timaeus222

I listened to the clyp version, which said "new version". I really don't hear that much vibrato (if any) in the sustains, particularly at 1:29 - 1:41 and 1:56 - 2:07. Are you sure it's there? Did you solo the track and check? Vibrato CAN be added via pitch bending, and that tends to be more noticeable, but... I hardly hear any in those time stamps I mentioned. Note that I am not talking about the pinch squeals.

Really smart partwriting. Engaging every step of the way.

Just from a quick listen, I thought the drums stayed fairly static... It just stays with the same kind of half-time rhythm, with relatively few fills. Try using toms sometime, to make the pacing more engaging. The lead guitars can have more attention to detail for added realism. It seems like you may be using Shreddage? Some of the sustains are lacking life, especially at 1:56 - 2:07 with those straight eighth notes and limited vibrato. Putting pitch bends would help (i.e. bending up, or bending up/down for vibrato; but always bend up first, not down first), as well as visualizing when the guitarist would slide his hand on the neck and pick extra hard, etc. Zircon has a great tips video on that for Shreddage here, if it helps at least in principle: Another example is here, where pitch bends really bring the guitar to life, depending on what you want to write:

Hey guys, it's been a long time, but here's an atmospheric Final Fantasy mashup of FF4's Prelude and FF6's Terra with dubstep and light glitch elements! This has been submitted to OCR on March 18, 2018. [EDIT: To show the timeline, this just got approved August 31, 2018 for a direct-post, so about 5 months in this case.] This was inspired by Stephen Anderson (stephen-anderson on soundcloud); it primarily uses bell and pad textures from Spectrasonics' Omnisphere 2; a Chapman Stick from Trilian; 4Front's TruePianos; and various FM sounds from my Zebra2 soundbank "FM Variations". Glitching was via Illformed's Glitch 2, and some of the remaining stuff was from LA Scoring Strings, Rhapsody Orchestral Percussion, and Serum. The solo violin was Embertone's Friedlander, highly recommend it!

I dunno, I think the balance was fine, but instead I had a hard time understanding the vocals... I think the surrounding instrumentation was solid though.

Starts out pretty conservative, but eh, I never really get tired of Dire Dire Docks remixes. There are plenty that I think you might also want to hear to get inspired; here are a few: http://ocremix.org/remix/OCR00952 http://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02909 http://ocremix.org/remix/OCR03183 What I think you could still work on, if you still like your arrangement as it is, is the humanization. Each note you have sounds like it's quantized (rigid, robotic, computer-perfect rhythm), and very similar (if not identical) velocities/intensities. Try to imagine how it would be played on the piano, and emulate that by manually varying the velocities and rhythm (even slight adjustments on rhythm help). In a syncopated 4/4 time signature like this one, you probably want to emphasize the "1", the "and" of "2", and the "and" of "3", followed by the "1" and the "and" of "2", of the main arpeggio, while the rest of the notes can be quieter in comparison, to create a typical phrasing. As an example, compare these to see the difference. https://app.box.com/s/pmwybgad4who5679p9xvuxdnnmqshas5 - Completely quantized and identical velocities https://app.box.com/s/lr9nxha1zbg5vfcxufqqvuiz9vjnliyu - Quantized, but not identical velocities https://app.box.com/s/jjapuupib9zfypwoew1ecr31nlq8siw4 - Humanized

Good luck! We don't get a lot of psytrance, last I recall, so it'll be nice to have some more!

Not exactly offtopic; so I moved it to Community. @bLiNd has been a significant part of our community. Let's help him get back on his feet!

Maybe just a minor gripe, but in the breakdown section you did, I personally found that the supersaw lead you used brought me out of the calm atmosphere that you introduced. How about switching that out for a tamer lead? It would also add variation in the choice of leads, which only helps your case. I don't have much to say otherwise, other than to second @Gario that the source usage isn't totally obvious, even though I know the source pretty well. It's in a minor key most of the time, and is also used in a segmented manner, so I would have to listen to the source side-by-side to be able to compare sometimes.

