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Wow, fantastic! I was riveted the whole time by a soundscape that oscillated between spaghetti Western and Jethro Tull. The work, which becomes a new genre itself, will be called... Cowboy Prog Metal. Or something.

Liking that guitar more and more. I'm feeling a more improvisational spirit in the middle section. Even more would be great, IMO. Maybe add some more grace notes and ornamentation, if you feel so inclined. I think there's also some added accenting in there, which is nice. Minor point: I'm hearing a dissonant note at 2:47, not sure if that's intentional. If I find anything else to nitpick, I'll let you know!

It might be my goldfish-like memory, but this sounds much the same as the last time I listened (which is good). What did you change? The end of the song sounds most different to me, with some heightened dynamics and different rhythms, but I'm not sure if that's new. I feel like the guitar starting at 1:05 could still use a little more humanization -- right now everything's well-grounded in the eighth notes, let your guitarist float a little more freely! I guess it just comes down to taste, but I think some triplets or more syncopation (there's already some) would be dandy.

One of my favorite memories from shortly after I began following OCR. Once in a while, while driving around town I'll begin singing this to myself out of the blue.

This is still one of the best piano mixes I've heard on OCR. The source was wonderfully sappy to start with, but you brought it into a whole other realm of gorgeous, gushing romance. Nicely done, you two!

Very nice work! The arrangement is quite expansive, with lots of variety in dynamics and textures. You use the samples in an organic way, and in general they're pretty good to start with. If there's any way you could back off on the vibrato on the flute and sax (using it judiciously, here and there), it would be a good idea. And the piano actually sounds great for the most part, I'd just use the rolled chords a bit more sparingly, especially in the beginning. Definitely fun to listen to as-is, though.

Interesting, the noise-caked percussion juxtaposed with a clear piano gives a kind of Metroid-Prime-meets-jazz effect. I like the direction your mixes are headed, Proto.

Yeah, I cleaned up the playing a bit for the final submission, but it's still far from perfect. :-\ I definitely didn't want to doctor up the midi, so this is where my technique is at the moment. Thanks for listening! Thanks, Swann. I'd be happy to send you the midi right now, but I'm a little afraid of how some of the runs will look! Let me know if you want to try now, otherwise I'll try to clean up the midi to reflect the "intended" note values and order.

Very true, it had to do with the recording settings I used. I fixed it in the final submission.

Nice job! I love how you wove the Dire, Dire Docks theme in there, and kept it interesting with such a brief and simple source tune. I think the guitar lead sounds good and pretty convincing. If you can't find a guitarist to collab with, you might try replacing some of the sixteenth notes at the beginning/end of some phrases with eighth note triplets to soften the momentum, especially in the original (?) section starting at 1:05 and later parts where the original theme comes back. This might add a more natural/improvisational quality to the phrasing, as well as some rhythmic variety. Keep with it, it's sounding really good!

I never understood all the controversy about this song. It's BEAUTIFUL, one of my all-time faves on OCR. This degree of emotion and expressiveness are rarely heard on the site, even today. I can't comment on the accuracy of the Japanese, but if one can appreciate beautiful Japanese songs with mangled English portions (Zone of Enders, anyone?), then why not the other way around? Aurally, I don't find the switch jarring at all, but rather a pleasant surprise. Bravo to Reuben and Jill for a terrific mix.

I enjoyed this. The intro is pleasantly heroic, and your samples are good. Plenty of potential here! Some suggestions: I like how you added instruments slowly throughout the intro. Could you also make it more expressive, maybe getting steadily louder? Some moderately lower strings to round out the sound at the very beginning would also be nice. Leading up to 1:20, I'd love to hear a humongous crescendo, with a gong or similar instrument sending you... off to the races! And the next section could be AWESOME if you picked up the tempo to twice what it is in the intro. Maybe John Williams' Duel of the Fates would be good inspiration here. This could become the middle section you need, as mak noted. Then you could end with a slow section reprising the introduction, but with more drama (you sort of do this already, just needs some more gusto). Just some ideas, maybe you want to move it in a different direction. There's a lot of good stuff here, keep working on it!

I love this. Careful attention to dynamics, voicing and articulation, and a nice piano sound to boot. You also have the style nailed, as far as I can tell. Nice work!

Submitted! Thanks for your input and encouragement, everybody. Hopefully the source is adequate for the panel, if not, can't say I wasn't warned.

Likewise, man. If we found a place where our sounds mesh well, the result could be mind-blowing, or at the very least interesting.

I'm pretty picky when it comes to rap, but this is fantastic. Some of the instrumentation reminds me of "Can't Nobody Hold Me Down" by P. Diddy, which takes me back to the '90s. And the lyrics are just ingenious, love all the culinary references. My favorite rap/hip-hop song on OCR yet!

Thanks, halc! I appreciate the detailed look. Probably individual judges will differ about what they consider close enough to the source material, but I trust your judgment more than mine. I have some residual ideas about expanding one of the themes a bit, but in my mind this is really a finished piece. I'll let it sit for a while, and then probably submit as polished a version as I can record.

Wonderful work, guys. Interesting juxtaposition of funky rhythms and soaring, echoing arpeggios. The combination of synthetic and acoustic instrumentation also works really well. And I LOVE the violin at 1:19, Chris. Goosebumps! Best of luck with the panel.

Excellent track -- it fits right in with what I've heard of Huelsbeck's style, which is terrific. Love the use of drums and other percussive voices, then the strings come in... even with such a brief source tune, the soundscape never gets boring. Nice work!

Hope I'm not breaching protocol too much by skipping the "Finished" stage. I'm almost ready to submit this (maybe with one or two more takes to see if I can clean it up just a tad, including eliminating that hum), but I am concerned about whether there is enough source in this mix to pass the judging panel. Thanks for taking a look! Source: 1. Lost Woods 2. Title Theme (minor influence, mainly at the end)

That may well be -- I'll definitely want to consult the Mod Review before final submission to get their input about this.

Protodome: It may be tough since there's a lot of dynamic contrast in the piece, and I suck at compression. But I'll see what I can do. evory: I'd be happy to share the sheet music, but I'm always too lazy to write it out. I could share the midi and maybe you could generate (un-quantized) sheet music from that. Let me know (private message or on this board) if you're interested. Hemophiliac, TheReverend, Gintokipianist -- thanks so much for the feedback. I'm thinking about how to make the source references more evident without compromising what I have. I think it can be done! Oh, and yep, the piece is meant to suggest leaves rustling and stirring through a veil of mist, constantly changing, playing tricks on your eyes and ears... I'm thinking about changing the title to English to get this point across, perhaps "Leaves Dancing in the Mist."