timaeus222

I guess if you sing a "blue note" on purpose, maybe. Or perhaps, you're singing something with notes that are so fast that no one can really detect the off-pitch without slowing down the song. As long as the singing doesn't sound "off" based on the intended style, it doesn't really need tuning. As with many musical choices, it depends on the context, so take it case-by-case. If you have the time to keep re-recording and splicing the best takes, yes, that is ideal, but usually people are off from perfect pitch by at least a little bit, and like I mentioned earlier, 5 cents is my personal threshold for calling someone on-tune (because I can hardly detect below 5 cents off-tune), so eventually you may want to just be OK with a few slightly off notes here and there, if for the sake of time or something else.

Cool, though not everybody else "gets" it, so to speak, so it's clarification for those people.

Later I'll give a source breakdown of what I thought matched up, just for that "faithful OC ReMixes" topic.

I agree; to add on to this, if it's not a vocoding context, then instead of using something like autotune, I would do manual tuning in an external audio editor (well, if you're pretty on-tune yourself; 5 cents of error is what I consider on-tune). The only drawback is that if you do more than about a whole step, you get evident shifts in your vocal tone (lossiness for pitch lowering, approaching chipmunk for pitch raising). Also, if you do it that way, you should check to make sure there aren't clicks or volume jumps that result from the stretching or compression of the length of the vocal portion you're adjusting.

I do see why it can be construed as chill. 0:49 - 1:21 had no lead, so it felt like the focus was the feel of the chords and bass, which aren't very active in that part. Similarly, 1:45 - 3:03 had no lead and the focus was on the chords, bass, and percussive elements. Although, I would call this more of a glitchmania that capitalizes on atmosphere, than a chill take. The parts seem to work fairly well, but the midrange is cluttered in the busier portions (2:26 - 2:41, 3:35 - 3:51), and there really isn't an actual ending. Just an "okay, I'm done playing" type of deal.

It's alright. One gripe is the bass note never changes from the point it comes in. It's just the same note repeated no matter what the chords are, and that makes it plodding for me. Also, from 0:48 - 3:08, the drums are practically on autopilot, and the melody feels copy-pasted. It feels like nearing the end of a pop song and hearing the chorus repeated a few times, but twice as long. Overall, it's just too repetitive, even as a dance song; the production is OK, but it doesn't draw me in to the extent that I would dance to it. Try this as a pacing reference. http://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02018

True, while really similar vibe ~= recognizable result, recognizable enough =/= really similar vibe necessarily. However, you took the instance of me saying "vibe" at the end as mistaken (which it was), and extrapolated it to be my whole point (which it wasn't). Basically you took my misspoken words as what I actually thought. So while I do agree with what you just said, what you believed to be my thoughts was not what I actually intended to say in my first post and does not represent my thoughts. (By the way, when I said, "For some other people, it really is about sticking to the vibe of the original, and they may refuse to take it any other way", I'm referring to the YT people Brandon was thinking of who love conservative remixes, or really, anyone like that, and not specifically OCR-goers) Now that that's cleared up, /OT

For the de-essing, considering that this plugin is free (so there's obviously no harm in trying it out), I would suggest Spitfish, which is an external VST. I personally just automate EQ bands of a certain scooping or notching shape down in sibilant or fricative parts, and then back up when that part is over (which is what I was referring to with the meticulousness). For reverb, Fruity Reeverb can work pretty well (strangely enough I find myself using it more than Reeverb 2), though I would suggest saving up money for ArtsAcoustic Reverb ($189) because of its immense flexibility, or trying out Dasample's Glaceverb for free (later, because right now the website is apparently under construction; try looking at this review page). The following are also useful (and free), namely epicVerb for reverb: https://varietyofsound.wordpress.com/downloads/ EDIT: Note that I'm not trying to de-emphasize the importance of compression and static EQ; I'm just discussing what I personally end up going through the most in a vocal editing process.

For me this creates a sense of horror and unease, and an anticipation of something wicked to come. Later on it feels like that evil thing is in essence rampaging (this should be pretty clear to identify; it's the part that acts as the looped portion). It's not exactly nostalgic per se since I've never played the game, but this resonates in the sense that I get that clear view of what it portrays.

