michinoku

Hey folks - wanted to share an arrangement of a great tune from Secret of Mana. There are three tracks of accordion and one track of beatboxing, and each has individual EQing, reverb, and in some cases compression. I probably won't revisit this specific tune again, but any feedback folks may have on the recording, mixing or arrangement would be welcome - I'm planning on doing a few more of these overdubbed covers soon... Video Here: https://youtu.be/_mAae4-O5pw Hi-Q Audio here: https://anhistoricmusic.bandcamp.com/track/a-bell-is-tolling-from-secret-of-mana

I for one am not hearing any dissonance except with the pitch bending, which I figure is on purpose. This is cool though - the Super Mario Land OST has some real gems on it and it's nice to see it get some recognition.

I like the overall remix - IMO the drums and the low sawtooth-y synth are a little high in the mix, kind of overpower the melody synth in the first section. But I think this would be awesome with one or two level adjustments.

Nice - the tunes complement each other nicely and the transition is virtually seamless.

This is nice - it offers kind of a different perspective on the rhythmic interplay in the original just based a bit on on the accents. It's a neat choice, and indicates some of the depth of the original too.

this is great! Ditto others' comments about the bass and mix compression - to my ear, the bass doesn't sound present enough in the mix, but maybe making it louder would make you want to tweak the bass part sound just a bit. But it's a really solid adaptation, nice flow. Is there organ around the 1:45 mark and building, or is it just the piano resonance? There's a prominent sustained sound that seems to build until about 2:40~ and it's cool, but gives the impression there's another instrument buried in the mix, which I don't hear elsewhere...

This is quite nice - I like that it doesn't stay heavily in time - it has the kind of rubato push/pull of a good romantic sounding piano work, but also some more contemporary comping/mixed meter stuff when there is a set tempo. Maybe now that you've sketched it out, you can sort of lay a map out for yourself with some hints of what your approach (dynamics, attack, etc.) would be to help guide a future recording? I don't think the playing is necessarily sloppy in a lot of places, it just sounds a little tentative.

I mentioned this in the other thread. All sounds created by piano accordion (7 overdubs on this track). Definitely going to return to this mix soon. https://soundcloud.com/doctorcaterwauls/an-historic-battle-chrono

Been a long time since i posted something, but I put this together today and would appreciate some feedback on it. I'm listing it as a cover because despite all the sounds being produced by accordion (6 overdubs total) the arrangement is based pretty closely off of the OST version. An Historic is the alias I use for my songwriting efforts, which are usually based around accordion. I recorded the Battle theme as well today (will be on a separate thread) and hope to do more from the Chrono soundtracks at some point. Mix is rough and will probably be revisited at a later date. https://soundcloud.com/doctorcaterwauls/an-historic-guardia-castle

Hey all, I wanted to share the first track of my latest release, called "A Good Idea At The Time" Piano and vocals overdubbed with some minor production. http://gzarapanecko.bandcamp.com/track/a-good-idea-at-the-time this is the latest release of my songwriting project "An Historic. It is a split release called "Cutoff" with Canadian artist Cud Eastbound, and each of us contributed 5 tracks. This is more conventional stuff than the G. Zarapanecko project I have shared on this same forum, but I think it is the best sounding recording of this project I have produced so far. All songs are about various scenarios in which the end of the world occurs. usually this project is based around accordion which is my main instrument, but these tracks ended up being mostly written on the piano with some other harmonies and layers filled out by voice and accordion. stream or download (name your price) the whole thing here: http://gzarapanecko.bandcamp.com/album/cutoff-split cheers!

just a bump. If still no interest I'll just get to work on my own.

I was looking through the site and saw only a few Silent Hill-based remixes - so I posted this to sort of feel out the interest for such a project - I have one or two ideas up my sleeve but neither that I have begun work on yet. The vague idea I have for a theme is some kind of jazzy set of reinterpretations, using jazz in the very loosest sense of the word (including free jazz, electronic-jazz and dark-jazz as well as more traditional styles) to allow for a maximum combination of atmosphere/ambiance/spookiness and the slow but propulsive movement of Yamaoka's melodic writing. (Anybody else see some similarities between the Twin Peaks soundtrack and some of the Silent Hill soundtracks?) Forgive me if I'm posting this at the wrong forum but since I'm not announcing my intention to start a project (yet!) I figured this was the place to post this. If other people have interest maybe I will consider trying to make a proper project.

I'm not sure if I have the patience to work on this one again for a bit (also have several other things on my plate at the moment composition-wise that are taking up more of my attention). But I will definitely take the mix suggestion into advisement when I do. Still learning a bit about mixing and any such suggestions are helpful especially since I use a practice amp as a monitor at current. Did want to mention, too, that for better or for worse, that is a live clarinet and bass clarinet in the background. Ended up swamping them in filters after all was said and done but underneath all that is some actual reed playing.

http://soundcloud.com/gzarapanecko/gzarasotf This mix is called the "18" mix in reference to Steve Reich's "Music for 18 Musicians," and its relatively consistent clarinet and bass clarinet pulsed harmonies in amongst an evolving backdrop of percussive harmonies(piano, marimba, xylophone) Some of the best cues from this game are the simplest, and working on the A and B section was a lot of fun. And returning to the A section at the end was a fun chance to try some gamelan-like poly-rhythmic improvisation utilizing treated harpsichord and celeste sounds. The second-to-last bit, trying to do some woodwind quintet stuff, despite all my best efforts, seems like a problem with the orchestral samples in Logic Studio, which do not respond well to minute velocity edits. Not sure if anything really can be done about this at this point, short of purchasing a new sample library which wouldn't be really feasible. I was committed to having a syncopated woodwind sound there and couldn't figure out anything with enough of the same character to replace it with that might tighten up that sound. So for now, I've called it done/quits.

