timaeus222

Incredible cinematic work!

This is my approach if I really want to be complex and I'm getting stuck. I actually listen to the source, and think of a mood I like or want to evoke. I then try to mentally improvise a rhythmic variation on the melody to match a groove that fits the mood I'm thinking of. Usually, drums and a lot of backing float around in my head while the melody is being improvised. I improvise a bassline out loud to follow an implied chord progression once I write out the percussion and the melody. That bassline forms my chord progression, and I fill that out to create that section of the remix. It tends to work out rather well since I don't follow the original chord progression and my jazz choir background helps me with formulating basslines that actually work. I also really like Flexstyle's Variation genre idea (genre as in Rondo, Aria, Fugue, Minuet, etc. Yes, Variation goes way back into the 1600s~1730s lol). It's genius if you really know how to do it well. Like . Focus on the "Devil's Lab" source and notice how many different rhythmic and textural variations there are. Incredible. And there was more coming that faded out. To think it started out pretty conservatively (the FM bassline was a recreation of the original bass sound, and the percussion was emulating the original's percussion). In a sense, almost like a Fugue (variations of one theme in many different textural ways). <3

Okay, well then djp isn't either. Right back at ya.

I thought this "how I can start remixing a song" topic was really interesting, brought up at 0:55:00 in OCR Talkbalk #3. I posted about my approach here.

Yeah, that's my first mixpost. Now to just wait for it to go up. Also, it just so happens that Larry seems to be one of the people who determine whether something DPs or not, and djp does the writeups. I know that because the email was signed by Larry, and I think he also posted once before in a random mixpost that the ReMixes are more accurately written on the ReMix review page as "evaluated by Liontamer". Larry usually is pretty detailed in his votes, so maybe he's lightened up his own bar after having gone through 9+ years of judging. Basically the difference I was hoping to convey was the EQing and reverb rather than the sound selection as sounds are more subjective, but oh well, opinions will vary. I guess the objective difference between the two tracks is smaller to other people than I thought.

Well, you see, since a good majority of those lead synths were ones I made, it means objectively I like how they sound in the context of this ReMix. I agree that by themselves with the EQ they have externally they might sound a little bit thin, but in context they allow other frequencies such as the C64 arp and the dry signal of the E. Piano to peek through. I personally believe this was my second toughest mixing experience, next to the final round's mixing difficulty, so I of course spent a long time fixing it up until I was satisfied with leaving it as it is now. Because of that, I did in fact run into the observation that some mids were clashing a bit, so I took that into account and scooped the mids on the bass only during that Electro House section, and that should be enough, but we'll see. Honestly, I think this mixing job was better than what I did for "Cloudhopping", a collaboration with Chimpazilla, and apparently "Cloudhopping" was good enough for a DP, so maybe the bar is lower than you think and what I used to think (before I got the email, thinking the mix was going to go through to the judges panel instead of DPing).

You sure man? I'm very satisfied with the production on it, and I already subbed it to OCR. I've honestly got no complaints of my own on it, and I was jiving in my room when I finished it.

Just attention to detail man, and good headphones. And I looked at his profile for the Ableton Live info

This isn't bad at all. I'm not the type of person who dislikes Electro House, though the production could be better. The bass at 0:32 and on is pretty good, but pretty static at the same time on those longer sustains. It would be much better if there was some sort of movement in the timbre, such as with a little band notch LFO or something else creative. Rozo is right in that this isn't that loud. This is louder. I also do hear the overcompression at 2:36, so I'm confirming that too.

HoboKa, He's using Ableton Live. At this tempo, I'd call this downtempo. Anyways, the bass is pretty basic. It's not creating any mud by itself as it's practically the only low end instrument, but it's not distinct enough to really be a solid bass sound. The majority of its tone is below 80Hz, so it's not exactly phat. Layer it if you can with some sort of thicker bass with more bite to its tone, and it would sound more satisfying, at least to me. Some leads are definitely too reverby, such as 1:15 and 1:36. It's fine that they're distant if this is intended to sound like ambient downtempo, but the notes need to be more distinct either way. The main muddiness issue comes into play from the reverb on the E. Piano. The low cut is too low, so there is unnecessary low end ambience clashing a bit with the bass. 2:29 though is where the most mud actually comes in; when the pad is there, the low mids really do have lots of muddiness.

