timaeus222   Members

That's true, it's fine in non-solo-piano arrangements or arrangements with the piano relatively non-exposed. Still good to have some reverb to mask the mechanical sound, just to be safe.

I don't think I've ever heard of a purposefully mechanical-sounding piano. It's not technically wrong, but the Judges would reject the mix on that for sure.

I think what you were going for was a gradual increase in excitement, but it turned out to be flat and then suddenly EXCITEMENT! at the last moment of the buildup.

Pretty obviously mechanical-sounding, and the sound quality could be better. Some notes are muddy as well at about 1:20. Try to get a better sample, and try to play it in with a MIDI keyboard or something.

Not entirely sure, but it might be muddy in the 200-300Hz range. Try dipping it a little there for your guitars if you haven't already, or wherever it is your bass is strongest.

Well, it definitely sounds cleaner. The dryness is a huge problem but you know about it. I think the kick should be layered. It's a moderately good acoustic kick, but it needs a bit more strength than that. Try to go for a sample that has that thump. The solo at 2:12 is better, but the pad playing alongside is pretty narrow in terms of sound design quality. It would probably work best panned center, though. It currently sounds somewhat panned right, but I'm not entirely sure. Not really digging the constant cymbals starting at 2:48, as they're playing a bit too often. For example, at 3:14, it's pretty much playing on every significant beat, rather than as bridges between multiples of 4 bars. I think this could work out better once the reverb and delay is added.

The percussion is pretty good. I think the snare could be a bit more tight, though. The decay is a bit long, and I was thinking you could shorten it a bit and give it more of a smack or thwap. The kick is close to a pitch envelope kick, but it's not super awesome. Try finding another similar kick that sounds better, or layer on a more thump-like kick and make that a bit louder in the layering. The square-ish lead at 0:36 is a bit soft and unexpressive. Try adding some vibrato and ambience, and raise the volume. 1:25 - The poly-saw synth that acts like spiccato strings could use more impact. It's kind of buried behind the acid-bass-like synth playing at the same time. The drums could use a bit more variation and transition work. The ending is nonexistent. Sounds like a copy+paste to me. Lead sounds bare at the end by itself, needs more TLC.

Before 1:05, the drums are pretty weak. I can barely hear the kick, and the kick is mainly low frequencies. Afterwards, the snare starts coming in, but the kick is still barely audible. Just choose better samples, and that would help a lot. Layer your drums. If you have good samples, you don't need too much processing other than a little bit of compression and room reverb. The arrangement has kind of a plodding pace. The drums need much more variation, and the pace feels constant almost the entire time. Replacing some sections could work.

Fantastic. Energy remains awesome, breakdowns are really nice, especially that first one. I wasn't really feeling the second one at 1:45, but it was still good! Solid mix.

Loved the mandolin breakdown and the instrument interplay. Great job, Vurez!

The snare is fine to me, it's just too soft IMO. The toms are a bit weak though. Either make those louder too or layer them. 1:52 feels a bit bare. Try to add a few more things there, like fret slides, or neck scrapes, or something. 2:14 feels either muddy or overcompressed. The bass might be too loud there, or maybe you forgot to sidechain. It's happened to me before; one time I thought I sidechained, but I forgot to select the sidechain signal number, so it's like it wasn't actually doing anything. The lead guitar feels a bit distant most of the time, so see if you can bring it out a bit more. The open hi hats and cymbals too, near the end. The ending feels a bit weird since you had toms end it, and still left in a tail. Personally I would have ended it after those tom hits. Sounds good so far!

Generally, it's good to have headphones too since they pick up some things you don't hear on speakers. To clarify, I think you had single notes in a synth in an arpeggiator mode where the synth plays specific notes that change in accordance with pitch shifts. For example: --- Note # --- Pitch Shift --- 1 --- 0 --- 2 --- 0 --- 3 --- 1 --- 4 --- 5 --- 5 --- 2 --- 6 --- -7 --- 7 --- 8 --- 8 --- -5 --- 9 --- 2 --- 10 --- 3 --- 11 --- 12 --- 12 --- -12 --- 13 --- -10 --- 14 --- 6 --- 15 --- -2 --- 16 --- 7 If you played the note A4, then the following notes would be cycled through: A4, A4, A#4, D5, B4, D4, F5, E4, B4, C5, A5, A3, B3, D#5, G4, E5. Those notes would be different for each note you play, and sometimes the notes won't line up with a good harmony note. That's what I'm hearing with that dissonance I mentioned.

Well of course. But if it's mixed well enough, it would have just sounded "ear-blasting". ;D

That is awesome, I love Alex's Jazz Jackrabbit soundtrack.

I wouldn't agree with adding sub bass, specifically. I would say add a bass in general. If it's going to be ambient, there should be a bass somewhere in there. Something FM could be cool. Occasional miscellaneous effects would be interesting too.

Nah, that "thing" isn't a dealbreaker for me. Just a weird thing with the glide or something, no clue.

Yeah. At this early stage though, that's all I could really say about it for now.

I think the clap is a bit weak. It's lacking the high end that I would prefer on a mix like this. Try for a semi-short high end "kp". The bouncy arp is kinda cool. I have a feeling it's from an arpeggiator voice mode in a synth, so that's why it's dissonant sometimes. You should try to fix that with either the UI or some creative sequencing. There's not much going for you in terms of excitement. It's quite a bare remix, but the sounds aren't bad. You just need more layers in the song, at this particular moment.

A lot of the bass and drumwork was influenced by zircon's 'Daft Drafts', so all of that was purposeful. The sine lead was leading into the upfront saw lead, so it was a little quiet for a bit. Glad you didn't notice something super-specific that I notice every time (which no one else notices) and can't figure out why it happens. I hear you on that remark about claps being cheesy. Sometimes they are, I get it, but in the case of this snare layering, it shouldn't be all that bad. Definitely the style I was going for here. The later unlayered claps are all chimpazilla. Eh, I still liked them being there. ;D At 0:52, the lead ends early to show off the ambience and delay. Thanks! Yeah, that Castlevania remix was one of my first remixes, but since then I've been designing my own sounds, and in Zebra in particular; all but about 3 or 4 patches in this remix were made just for this or taken from my Zebra soundbank. @Chris: Batman apparently means thwap. I never heard it either before like 2 days ago.

Interesting sound. It would benefit from a bit more ambience on the phasered percussion, and perhaps a bit of high passing on the sub bass, but otherwise this is great.

I had this before it was an OCReMix. xD Great stuff. Loved that soft moog lead at the end a lot.

1:38 = Time signature change. It's not the best ending, but it works well enough. Good job.

Work with the DAW that best suits your workflow. Just use what you know how to use best. If it ends up not doing what you want, you can always ask someone to contribute some cool WAV files.

No problem. Also, before you possibly go off wondering what a resonant sweep is, here is an example: http://www.zirconstudios.com/music/demos/Z-Squared.mp3 @ 0:55 (If you have no idea how that's made, I have no issue making a WAV file for you to use, just PM and ask)