timaeus222   Members

This source could really go any way in a remix. I've heard a shorter source go for a longer remix, so it's possible for this to pass. I recognized this all the way through, but I'd say for the arrangement, add more source recognizability in there. It might ring in as ~40% source. I really liked the gating and the bitcrushing sweeps. 2:51 = iZotope Stutter Edit?

Yeahhhhhhh! I love VirtualDub! I also use Sony Vegas, and it's practically something I can do in my sleep now. =D I'd like to get After Effects someday, but it's not a necessity for me.

You could probably just try a bunch of notch EQs on other instruments at the snare fundamental and that should let it come through enough.

Yeah, there we go! Probably the last thing would be to see if you can layer a stronger snare, and that's about all I'd suggest. It currently sounds almost like a strong rimshot. I actually really like that low gritty bass (1:08).

For me, my round 2 was 29 hours and 18 minutes, and my round 4 was 21 hours and 5 minutes. I tend to overdo things and make them really intense though.

Usually it takes me 20~30 hours including arrangement and mixing/mastering. It's held true so far too.

DAAAAMN. I love that pseudo-sync bass (It's not made with typical oscillator sync, but with waveshaping and distortion on a pulse wave) and the intense saw lead. <3 Fun wahed EP too.

Sounds great! I hear a little overcompression but it's not bad. The Gratifier/Ultrasonic-esque guitar tone could have used a little less distortion, but other than that, intense mix.

I can say with confidence that my Grado SR-60i's ($80) are not going to fall apart anytime soon; I've had them for at least 6 months now and they look the same. And yes, headphones can't get sufficient bass necessarily, but you can get the best bass possible from them, IMO, if you use the Beyerdynamic DT-880's ($300~400). I don't have them, but I know they're awesome and I'd like to get them someday.

What is this?! xD I think you had fun with this.

This is lacking low end power below 65Hz, but the dubstep wobbles are okay at their octave IMO. The wobbles just need to be a tad louder (in mostly volume rather than EQ, from what I can hear) in the end if you end up making other parts louder, as the track overall, from what I see in my spectral analyzer, is not as loud volume-wise as it can be. The phasered bass by itself doesn't quite pull off the apparent aggressive nature of this track due to its lacking low end. Here's a bass sound that I believe could really nail the intro, for example. Listen on speakers and subwoofers to really hear and/or feel the sub-65Hz frequencies. Try to create something similar to that in aggressiveness if you think you need it, or ask me to collab or something. The drums also lack power and some truly over-the-top tight compression from what I can hear. Here's an example of a completely jacked-up version of the intro (in a good way). I only did stuff to the main bass and the kick/snare though. The off-sync glitching on the bass kind of confuses me a bit, so you might want to look into that and revise it a little to see if you can do some more rhythmically flowing gating and retrigger. I didn't know what you did with that rhythmically, so I just did something that was close. I think the wobbles fit fine as they are, but they wind up leaving me wanting them to be thicker than they are now. Preferably, they could have more waveshaping and distortion for a grittier tone, and slightly less resonance for less of a thin "wah" sound and more of a darker "wuh" sound. It doesn't have to be complicated necessarily; just a bit thicker would be nice. Aside from that, like Argle pointed out, some of the leads are a bit buried sometimes under the bass instruments (which doesn't really have much bass frequency content like I said above). The leads need to be louder in volume, could be less thick (thinner than a supersaw, thicker than a sine wave) to help them fit into the soundscape more easily, and some mids would preferentially need to be scooped mildly to bring out the leads. Scooping the mids might leave a person less prone to boosting the leads too much (if frequencies were freed up for something to come through, you don't have to raise the volume so much of what you want to come through). As for the lead tones, I'm gonna show you two synth leads that I think would fit somewhere in the mix. I'll timestamp where I think each one might fit best, and that might give you ideas, timbre-wise. 80's Acid House Bass as Lead (Loads of internal Waveshaping and Distortion on a resonant pulse wave, LFO on the cutoff) ~ Could work at 0:13 Detuned Sync Square Lead (Detune a square lead and put on some mild oscillator sync) ~ Could work at 0:34

The only real downside that I found was that the really low bass (20~80Hz) is basically mildly high passed, but you don't really notice it until you're in a situation where you have to mix bass rigorously. I'd say the ATH-M50's have better bass but slightly worse treble than the Grados from the frequency graphs.

You still have plenty of time to update the file before the judges see it. I think the 0:07 sawtooth lead could have less treble. Not too much, just maybe around 0.4~0.8dB less. At 1:48, the low pizzicato could be more bright. Other than that it sounds good.

