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MindWanderer

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    Reaper

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  1. It's very difficult to write tunes that are strictly chiptunes while making them complex and engaging enough to be listened to as standalone music. Unfortunately, sticking to a fixed sound palette does make a track sound repetitive, even if there's no actual copy-pasting going on. I do notice the subtle variations between the loops in this remix, but they're quite subtle. 1:08 sounds too much like a return to 0:11. The fade-out ending adds to the feeling of repetition. It sounds to me like you're not sticking to an authentic GB sound anyway—to me, the reverb sounds richer than what the GB could produce, and it feels like too many layers—so you might as well go the extra mile and use more tools than what it had. Change up the synths, strengthen the kicks. It's a good start, though. NO
  2. I have to agree. This is an absolute wall of sound, and not in a good "fills up the soundscape" way. By the halfway point, there's just so much going on that nothing can breathe. There are so many parts that you can just barely hear peeking out every once in a while. It's so busy that I didn't even hear the Green Hill section until my second listen, because most of the accompanying parts are kind of static: the arp, the choir, the drums, and several instruments that function as a pad are on a near-loop for minutes at a time. It also sounds like it was reverse-balanced: the beginning, when there are few parts, is quiet and sounds crushed even though nothing is crushing it, and there's a thin layer of white noise. So, same take-home message as proph: Lots of good idea, but you can't hear like 80% of it. If you don't cut parts entirely, let them take turns so we can appreciate them clearly. Then there will be some production work to do, but the lion's share of the work is just giving the composition the space it needs to be audible. NO
  3. Brad's right on all counts, of course. This just isn't the type of creation we're looking for. I have nothing to add. NO
  4. I'm immediately struck by how much of a better soundscape this is than the previous version, as far as I remember it. Reverb on the pads and chimes is a little over the top, but the percussion is still pretty dry. The snares are a little dry, but the toms are very, very dry and sound out of place. The saw lead that starts at 1:09 is also much drier than the rest of the soundscape. The bass is a hair dry, but it didn't bother me until repetition started becoming a problem. Speaking of which, it's still pretty repetitive. Everything up to 1:10 takes strictly an additive approach, each couple of loops adding an instrument or a few notes. The percussion loop is "complete" at 0:40 and repeats until 2:15. The main hook, which first plays at 0:34, plays an awfully large number of times total, and I personally got very tired of it. at 3:39 it returns to the same concept as the beginning, which is fine conceptually as a bookend, except it doesn't really expand on the theme and goes on for another full minute. There's no climax or anything, it just winds down the same way it built up. Overall, kudos on the substantial improvement, but the same core issues remain: Reverb on the instruments is inconsistent, making them sound like they're not in the same space, with the chimes and pads at opposite extremes; and the overall arrangement is too repetitive, with insufficient variation to retain the listener's interest. I encourage you to keep working at it, though, as this was a massive leap forward. NO
  5. I try to be open-minded about Hudak pieces, but I was reminded in another vote that we need to be careful to judge all submissions on their own merits, not taking the artist under consideration. In that light, the mono-left section is a dealbreaker, but it's not the only thing that concerns me here. If you're going to use a retro FM synth palette, you need to be firing on all cylinders to create something either novel or period-appropriate, and I feel like this falls short. It's promising up through 0:41, but then it starts to ramble, with leads and harmonies that don't match up, and leads that are sometimes buried. 2:05 and onward has this problem as well, with leads and accompaniment that often don't play well together. The breakdown at 1:09-1:30 doesn't work for me, either. It's lengthy, minimal, bland, and doesn't seem to serve a structural purpose. There are a lot of really cool ideas here, as I expect from Michael. The general idea, of an energetic synthwave take on these sources, is sound. When everything is firing on all its '80s-inspired cylinders, it sounds great. When it gets noodly or experimental, it sounds less great. I don't think the creative structure was an experiment that worked well; even if that mono section were shifted to center, I think Brad's and Larry's criticisms about energy and pacing were dead on, and I'm not sure if the dissonance I'm hearing is a result of "detuning" or just mismatched part-writing. I'd want both of those matters to be addressed if we see a revision of this back on the panel. NO
  6. I'm afraid I have to agree with proph. This is a very long burn: it's nearly 2 minutes of intro, 3 minutes of a static loop, and a minute of wind down. The synths are bland and quiet, and the overall sound is flat. I don't really have anything to add that Brad didn't already say, so just read his critique and take it to heart. NO
