MindWanderer

I agree that the orchestra is pretty clearly synthetic given the central role it plays here, but I think it's well above where our standards should be for an arrangement like this. Likewise, I think most of the vanilla synths are perfectly appropriate, although the drums do get a little grating in places (notably 1:04-1:53 and 2:56-3:44). As Gario said, there's room for improvement, but I don't come down as borderline on this one at all. Very nice work overall. YES

Yeah, I have a pair of Sennheisers for home use, but they're pretty hefty, and they provide too much sound isolation for me to use at work. That was one thing in the Amazon reviews for the HD 497's that's keeping me from figuring out what their present-day equivalent is. (Folks also mentioned that they pinch, which is a problem I have with a lot of headphones.) The Sennheiser HD 2.20s seem to have the form factor I want, but they're the successor to the HD219S, which, according to graphs.headphone.com, are really bass-heavy. Anyone have experience with those or anything like them?

Production and instrumentation are top-notch, as expected, but I'm not sold on the structure, myself. More than half of it (up to 1:56) is build-up, and then 1:56-3:08 is additive repetition of a very simple hook. All that suspense leading into a section that's so repetitive was pretty disappointing. Still, the strengths of this are way up there. I wish the main section had more in it to hold the listener's interest, both in variety and length (compared to the build-up), but I don't think it's worth sending this back over. YES

Per the rules, you both won. Simon got the "bad ending." Which is why Dracula is back again so soon!

I'm listening to music or something pretty much all day at work, and I need to be aware of what's going on around me, so I need headphones that don't shut out the world and are lightweight and comfortable enough to wear for many hours at a time. Right now I use the simple and cheap Panasonic RP-HT21's, which meet my comfort and openness requirements, but the sound is distinctly on the tinny side. I often switch to other headphones that aren't so comfortable when I'm judging, but I can't wear them all day. I'm not remixing with these, so they don't need to be high-end, but a more flat frequency response would be nice to have. Any suggestions?

It's a bizarre mix of genres, but I can't say there's anything in there that doesn't work. The melody gets a little repetitive (especially the main hook with the triplets, which is lengthy and repeats 6 times), but it's a short source, and the remix does take it in different directions. Production is on point, as expected. I don't have any significant concerns; it'll be a great addition to the album. YES

We can do two-week remixing periods. I got the impression last time that most people just procrastinated the first week away, but I'll go ahead and make the change. I've also edited the minimum signup--we certainly won't get 5 teams at this rate. Might just drop the team format instead if there are even fewer signups than that. Remixing With the Stars was a tough sell at the time, and compo signups have dropped off even further since I was running that. I don't think I'd be able to get enough experienced remixers to get it going at this point.

I can't disagree with anything Gario said. Nice retro synth approach, with a rich soundscape and a constant but creative evolution of sounds and some nice tweaks to the source melodies. Definitely mixed oddly in places, such as 2:53-3:08 where the snare is too loud and the lead too quiet, but it's nothing egregious. A solid arrangement overall. YES

The sound design is classic, true, but I got more an 80's synth vibe here, feeling a Eurythmics influence. I don't have an issue with that. The crowding is more of an issue to my mind. 2:12-2:39 and 4:05-5:15 in particular get a lot buried in the mid range, and 3:09-3:36 and 4:48-5:15 get fatiguing due to the highs being overloaded. I too think this is borderline, and frankly I'd love to see this cleaned up and sent back. There's a lot of really clever accompaniment going on that's barely audible, and I want to be able to appreciate it! The climax in particular is such a cluttered mess that it's really hard to appreciate. Ultimately I think enough of this works that I think we can post it--but my own best-case scenario would be if we could get a version with less conflict. YES (borderline)

I started off pretty dubious, with the thin soundscape and the slightly altered rhythm, but the SFX kicked it into gear for me. Which is odd, because I'm usually not a fan, but they really added to the arrangement this time. I'm definitely feeling Gario's crits about the arrangement taking too long to develop and being overcrowded. It spent far too long on the main hook for my tastes, especially since it revisits it later on; I could have done with about one less loop per added element. And then what would ordinarily be the main melody from 1:08-1:35 is almost inaudible; if I weren't already familiar with that melody, I'd be having a hard time making half of it out at all. Even as it is, there are a couple of creative riffs where I can't really hear what's been done with them. There's far too much conflict in the frequency range where the the melody hangs out: the hook, the snares, and even part of the bass synth overlap it and drown out a lot of it. I had less of a problem with the fake brass than I did with the fake choir, since the latter was much more exposed. It was also paired with perhaps the most generic "Whoop! Yeah!" effects imaginable. I like a lot of the ideas here--the creative instrumentation was more of a highlight than a detractor for me, and it's full of energy--but it does drag, and the main melodic section, which should be the strongest part of the arrangement, needs some EQ work at least to clean up the mid-high to high range so each of the instruments, the lead especially, can be heard clearly. NO (resubmit)