Something that I've found myself doing pretty often in the process is de-essing and reverb. Static EQ in general is important too, but I don't think it's as time-consuming, once you know where to look. Compression can be done to even out crazy waveforms, preferably in a transparent (hard-to-notice) way. When I say de-essing, I'm referring to reducing egregious sibilances (or I guess I should plop in the idea of fricatives too) via volume automation or external waveform adjustment, in addition to (dynamic) EQ band automation to keep the airiness of the rest of the performance where there aren't sibilances (if the airiness is there). It might seem a little meticulous, but you get out what you put in. It does ask for a reasonably accurate perception of treble though. Reverb, on the other hand, is not quite as meticulous (unless you're picky, but I consider that a good thing), but it is fairly complex to model the acoustics of a real(istic) room. With reverb, you might consider the following questions: What is the size of the room? Large, small, or medium? How does the sound disperse? Narrowly or widely or somewhere in between? (Width) How much do the sound reflections blur together due to early reflections? (Density, Diffusion) How long does it take for the reverberation to reach its maximum amount (Attack)? How far away is the object of interest from a back wall (Predelay time)? What is covering the object or blocking the object? (Amount of high frequency attenuation) How long does the sound take to dissipate as it begins to decay (lose 'power') towards silence? (Decay time) What frequency range is being reverberated? (Low Cut, High Cut, Damping with Low/Mid/High Ratios) What is the Dry/Wet mix? (this is more of a digital consideration, not really a simulation of a real room, which has a set 'mix') The good thing is, you can make presets for what you have already done with this and keep reusing them for similar situations with a few tweaks here and there.

I never said I prefer retaining the original vibe, assuming you see it as including atmosphere and rhythm as some possible aspects of "vibe". In fact, I said that I prefer interesting personalization. I also didn't say that the purpose is specifically to retain the vibe of the original; I just said that it should be close enough to tell that it's a remix of the VGM in the first place. All it needs to be is recognizable, and that does not imply having the same vibe. You can surely have the same melody but change the harmonies, structure, melodic contour (to a certain extent), etc.; it's what you just said. I definitely said interpretation and keeping the recognizability of the original is a balancing act. The core of what I said earlier was: You have to start somewhere, and you might start with original content, maybe you might start with a conservative take and build on that, etc.; generally the reference (or at least my reference) is the source as it is verbatim, and you go out from there along a spectrum of interpretation/personalization, until you get to a point where it's just about right where you want it, and it just so happens to also fit nicely for OCR too. Or, when the judges evaluate something, they tend to start at the source tune as the reference and go out from there to find where the interpretation stops, and they think, "is this enough for OCR?" and/or "what makes this stand out from the original?". They might do the reverse direction of that (remix -> source), but whatever works for them. So no, I don't disagree with you. In fact, I do agree with you.

I've actually thought about this before; when will someone's ideas run out? Since music is an art that has an openness to it, there shouldn't be limitations on what you "ought" to do, because once you begin to write something under certain "rules", you limit what original material you can come up with that falls into your boundaries. There generally are previous references to consider, but they aren't necessary to consider in an "A/B" way. The advice I've found from zircon essentially says that if you go with the flow and write what is on your mind, and you develop that skill, it'll be much longer before you run out of ideas. Like zircon, I don't always end up writing precisely what I envision, but it still usually turns out the way I want it, even if it doesn't match my original vision. ...And other times it really does turn out exactly like I want it, in which case I get really excited about it and polish it beyond belief (that we call inspiration!). So basically, even if what you write was already previously written, just see how you can change it up. Plenty of ways to differentiate; just gotta figure out how you want to do it.

Well sure, but then I just differentiate it by changing the melodic contour, harmonies, structure, etc. PERSONALIZATION IS ALL THE RAGE, BRO.