You know what, I'm gonna dig up my supposedly finished Yu-Gi-Oh remix and give another pass-through on the bass mixing.

I'd actually say that humming ideas is just brewing ideas. You have the compositional idea in your head, but it's not a composition yet.

Submission Standards Last I recall, a medley consists of many songs. Medleys can be mashups too, but in that particular Zelda case it was a cohesive medley. However, it was not a traditional mash-up, as it was not two or more songs playing at the same time the whole entire time, but a song that introduces brief cameos of many songs. From the same site: If you plan to submit to OCR, then that's what I would suggest you do if you want to go through with this medley, as the traditional medley is too predictable, IMO.Also, your track is private.

Yeah, I can definitely make that.

The Grado SR-60i is actually really good. I find it to have really clear midrange, excellent treble (maybe 90% of the way towards sufficient), and defined bass. You still need subwoofers though to cover the whole spectrum.

Let's have another listening party---one I can't miss.

Well, this is essentially MegaMan X Metal.

Alright, let's check out some eclectic stuff. Sweeeeet orchestral intro. Intense reverses. Glitching wobbles? =OOO Hm... Maybe at 2:02, some pads would fill things out until 3:00. The part afterwards is sooooo awesome. Aaaaaand shift to smooth jazz. xD This is a pretty hilarious remix. I liked it. =D

Production-wise, it would be ready. Arrangement-wise, it falls into the description Gario had given you because the bell lead which represents the source usage the most is a little too far back spatially to be immediately audible due to its volume and possibly its reverb, and the long fade would, to a good portion of listeners, be "a disruption of the pacing". You can say people "don't get it", but that's how they, and the judges, would most likely perceive the fade. Perhaps the source is just difficult to arrange in this particular style. If you want some inspiration for remixing a source that is very minimalistic, here's an example of a remix of a 6 second source. , lol.

Yup, I just used Kirby because its face illustrates my passion for music.

Yep, ambience can still be the existence of pad-like sounds or simply a calm atmosphere. I just find the presence of evolving pads or otherwise dynamically changing atmospheric elements an improvement from a mere atmosphere by itself created by one sound with a colossal reverb. The realism of sounds, though, is another story. We both understand that the concept of hearing realism depends on the listener's experience with and the usage of the instrument in question. If a violin were to be sequenced as a lead violin sound, for example, upfront in a mix with tasteful "airiness" (to emulate a real recording of a violin in a treated room), proper reverb (to make it fit spatially into the context of the mix), delay (to further emulate the perceived room), saturation (to optionally emulate analog tape recordings' "sparkle and sheen"), etc., then it needs all those humanistic nuances with such methods as volume automation (to create a sort of humanized volume swelling), keyswitches for articulations (nobody plays just sustains on a violin), natural velocities (no human plays violins flatly, even if they aren't good), and feasible phrasing (even a professional can't play scales at 240+ BPM). In your case, I couldn't tell it was a violin because of the effects you used, so it didn't matter whether it sounded real or fake. However, I personally think it just sounded good or fitting in general, rather than realistic, as it didn't seem to be your intention to make it realistic.

That's fine, I just figured I should bring that up. This isn't as nitpicky as my other suggestions, as when one of the most obvious connections to the source is somewhat in the background. Most music I hear has the lead element more upfront than this, and while that may seem subjective, it's merely for the aspect of consistency. I've been participating in a remixing competition at OCR for about 5 weeks now, and at one point, length was brought up. Three or so people said "30 seconds is a long time". It sounds arbitrary, but I agree with it in the general case. Sitting for 30 seconds listening to a song could be the equivalent of sitting through an entire commercial. 1 minute is perhaps like half an infomercial. Now, you have more perspective with length. Precisely, that's how I feel. When I mentioned the bell lead, I figured since it was the only melodic element in the piece, it should be a little more upfront, but if you want to leave it in the background like that, it's okay. Not a big deal. Ambiences are fun. Like (most evident in the intro), or this (referring to 2:02), so I love ambiences as you can see. Isn't a song capable of portraying a story as well as being a song? 'o' A story is usually progressive, so if your song reflected that, it would be even more applicable to the tracing of a story. Plus, I did say "I don't have a problem with [the repetition of the drum rhythms]."Also, I edited my previous post earlier, but since you didn't see it, I moved it here: I've decided to synthesize a little example on thin bands of resonance. This is an FM sub bass centered at 64Hz that automates up in frequency until an awkward resonance appears at exactly 15000Hz. Then, it reaches a point where the frequency is so high that it just sounds like digital noise. Afterwards it's automated back down to a sub bass. This is most similar to what I was referring to earlier. I just thought I'd get you familiar on the topic so you're more aware of it in the future.