about synth quality either, I agree. Because you can listen to any konami kukeiha club, sega 80s/early 90s or Falcom music that can harness the power of throwback synths. In this case I just don't see that to that level to override the existing issues. Additionally, I personally don't like the drums/percussion in this one. The sound quality, the pattern all sound too repetitive in my opinion. There are bright spots in the midst of it, but the focal points are lacking in my opinion. The texture of the piece just doesn't appeal to me personally. The annoying beeping fx doesn't help much as far as I'm concerned either. I think this could benefit from further arrangement, supporting materials, evolution and more interesting focal elements of the mix, whether they be the synth design, drum work/programming or both. I enjoy almost all your stuff, and your last mix which was passed, I had no beef with, but as for this, it's a NO from me I'm afraid.

You provide nothing there for the remixer other than your affirmative statement to tell him someone is better than him. Poor delivery. Onto the mix. It sounds like it's 80s week at the panel. This is another retro-ish, 80s style mix. I personally find this catchy. The choir section with the groove was in particular the stronger point of the mix. I don't mind the simplicity of the mix, but the problem here is there's no evolution, it almost sounds like once it got on, it went without changing course. Try to add some subtlety to your music. Change up the rhythm, harmony, drum pattern, add humanization...something to spice things up. Also the arrangement feels underdeveloped, with a very abrupt ending to boot. Fun listen though. But per the above issues I and other judges cited, it's a NO.

Yeah the attacks are too slow for this kind of piece, either try adjusting it or use another articulation or you can overlap the notes from end to start notes to cover up the slower attacks. I think having these works, if you use it sparingly and with different variations, but when every single note has the same ramp up and slowness it sounds obviously fake. The same is true with all the other samples here oddly enough - the choir and solo strings suffer from the same problems. I can hear the Dougan influence here. You did a good job of layering the ensembles with solo strings to give a more intimate sound. Dougan tends to use smaller string sections. Overall though, this is too simplistic and repetitive, in addition to the aforementioned problems. Pretty good stuff, but not really up to the bar at this point. Keep working at it. You show potential. This though needs quite a bit of polishing and reworking. NO

Yeah this is very basic and cheesy, but I find myself rather enjoying it. I don't think it's passable, but there's a good framework here of possibilities. The singing and lyrics are definitely well above average. You did a great job there. Unfortunately the suporting elements are way too basic. The horrible sharp sounding snare is the greatest offender. It completely clashes with the lowkey mix, but here you have that snare that's too crisp and loud - It doesn't really fit the mix in my opinion - consider something more subtle sounding. The supporting material sounds retro-ish. This reminds me of an 80s mix. The sound quality of the samples here doesn't really bother me too much, there's hiss and noise throughout the track though and if you have a noise filter or reduction plugin I think that would help a lot. My biggest gripe is the the bass instrument/composition. It's horribly repetitive. The same can be said with the pizz sections. Work on your instrumentation and harmony and mix things up a bit. Work on your drum pattern too, it's way too static/timekeeping sounding. Even 80s style drums have more evolution than this. This has a lot of potential and a lot of elements that I dig. I hope you come back to this. Keep at it, I hope you resubmit this or consider submitting further material. NO

Finally Larry is able to make a good/decent poll in years! I suspect Paige helped save it. Paige feel free to dump that scrub. I bet Larry's getting Paige McDonalds shit, and Campbell's poison soup. :vomit: I voted on "Valentine's Day is for capitalist oil-mongerers; we must shuck their oppression" just to bump up the numbers on that one, but in reality for my case it was actually "Give them a meaningful gift" and to a lesser degree this "Give them an expensive gift."

Haha, that's what I thought. It's just that the judges kept talking like this was a live performance. No, I wouldn't say that. Certainly not for me. Okay, so not you, Larry. But TO talking about the sustain pedal and analoq referring to it as a performance did give that impression. These aspects are available and controllable via midi data in any sequencer/piano roll in most music software packages. More information: http://www.digifreq.com/digifreq/article.asp?ID=45 Does this explain our votes better?