One of the focuses of evaluating an OC ReMix candidate is on a nice balance between enough interpretation to make it your own and being close enough to the original that it still sounds like the original. It's not so much "how different is it"; rather, it's more like, "how well does this differentiate". Nostalvania's remix, though seemingly very liberal, actually retains the melody (and the bass line, too) but indeed changes the harmonies. However, it's still quite recognizable because the core motifs shine through, and in being recognizable but still adapted to cohesive new harmonies, it imparts plenty of creativity in it and so the personalization is more evident and the conveyed effort put into it is more evident. In your case, it just so happens that when it sounds too close to the original, it just doesn't convey as much effort (even if you believe you put in the effort, what is conveyed will not be quite the same as you intended) since the original has already been written. If it's close to verbatim, as Gario stated, it doesn't take anything more than transcribing it to different instruments to fit your new context, and that shows less of your capabilities than if you reformulated the source tune's structure, harmonies, melodic contour, or other aspects. In other words, writing a really conservative remix is "too easy". --- I honestly prefer the higher level of personalization because that tends to emotionally click more for me. Incorporating your own ideas to spice up a mix shows that you were having fun in writing it, and not just writing something for the sake of making a souped-up version of the original. For some other people, it really is about sticking to the vibe of the original, and they may refuse to take it any other way (for example, a ballad tune turned into an aggressive dubstep remix). Specifically, OCR is still in part about retaining the recognizability of the original, but the idea of elevating the VGM is more emphasized.

Generally, you should ask the project director if he or she is OK with you posting the album WIP in the Workshop.

It's all set!

I usually like something about 3~5 minutes long with creative interpretation (I mostly love great reharmonizations and structural creativity), good-enough production, and I don't mind whether the vibe is similar or completely different from the original as long as it makes me smile on the personalization. Cohesive and inventive sound design is a plus. Sometimes if it's really good I'm willing to listen to up to a 10-minute remix.

I could make up one mixing practice set of stems sometime later. I'll have it cover mixing bass and midrange, mostly, in a clean stereo field (mixing treble rigorously is kind of a "do I really need to go that far" type of deal in my opinion). I'm making a new one because I want it to be simple, no overarching context that comes with mixing a full song. https://app.box.com/s/x0y3aq91ntrkcyyu2bn4x0hhkxnpdpkk - Mixing Practice Set

I would suggest the closet more than the bathroom. Bathroom tiles (or otherwise hard, non-absorbent surfaces in the bathroom) reflect quite a bit of sound, creating a fairly high amount of early reflections that blur together, so you sound a little louder than usual, and seem a little less pitchy, but quite reverbed. Something I would look out for is the amplified resonances. You might have to EQ more in the midrange to adjust for that. Also, I found this weird website talking about this. https://sciencemia.wordpress.com/2011/09/21/why-does-my-singing-sound-better-in-the-shower/

Hm, I wonder if you could try replacing the dulcimer with a santoor if you have one, or cutting the low end of the dulcimer; it seems to stick out when it seems like it could fit more in the soundscape. I also think at 3:45, you could try some reverse delay work (psychedelay?) on a bell sound (how about "Tibetan Sforzando" from Omnisphere?). Maybe some more airiness to the reverb on the bells throughout could make this more immersive too.

No problem, me too.

That's true, he should get some good speakers too if he can afford it, but I don't want to suggest the one brand that I would say has the flattest frequency response (Yamaha HS80M) since it's pretty expensive. I don't mix on exclusively headphones either.

Had a good inspiring night last night. Got through the drum solo and a middle low-ish energy section. The 3o3 arp is a little different, and a pad was added to 0:55 - 1:20. Tempo's now 148 instead of 152. I'm thinking of refining the drums some more later to match the energy of the sections. I'm probably going to also double the length of 2:12 - 2:26 and put 2:19 - 2:26 at the last fourth of that. https://app.box.com/s/qhf80ytlegmdnafhp2zzet8283o660vw - V2

I think that's a good idea; I mix as I go as well, so I can get a context for what I'm wanting to put in. That way I have a better idea of what doesn't fit just because of EQ issues and what doesn't fit because it is completely awkward.

Not bad actually. It didn't really feel complextro until near the end of the WIP, but it's getting there. The biggest issue I'm noticing is the resonance in the midrange at 0:00 - 1:20. Also, the snare sample could use a bit more brightness above 16000 Hz. Maybe a different sample could be fuller. The arrangement is bit strange too. It just seems all over the place. You don't have your genres mixed up, but you did mix your genres up (and over and sideways). Also, hola, Harmonious PWM for Zebra2