For another perspective, whenever I collab, I just ask upfront which of us would host things in a primary DAW (if in fact we are comfortable in different DAWs), depending on who feels better about mixing and project organization. That person handles the MIDI and plugin work, and "commits" to less when it comes to set ideas. Also, I find that it would make it easier, at least for one of us, to have an idea of what the big picture of the project is, as it isn't scattered between two DAWs. In terms of what happens in between, typically I openly recommend that we often send rendered WIPs each other's way for feedback before finally sending the newest version of the tracks (rather than sending it because of a lack of inspiration or something and having the other fix it). That way, we minimize fudge factors in mixing, or reworking a performance, etc. because someone found a error in the middle of working on the track that would be frustrating to fix. It also keeps the shared vision as clear as possible so that we can both see what we both want. On the other hand, if we have two people in different DAWs writing something and sending WAVs to each other, eventually it could get confusing whose ideas are newer (say, if one of them decide to work ahead because they felt inspired), so that's why I prefer to have one person doing things on a primary DAW between the collaborators. Furthermore, if it is done that first way (well-defined roles), ideas shouldn't feel as "set", even if you're bouncing WAVs to send to the other person; because one person can write in regular MIDI, and the other person is bouncing WAVs, that other person can tell pretty easily how new their ideas are (although admittedly they might feel they have less control), and can update what they have at any time as long as the primary mixer doesn't mind some slight adjustments based on the updates. ----- You do what works for you, but that's how I tend to do it.

Were you actually looking for a mod review? (If not, just pretend this is regular critique.) ARRANGEMENT I'm not very familiar with these sources, but after listening to this back and forth, it seems to be a fairly conservative arrangement. Not necessarily an issue in and of itself, but in terms of OCR guidelines, a ReMix that sounds too close to the original generally doesn't demonstrate as much interpretation as it could. What I would suggest is deviation in the (i) structure, (ii) rhythm, (iii) harmonies, and so on. I have this feeling that you maybe listened to the original and tried to be faithful to it, and ended up having very similar note sequences on each instrument; from what I can tell, this ended up being not too far from an instrument switch on a nearly exact transcription. A nice analogy is plagiarism (sans the connotation); if you look at someone else's work and just try to reword it, chances are you might not really reword it that much if you really like their wording. But if you don't have that person's work in front of you, and you just try to come up with the same ideas in your own words, you have a much better chance of making a more original work that satisfies the assignment. OVERALL I like the result personally, and I can appreciate the melodic variation you tried later on in the track. The pacing is alright, and I didn't find it all that repetitive. [In terms of "would this be accepted on OCR?" though, probably not.] ----- ADVICE? If I were to have remixed these two sources, my approach would be to listen to each source and try to internalize the melodies over a few days or weeks. From the melody, I would imagine my own harmonies, or perhaps try to hum one melody on top while the other source is playing. When I come up with something neat, then I start writing from scratch with no pre-loaded MIDI. As an easy example, try humming the "chorus" from the Super Mario 64 credits theme on top of the Pokemon GSC Goldenrod City theme. That's one I found recently!

So... you're saying that people's ears got... worse... over time? o_o Even a person like me, who can't really stand pop music, can admit that whoever's doing the production for each pop artist generally does quite a pristine job. Anyways, I get your point that orchestration didn't require EQ for performances to the general public in the past, but we're talking about a digital context here. We can (and do!) use orchestral instruments in a digital setting now, and in that setting, EQ (and volume and panning tweaks) is necessary to even out the orchestral performances, which are necessarily recorded to be produced into a song in the first place. An example that immediately comes to mind is that maybe a contrabass recording picked up too much bass, and would make the mix muddy (bass + reverb = mud!); then it would require some cutting to clear out the low end in the context of the mix.

Or, you could actually try the advice first and make judgment calls afterwards... If you don't want the critique, then don't ask for it. If you never cut frequencies and you boost instead, then I can almost guarantee that your music will sound resonant somewhere in the midrange. If you neither cut nor boost, then you'll likely get midrange clutter that makes your lead compete for attention. I get that you can adjust volumes, velocities, and panning. But those are not the prominent issues here. In fact, even real orchestras need EQ to sound right. It's often not because the instruments were faulty... it's generally because the microphone(s) used were, and EQ is often necessary to even out the frequency pickup of the microphone(s) used.