I would definitely be interested in revisiting some of the Chrono cross music. I spent a long time dissecting that music (having purchased the soundtrack at a local anime shop when I was growing up) and it certainly had an influence as well - not as much certainly as Chrono Trigger but I spent a LONG time on that game and the music really did sink in. If it were to be Chrono Cross focused, the project could go in many, many directions. That would be up to the project creator, for sure. If it were to include Chrono Trigger music or Radical Dreamers music I think it would have to have a specific focus, either by musical genre or by some connecting thread in the plots in order to justify getting people who have doing remixes for awhile to come back to these really obvious choices.

Yesterday the hip-hop group Death Grips released the stems for the Ex-Military mix tape. I immediately sank my teeth into a remix. Not sure if this is done yet but I have serious aural fatigue and needed a break. http://soundcloud.com/gzarapanecko/death-grips-beware-aetheric and check out the original mix tape or get the stems yourself at http://thirdworlds.net

-there is some clipping in the track that is really distracting. It could be some intentional filtering or what have you but to me it makes it so that the drums are too over powering when they are going, and that the rest of the track feels too quiet. - the lush string harmonies are nice, but they get repetitive after a bit. maybe consider throwing in another texture for the lead melody at points? -There are certain ill-timed breaks in the drums that make it sound as though the piece is losing tempo. Some of the string sounds are quite nice especially with some of the tremolo, and the slightly jazzier harmonies are a nice addition.

well, thanks for commenting. I was very much inspired by the spirit of the original which is quite minimal. Definitely learned a lot from the process of working on this one, both about myself as an arranger/composer but also about Logic Studio, the software I was using (and still use.) I have another mix (yes, of yet another highly beloved Chrono Trigger OST tune so I am prepared for the worst!) which I hope to post in about a week or so.

Thanks for the feedback. I was really shooting for a wall-of-sound type of production with this piece and this album, and it unfortunately really obscures the accordion line which independently is one of my favorite chord progressions, being so unstable and so rarely resolving. So the density of sound was intentional but definitely works better in some places on this album than on others. And having a feeling of two rhythms occurring simultaneously is something I've explored and paid a lot of attention to in modern classical music. I figured it would be something that would translate well to electronic music but getting the mix to balance and emphasize the right beat at the right time has proved to be difficult for me.

Hey, I'm new to this forum so I don't want to post too much of my stuff all at once. I've chosen to post this track because while I am reasonably satisfied with the recording, I want to retake the harmonic structure of this tune in a different style, with a little bit less sound density, for a future album of the G. Zarapanecko project. I was hoping to get some feedback from it because while I consider it successful to an extent it is not one of my favorite tracks from this project. I want to see if I can recover it or cannibalize it to an extent. It is inspired by the minimalist compositions of Arvo Pärt. All sounds are: Accordion, synth percussion, processing. http://gzarapanecko.bandcamp.com/track/gnostic-registral

I know, I'm only the billionth person to cover a song from Chrono Trigger, and mostly just finished this project a few months ago because it was a rainy-day thing that I worked on VERY sporadically over the last little while. It's a pretty faithful interpretation except that it's in 4 and not 3, and there's a bit of an improvisation before returning back to the A-section at the end. Check it out here, and comments welcome. http://soundcloud.com/gzarapanecko/the-brink-ov-time

hello, I'm michinoku - I just joined as I have only recently finished any VGM-related music projects, although I have been composing and recording music for nearly 6 years. There are several bands and projects I'm involved in ranging from songwriter-style stuff to more formal new music/classical compositions to ambient/electronic inspired stuff. I am gigging a fair amount with various of these projects but as I don't make my primary income from music I'm able to be picky about the projects I get involved with, and do things for the love from time to time. I sing, play keyboards, accordion, and clarinets and mess around alot with various synths and miscellaneous instruments. I also utilize Logic Studio for sound production and manipulation as well as as a platform for recording. Many of my VGM-related material is done under the name of my ambient/electro-acoustic project G. Zarapanecko. I feel like I owe a lot of my current interest in music to video game soundtracks, especially those of RPGs. Spending hours with that music running in the background really allowed it to sync in and for me to notice the details of what made it work - AND also gave me a good awareness of what NOT to do in these contexts as a composer and as an arranger/remixer. I listen to a lot of "extreme" metal (black/doom/avantgarde), a lot of experimental classical music (especially chamber music but also orchestral) and a lot of new jazz-oriented creative music. I could also listen to Dark Ambient and Dark-Jazz all day if necessary. I have spent a lot of time exploring prog and industrial music too. Happy to be a part of this thing!