Swifthom

Many, many years ago I used to join in writing competitions at the Terry Brooks website forum... Terry Brooks being a fantasy writer who'se been publishing since the 70s, his website was operated by a would-be author Shawn Speakman on Terry's behalf, they had a fairly good community for encouraging would be writers and discussing the craft and their opinions of other authors. Though I stopped posting there regularly about 5 years ago I occasionally glance in and it still seems to be going So, not just a shout out to that 'particular' writer but if you find an author YOU like in the genre you want they may, just may, have a forum and a community of fans who can help you out. OR perhaps I should set something up at Distant Spires for other would be authors like me... If there's an interest out there The thing is, people who write are much MUCH worse than musicians about this; they only care about their own stuff. You can listen to a piece of music and give feedback fairly easily, so music communites swell as people applaud each other's work and creativity flourishes. Without a LOT of effort from the organisers writing communities tend to stagnate... 90% of the writers forums i've checked in on feature a tonne of people just dumping their latest creation, waiting a few days, then complaining that nobody has read it and given feedback. Cheifly because the act of reading something more than a thousand words, digesting it and giving feedback is actually fairly difficult and time consuming (unless it's litered with spelling mistakes / no paragraphs / no full stops or commas at all, in which case it's easy )

Thanks everyone who's suggested things; self promotion is not a bad thing in this case and MUCH appreciated. The more range I can cover the better... It was the FF12 song that made me decide to ask if anyone else had any suggestions. You've pointed out some songs i'd never heard before which are fantastic and i'm sure my mum will appreciate them as well. Thanks

My mum's ill. She's been spending a lot of time lately in and out of hospital, getting tests done and being presented with some very unfortunate surgery options. The medication she's on had knocked her out most of the time and a side effect is a buzzing in her ear that keeps her up at night so she gets no sleep. She has a few 'ambient music' cds in the house and they seem to help. The other day I travelled down to visit her and she asked me to put some music on whilst she rested in the back room. I thought i'd chance OCRemix's 'Threshold of a Dream' - it's a fantastic album and whilst not my personal taste, exactly the kind of thing that she wanted. It seems to have gone down really well. I liked the fact that, for once, she was listening to stuff I listen to; it gave us something to talk about afterwards. So firstly; thanks to everyone behind that album; you've made something truly beautiful that's helped someone in pain. She's asked me if I can get my hands on any more like it. I've downloaded a few from the OCRemix website and elsewhere and made a small playlist of things for her... but has anyone got any suggestions? Relaxing songs ONLY - no heavy rocking or striking beats, just good chillout songs to help her through the pain? Any suggestions?

I might have a whistling part i'd love you to do; album intro with the sound of seashore, a drum solo and a lone whistler? If your interested once the drums are recorded i'll get back in touch.

Really like it, nice to see a remix that highlight's the sheer etheral beauty of the original peace I've loved the work you've shown off so far. keep it up

Don't know if it's my speakers but there's an ambient fuzz from 4 - 29 seconds... Is that deliberate? Apart from that I still like it

Yeah, we still need a cover. And grandma would be awesome Thanks for the birthday message; had a good time. My attention between now and mid June is firmly fixed to the realease of Distant Spires; making final adjustment and waiting on a friend for final edits to his music... I'm going to have a trailer to share with everyone soon regards to that. The moment it is DONE i'll be back on this full time. Also; collab stats: Mangaman sent me the first verse lyrics wise; I suggested some edits and I haven't heard back from him.

*disclaimer: Massive generalisations within - I started typing and more came out than I expected * I did like them but they did my head in trying to work out whether the characters were simply brought forwards from the position they occupied a thousand years before or regressed to the same state... I.E. how aware were they that they were in the future? Not sure i'd say it was a 'step in the right direction' myself, because for me that implies I thought TP was a step in the wrong one and I enjoyed that game. I always just think that Zelda goes through the same motions as Final Fantasy. As in: "Oh crap, people complained about this aspect in the previous game, we must proove them one with the next one!" Case in point: FF8 - fairly linear story FF9 - less linear story FFX - very Linear (complaints about linearity) FFXII - Open world with very few constraints (complaints that it isn't structured enough) FFXIII - ULTRA LINEAR (more complaints FFXIII-2 - ULTRA NO DIRECTION AT ALL!!!! For gods sake, stop listening to you fanbase whining and just make the game you want to make. It just seems to me that every decision made is a reaction to how the previous game went down. Zelda does the same (but not as bad): OOT - EPIC STORY MM - Dark, twisted story (complaints from people that it's not epic enough and too creepy) Wind Waker - bright, cheerful yet epic (complaints from people that it's childish) TP - dark, brooding, epic (complaints from people about it being a rehash of OOT and that Ganondorf pops up at end) SS - bright, cheerful, less cutscenes, no Ganondorf (although... )

It's got that Ice Cap quality... Catchy tune; fast, almost danceish, grabs people's attentions. The level itself was fairly good if I remember rightly; it's been a few years. There are a 1001 remixes on youtube of people who have just changed the instruments, or added a drum kit, or sped it up further, or slowed it down, or whatever... A couple of them are good but... the majority Glad to say yours stands head over heals one of the best.