  7. I see exactly how you were inspired to make this. I could easily imagine the OoT theme interleaved within See You At the Top exactly the way you did it. I came to the same conclusion as proph within the first 30 seconds. The Short Hike saw is loud and thick and overpowers the entire soundscape, and the kick causes the whole thing to pump. As a secondary concern, this is quite short. Other than the obvious inspiration of interleaving the two sources together, it doesn't really do much. It feels more like a proof-of-concept than a full song. See You At the Top is a long, complex tune, and you only made use of the intro. That's not to say we have any rule against using only part of a source, but it's unusual to take a source that has this much to it and use it to make something simple and just over 2 minutes long. You have a lot more to draw on here to flesh your arrangement out, and I think you could make a more interesting, engaging remix if you did that. But the important factor is the lack of clarity and balance. Take a look at that first and foremost. NO
  8. Okay, I'm not going to listen to an entire hour-plus-long OST to review one track. This also opens with an 81-second rendition of the main TMNT theme song, which is originally from the cartoon. Our guidelines say the following: The music must have been composed specifically for the game or first published (or recognized) as the game's soundtrack. Movie themes such as Star Wars or licensed songs from games like Gran Turismo do not qualify. Any incorporation or arrangement of source material not from games (mainstream, classical, etc.) should be extremely limited. So that's immediately disqualifying right there. As for the production and arrangement, proph hit all the relevant notes. It's a thin, treble-heavy soundscape, and the arrangement is an overly-conservative medley with no connective tissue. proph gave plenty of good advice, so please take it to heart. NO
  9. I know this source like the back of my hand, so the fact that I didn't pick up on the melody until 20 seconds in means that the mixing really could be improved. The bass, drums, and chugs just stomp all over it. I understand that the melody line is often not the loudest part in heavy metal, but it still shouldn't be quite this hard to pick out. The subtractive stuff really is quite neat. Too hard to hear, but it's riffing on the melody in a creative way that I don't hear often enough. It just skirts that line between "uses the source" and "is inspired by the source." It's tough to judge vis-a-vis our standards. Here are my timestamps: 0:03-0:32 (direct) 0:48-1:13 (subtractive) 1:42-2:03 (half direct, half subtractive) 2:03-2:08 (direct) 2:35-2:38 (direct) Total: 81/180 seconds = 45% Ugh. Even giving generous credit, I can't come up with 50%, and I think some of our stricter timestamper judges would come up with even less. It's a real shame, because other than the mixing, I like what I'm hearing a lot. I absolutely want to see some of those ideas on the panel again, whether it's a revision of this or something new, but this submission has to be a NO
  10. Far too quiet, right off the bat. Even maxing out my player volume, about a 50% increase in my usual volume, it's too quiet to hear clearly. From what I can hear, there are quite a few issues, but proph covered them pretty well. The soundscape is minimal, the layers aren't in the same key, and the arrangement is underdeveloped. I hate to be harsh, but I think spending some time in our workshop areas would be helpful to you. NO
  11. I'm afraid I have to agree. The drums vary in intensity but never in pattern, and the second half is pretty similar in structure to the first, so it feels longer and more repetitive than it really is. I don't think the production is all that muddy, but it is loud, and the brass slips into the uncanny valley at times. Also the female vocals sound really strained on the high notes (0:26 and 0:47, for instance). I'm not totally on board with the moog-like synth used, either; it's really out of place in an otherwise quasi-medieval orchestral piece. Lots of great ideas and a good foundation here, just needs some tweaks to get it over the finish line. NO
  12. I have to co-sign on all the above. I didn't look at this in a frequency graph, but the production lacks clarity in a big way. It's all mids and highs, and the mids are muddy. Nearly everything is fighting for a very narrow bandwidth. Proph is right about the loudness, too; the example of the solo organ hitting the limiter just as much as when the whole ensemble is playing is a striking one. The waveform isn't even a normal sausage, it's like... a linguica? Mostly one long tube. It's a fun arrangement, great performances, but needs a lot of work in the levels and and EQ departments. proph told you what to do, so please go do it. NO (resubmit)
  13. Co-signing on the above. The drums are better but still mushy, and the performances are not where they need to be (0:59 is a notable flub that wasn't mentioned above). The arrangement is still on the plodding and conservative side, but I did enjoy the bridge in 1:46-2:09. I'd probably vote in favor, though with hesitation, if we got this arrangement but the production and performances were perfect. But they're not. NO
  14. Took me a while to find the problem, because the part of Sun of Nothing that's referenced doesn't start until 7:50 in that song. I'm actually borderline on the Strauss; it's very obviously derived from Also sprach Zarathustra, but there are differences. They're not major differences, but they are differences. If I had to make a judgment call about it, I'd be waffling a lot. Fortunately I don't have to, because the Sun of Nothing reference is much longer and closer to the original, as well as more complex. I don't like rejecting this, and it's a real shame that we have to. NO
  15. Yep, this is, unfortunately, not what we're looking for. Any of the issues of how close it hews to the original, how quiet and un-produced it is, the vanilla sound design with little complexity and virtually no percussion, and how it consists of two loops of the same thing, would be cause for rejection. NO
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