Wait a minute, is that a reference to the anime? Because that's what happens in Season 0. Oh, and I'm happy with the current mixing on my track.

As far as I'm concerned, the government is already shut down, and I'm blaming it on Darke. *runs*

Split? Like you used two stem clones and... panned each one? Or...? I personally find it really strange that the bass's position keeps moving around. Switching between mono and stereo throughout is having a weird effect on the stereo image overall. Sometimes it feels like there's random panning and stuttering, like at 1:03-1:18. I noticed the switch to stereo from 1:28 to 1:32, and that also feels odd to me. By default, if everything was layered as they were, there would have been zero positioning issues (no large jumps from narrow to wide, no jumps from front to back, etc.), so I think it has something to do with how you processed it in Audacity? Also, now that I think about it, the bass is a little too loud compared to the kick whenever the bass is in the very front. I can kinda feel the impact of the weakest kick (I used three kicks in this; the main electro kick, the "overkill" electro house kick, and the one with punchiness in between those two), but I could feel it more in the original mixing. I'll probably convert the OGGs to WAVs myself later on and provide those too.

Yeah, I wouldn't believe you intentionally conveyed that tone, and we all have our days. The implications remain the same, but the wording was what bothered me. Anyways, enough of this dwelling. Actually, I just checked a whole bunch of videos, and the third line is visible even without clicking "Show More". EDIT: Wait a minute... different, and too. I guess someone's hard at work! =D

Unless I'm mistaken, I hear a weird phasing/volume fluctuation issue in the bass instruments and wide instruments all throughout. Very strange. No clue what happened there. I purposely left out how I compressed the kick and snare so people could go either way (heavier or tighter). The snare is pretty good. The kick is a little bit buried, but not that badly; that too didn't start out with compression. I like the hard panning on the C64 arp, but with the phasing issue I'm apparently hearing (I don't hear it on my original), I may just be hearing panning that isn't happening. xD I also tried re-mixing my own stems right after I made them, and I didn't get phasing issues, so something's up? Hm.

This is just personal taste, but the distortion could have been toned down just a little tiny bit on the rhythm guitars. Other than that, very heavy, and I agree with all of Dave's last-sentence adjectives.

Hm... As peppy as this sounds, it's not really ruining the supposed badassness, though the drum programming could have been stronger. The kick received less attention to detail than the snares, which were bested by the filler snares. Overall, I guess the production brought down the impressiveness of this for me a bit, but I would also agree that this is just good enough to pass based on the non-percussive elements alone.

Very high energy. I wish the mixing was less muddy, like Larry and Vinnie kinda feel. Basically, the cymbals have a lot of release time, and the sub bass from the ambient impacts is cluttering the mix, but oh well, it's already up. The arrangement is great.

I said some stuff too, lol.

I would support this, though it would honestly take a few full days of effort (i.e. a tedious length of time) to update every single video description, or at least many of the early and later ones. Add that to album kickstarters, album releases, judging, writeups, and a whole bunch of other behind-the-scenes and you've got even more time added to those few full days. I've done something just like this before to my own videos, and it's a big pain even for just one little edit on a few hundred videos, let alone 800~2000.

It may come off that way to some people, but I wouldn't believe it's intentional, and it doesn't come off that way to me.

Maybe I can have time to do it, maybe not. If anyone wants me to collab, I'd be happy to help.

Yeah, same here. I tried out so many other styles. Funk, Electro House, Orchestral (yes, I had to carry out Cosmic Sounds's arrangements because he was having trouble with something), and now... Metal/Industrial/Ambient. Our entry isn't too liberal, is it? I dunno, I was actually going back and forth and making sure I could recognize the source as I arranged it. Do you want me to provide a source breakdown?

Source: On another note, this is actually a really cool source tune. Makes me want to remix it someday.