I always say that with sports... I.E. whenever England inevitably get knocked out of the world cup, the fact they were trounced by the tournament winners means there's far less shame in it. Somehow though this opinions never goes down very well at the pub All excellent mixes guys; I discovered OCREMIX through Project Chaos and my collection of excellent Sonic mixes has almost doubled in size. Also enjoying the love for Chaos Angel; on youtube it's one of THE most remixed songs out there, yet very rarely done with great quality.

I've decided to postpone this WIP until 1st of July (it was 1st June) for 2 reasons: 1) A couple of people have asked me for more time 2) I promised some people vocal samples that I recorded the other weekend and I've not got them out yet and 3) I'm knee deep right now in preparing for my own project, the website Distant Spires, which will be releasing its first project 'Monsters' this June. Until that is sucesfully through the door I'm not going to have the time required to dedicate 100% to this, especially as I'm also hitting a load of deadlines at work at the same time. So, people, remember! Next deadline 1st July. And people waiting on me for one reason or another, I promise I will sort myself out soon. Sorry

Okay, sorry to hear that. The latest WIP I did see though was cool; much more expanded than the previous version Quick update for anyone listening: We currently have 11 songs with solid WIPS! The next deadline will be 1st July 2012! There are a few people i've let off from sending WIPS in as they've been busy but I will have to ask them to get something to me by the end of July or release the track back to the public Also if there's anyone out there who wants a track It looks like Princess Zelda's theme probably wont be happening now; so that's free again. Also Grandma, Forsaken Fortress, ALL OF THE BOSS THEMES and, SHOCK HORROR DRAGON ROOST ISLAND are unclaimed. seriously; thats possibly the most popular song in the game... although perhaps the quality of the remixes already out there might make it daunting to do something completely different. Proove theme wrong

Interesting... I do tend to approach it as a sequential journey - 'and onto the next note' tends to be my mindset ninty per cent of the time...

What I'm bad at: Lead instruments and melodies... I can arrange notes but getting my lead instrument to sound 1) good and 2) soulfull is just beyond me. I'm a percussionist, I like noises... I get chords - their just an advancement of the rhythm, but actual melody... Bah What I'm good at: Cooking myself the kind of feel good meal that makes it all better

You can download several Legend of Zelda fonts from this site: http://www.zeldalegends.net/index.php?n=fonts Ooh, it's sweet. I like it ; but your right, it isn't album cover art material. I have been toying with the idea of creating a pdf file that goes through the album from start to finish. IF (and it's a big if but IF) we meet OCR standards I need to have a list of all the lyrics to hand anyway and I thought making something akin to an album booklet would be a good idea. And if we went down that route it would mean a lot of small pictures from various points in the game We'll see. That's the king of thing I really need to be thinking about in six months time AFTER the music is ready. I spent about three hours today putting an automated drum track on one song, went away, had a drink, came back and just deleted it all because it was awful . I don't get on with drum programming at all... I'd rather just sit on the kit and play it myself. Only that really restricts the type of noises I can make. Good for the acoustic feel but not much else... And something for Grandma? I'm intruiged... And lyrics for the staff credits song: yes please, really want to get moving on that because it's a brilliant idea.

Update! The first finished WIP is on it's way. Recruiting Artists As well as musicians, does anyone skilled in the visual arts fancy getting involved? The artwork below was something I knocked up in half an hour to drum up interest in the project. If you think you can do better send me a PM and get in touch; i'm not looking for cover art for the album and some incidental art as well. It's only a rough sketch not a working product. If there's anyone out there with an artistic bent who could offer their services get in touch and let me know what you can do. We could do with some original pictures of scenes from the game as well as cover art so even if it's not front material we could still use you.

You did it in AUDACITY! Amazing... I started out with only audacity and a midi composer when I started, and found very quickly although it's good for recording and quick arranging jobs, getting a good sound from the program is nigh on impossible. But you've somehow managed it... I'm impressed

Voice exercises are good, but nothing compared to the character... It's not just a case of working out the voice you want to use, you have to stick with it. Going to use your own voice? Fine, but be aware of what you can and can't get out of it. There's nothing worse than someone adopting an accent, then having that accent go wandering as soon as they get into serious conversation.

Absolutely brilliant... I suck at coming up with lyrics, but this sounds almost as though the song was originally designed to fit around them. Great summertime song, but makes me even more depressed that it's only April

Sorry to drag this topic back up again but I want to let everyone know that Kyle has very kindly agreed to host project discussions at the KNGI board. http://kngi.org/phpbb3/ So yeah, set up an account, let me know about it, and i'll see you all there. And for anyone who wants to know, tracks are still available! Check out my intro post and get in touch - we want remixers, experienced or not, i'd love to hear your take on the Wind Waker.

Tingle gets a part???? If you want someone who can't sing AT ALL i volunteer with no reservations. I can send you MANY samples of my voice (speaking, not singing, but you'll get the idea) - I'm willing to have a go at proper singing but my voice just isn't cut out for it - but that MIGHT suit Tingle down to the ground depending on how far you want to take the joke... I've kept an eager eye on this project but with no skill at operatic music or lyric writing or singing it wasn't for me. However, TINGLE!!! TINGLE!!!!

Guys, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but just one quick question: Is this you? http://www.zeldainformer.com/2012/03/the-legend-of-zelda-majoras-mask---the-opera.html

Just to let you know On the Breath of the Wind has gone from seeking interest to actively recruiting - I've reached enough WIPs to be satisfied there WILL definitely be an album of some shape or form...

I missed out on tickets to the London event in November... Sold out FAR too quickly, damn them.