I always recommend cutting rather than boosting, if possible. Boosting tends to lead to clutter if you don't really know where you actually want to boost and are just spitballing. If a sound becomes too hollow by cutting, slightly undo what you just did (with your mouse, not Ctrl+Z) until you find a balance. The point is to make room for other instruments, in the context of the mix. It doesn't matter what they sound like by themselves, because instruments in a song are generally playing with other instruments. The harp does sound rather dull. I don't think EQ would fix that (unless for some reason you gave it a low pass or a 10 dB cut in the midrange or something... THAT can be undone), though a small dip in the low-midrange (2-4 dB) would help reduce its resonance. Or try a different soundfont. If you can find FluidR3 GM out there, that harp actually comes through mixes quite well.

You would add your external hard drive as another directory for FL to search when you want to install a new plugin. When it finds the plugin, checkmark it and it should show up.

I don't have much to say, actually. Sounds pretty darn good; I would just check the last notes, and make sure they don't end as abruptly, as the whistle stops early.

If you want the most "honest" sound, try first plugging it in directly. You don't strictly need an audio interface if you know the headphones should be good already. Mainly what those provide is further fine-tunability for the frequency distribution you get, as well as giving you an additional volume control (more precise than your computer gives you, probably). Having an audio interface, however, does give you more flexibility, so it could help. [What I would do if you do want to use an audio interface is to try to match what you get when you plug in the headphones directly with what you get when the interface is in between the headphones and the PC (then adjust from there).]

I had the 250-ohm version, which did need a headphone amp to get up to normal listening volumes. Lower impedance values means it is easier to get up to normal volumes. So, no, the 32-ohm version won't require an amp.

This is what I mean; after you drag an image file in (where the paper clip is), simply click the image and it'll go into the post.

@Silverpool You can drag images from your computer onto "Drag files here to attach, or choose files..." in the posting box.

Well, in general, you should check the impedance on the headphones you choose to buy. If it's large, like 250 ohms, then you would need a headphone amp to get the volume to a normal level. As always, I would actually recommend you save up for the Beyerdynamic DT-880, 32-ohm version if possible. I've been using them for about 5 years now (got them on sale for 51% off), and they have been working especially well. They really helped with mixing bass and upper treble with relative ease; they are semi-closed back, so they don't leak too much bass (unlike open-back), but also don't make it too muffled (unlike closed-back). Something that I couldn't mix properly on my previous headphones (Grado SR-60i) in less than 6 hours, I managed to mix on these in 30 minutes. They give an honest stereo field. Some headphones spread things out too wide... They give an honest representation of the amount of reverb that is actually going on. All of the other headphones I have tried previously exaggerate the reverb to some extent. So those are some of the things you could consider. Here's an example of something I've written using those headphones. I haven't tried the Sony MDR-7506 before, but I would suppose that they are alright. Here's a frequency distribution for three headphones to compare: For a cheaper option than the Beyers, I also recommend checking out the Grado SR60i (open-back); those are sadly discontinued, but you may find them on amazon for roughly $80, or the SR-60e edition should also be as good. You can see from the graph that they are definitely fuller than the MDR-7506, particularly below the midrange and in the upper treble region. I still have them today. Note: yeah, they can get kinda itchy, but once I took the time to break them in, they did help with bass and treble mixing. I used them to write this at one point.

I think I've done a polyrhythm before; an example is at 1:59 - 2:15 in this mix, I have triplet eighths (on the arpeggio) against regular eighth notes (the piano). Hope it helps!

The arrangement was super innovative! I loved how all the different contours made the same melody sound new, and ilp0's performances were on point.

This is a kickin' arrangement! I agree that the drums lack a bit of production punch, but mainly the arrangement flowed pretty well and I never felt the need to skip around. The drum fills were also a great addition.

Wow, excellent work! Really nails the mountainous vibe you were going for! If I had to nitpick, it felt a bit muddy. I liked how the oud (pretty sure it's an oud) fit in though.