Other than the conservatism Gario rightfully pointed out, my big concern is how busy this gets in most of the flute-led sections: 0:23-0:45, 2:54-3:39, and 4:48-5:34 all suffer from this issue, where the pads and arps substantially bury the lead, and since that's the main melodic hook, it's a big deal. (It's a little quiet but acceptable in 1:20-1:42.) Gario's also right in that it does drag. I felt that the subtractive sections were paced well, and I really enjoyed the noodly marimba-synth and piano sections, but the pads never take a break or a change in direction, and the percussion is doing the same thing everywhere it appears. The third flute-led section also seems to be a copy-paste of the second, as well. I like the structure, the sound design, and the original writing a lot. But I think the balance in those main melodic sections is a critical issue that needs to be addressed, and some changes in the texture or pattern of the pads and percussion as the remix goes on would be extremely welcome. NO (resubmit)

Nice job doing a lot with a little. It's a beautifully rich soundscape, even if the reverb is a little over the top (sometimes the long tails do cause a little bit of muddiness and conflict). More importantly, it gets pretty repetitive. Melodically, I found that the amount of added accompaniment and variation with each iteration was enough to hold my interest. The percussion is very much on autopilot, though, and if this gets sent back, I recommend mixing it up a little. Also, that pad is present during the entire arrangement, and it gets pretty old--I know you're proud of its design, and it's very nice, but it's too much of a good thing. One other, minor complaint would be that the intro fades in very slowly, to the point that I thought it was going to stabilize at a very quiet level and turned my volume up, only to find that I then had it way too high. Might be OK as the first track on an album, but I don't think the effect is great in the middle of a tracklist or as a standalone piece. And then the ending fades out too slowly as well. For me this is just under the bar for the front page, though I think it's acceptable as part of an album. Mix up the percussion and the pads, clean up some of the conflict caused by the long reverb decay, and tighten up the fade-in and fade-out and I think this will be a winner. NO (resubmit)

Nice job doing a lot with a little. I love the groove here, it's a very cool approach. Does a lot in a short time; I think the short length is perfectly appropriate here. The one thing I think is really holding this back is the volume leveling. It's a little hard to parse because of the distracting ping-pong panning of the rain sticks (or whatever that percussive element is), which is a pet peeve of mine, but on top of that there seems to be some pumping, especially in the loud section from 1:16-1:50. It's especially odd that this is an issue because this is quite quiet overall, with over a dB of headroom. The swells in that section sound very artificial as well, and I thought I caught some off notes in there (another judge's ears on that would be appreciated). It also gets muddy, especially with the vocals and the brass conflicting with each other. Unfortunately, I really do find this hard to listen to because of those production issues. Clean that up, with a focus specifically on that loud section with the vocals, and I think this will be gold. I really enjoyed the arrangement and the rest of the production, so I really hope you'll do that and send it back our way. (And I'd personally love it if you removed the ping-pong panning, but other judges seem to tolerate that better than I do.) NO (resubmit)

I can't argue. It doesn't help that the most fake-sounding strings are the ones that the arrangement opens up with. Wham, artificial swells, right in your face. The choir stuff is a lot of fun, but those strings need another thorough pass and the flutes could use a touch-up as well. NO (resubmit)

Let me start off by saying that this is a really gorgeous, emotive arrangement. I love what's been done with the orchestration, and the flute and oboe work are indeed superb. That being said, the other instruments, notably the string and brass ensembles, weren't as great. The string swells were unvarying, and the brass was overall mechanical in execution. Also, this seemed source-light, so here's my stopwatch test: 0:03-0:28, 0:40-1:01, 1:53-2:31, 3:02-3:13, 4:27-4:29, 4:56-5:39, 5:58-6:31, 6:49-7:00 = 184/456 seconds = 40.4%. I may have missed some subtle references here and there, but even subjectively, there were long periods of exposition that didn't seem to reference the source material. I'm also not a fan of the dynamic range here. I didn't feel like it was necessarily too quiet at baseline (though it was definitely on the quiet side), but 4:25-5:45 is dramatically louder than the rest, and I couldn't set my volume to a point where I could hear everything else clearly but that section wasn't uncomfortably loud. Thanks for the submission, I enjoyed the arrangement itself quite a bit, but the ensembles really need to be more humanized, and I don't think there's quite enough source material for what we look for. I look forward to seeing more from you, though! NO

I'm pretty sure I have heard this source done in this style before, but I can't place it. The performance is pretty darn good, and the mixing is OK (the rhythm guitar is buried and the right-panned sax has way too much reverb), but I think the arrangement is the main thing holding this back. It's extremely conservative despite the genre change, which is driven primarily by the choice of instruments and the percussion. It's basically a cover up until 2:14, 2/3 of the way through, then 2:31-2:48 is a variant of 0:58-1:15, and 2:49-end is a near-exact repetition of 1:15-1:40. The amount of original content or interpretation is very slight--a small amount of accompaniment in a couple of sections, some very simple percussion, and the sax solo. I enjoyed this, but I don't think it's transformative enough for the site. NO BTW, uncredited source:

Really nice work! Excellent orchestration and arrangement. Contains a fair amount of content that isn't directly from one of the sources, but you never lose sight of the fact that it's a Zelda remix. I hardly have anything to say by way of criticism. Let's get this posted. YES

Funny thing is, I listened to the source and immediately thought, "Yep, this is exactly the sort of thing Hylian Lemon likes to remix." And then he did something totally different from his usual style! Well, not totally different--it still includes his signature 8-bit arps and a few sections of 8-bit melody, but the 16-bit elements and the pseudo-racing motif aren't things I've heard from him before. I hear the Kirby influence as well, even though I would have pegged it more as TMNT if I were to guess blindly. Anyway, this checks all my boxes. Does exactly what it's meant to do and does it well. Takes the source in new directions but never loses sight of it. Great work! YES

While the production is even better than Rebecca's usual, this is quite a conservative arrangement. 1:35-3:27 is basically a sound upgrade, and that's nearly a third of the total arrangement, as well as being the centerpiece of the whole thing. However, the other 2/3 of the remix is pretty darn good, with even the more conservative takes on the source adding in creative accompaniment (although the iconic snare does get old). I'm a bit on the fence about it, but since the majority of the arrangement is creatively interpretive, I think it can fly as a whole. It won't be for anyone looking for something new and different, but similarity to existing arrangements isn't one of our decision criteria. YES (borderline)

Mostly this is up to Rebecca's usual high standards, although the panpipes aren't quite as crisp as the rest of the instruments and don't sound like they're in the same space. I do have one significant concern: repetitiveness. The source is quite short, and it's easy to tell from the remix. Each loop is orchestrated differently every time it repeats, and there's a fair amount of riffing and original content between the loops to make them not feel too egregious, but they're still there. And it doesn't help that the source consists of two variants of the same pattern, so each time it's looped in the remix, it sounds a lot like two repetitions instead of one. I hear four loops in this arrangement (which is already a lot), but it feels like more because that 4-note scale is used so many times. I think this one is close, but I think that if I hadn't been listening to this so many times for the purpose of judging it, the repetitiveness of it wouldn't be quite so noticeable. I'll be interested to see what other judges think, and I may change my mind, but for now I'm coming down on the side of YES

Castlevania: Cacophony of Incarnation (CCoI) A Remix Competition Presented by the OverClocked ReMix Forums Introduction After being defeated by Simon Belmont, the spirit of Dracula floated in the void beyond time. After an unmeasurable age, he found himself returned to his body, but in a strange place. Reaching out, he found himself cut off from his seat of power, the eternal Castlevania! He soon discovered that, once again, fragments of the castle and the surrounding Wallachian countryside had been thrown together, along with some of his old minions--but only a handful of the monsters that once served him remained loyal, while the rest stood between him and his new enemy, the usurper of his domain. But he also found new allies! The heroes who had proved his bane time and time again have also been sucked through time and, sensing a greater foe than any they had ever faced before, now stand beside the former Prince of Chaos to defeat this mysterious enemy and restore Castlevania to its normal order! Current News Signups are now taking place. Anyone who wants to participate should post the names of their two teammates and their top 5 character selections, in order. Some characters have more than one source associated with them. If you choose one of those characters, also specify which of their sources you would like to use. You may choose only one source per character, and each character will be represented by only one remixer. Signups are still open, but the competition won't start until late January. More details forthcoming. Format This competition uses Darkesword's "gauntlet" format. Teams of 3 remixers will take turns remixing their character's theme with the shared theme of the week. The competition will be 12 weeks long. The main event will consist of 3 blocks of 3 rounds each, one announced per week but with a two-week remixing period, so that they overlap. This will be followed by a 1-week break and a 3-week final boss round. In each block, each remixer on a team will be that team's remixer for one week. The teams do not need to select a remixer ahead of time, as long as each member submits only one remix per 3-week block (which means that the third remixer of each block will be determined by default). The other remixers on a team are allowed to help with production and ideas, but the chosen remixer for a round must be the primary artist/arranger. Remixers can make use of other performers to play instruments, sing, etc., even those not involved with the competition, but these may not help in any other way. Submissions and File Names Entries must be sent to me by PM on the forums. Please include your team name and the round number in the subject line of the message. Please do not use a file-sharing service that includes ads or that changes the filename. Dropbox, Google Drive, and Soundcloud work well. If you use Soundcloud, please double-check to make sure you have set your remix to be downloadable. I will specify the filename for each round depending on the theme. Please read and follow the directions carefully when they are announced. Voting Rules and Guidelines After each week, I will create a voting thread in the public voting forum. Voters will rank their top three choices. A #1 vote is worth 3 point, a #2 vote is worth 2 points, and a #3 vote is worth 1 point. Competition members who vote will also earn their team 1 point just for voting. Team members may not vote for their own teams. This is primarily an arrangement competition. A creative arrangement that blends the two sources seamlessly, but with mediocre instrumentation and production, should be ranked more highly than an uninspired medley with flawless sound quality. Everyone must adhere to the Competitions Code of Conduct. Sources Participants can choose from the following characters and associated themes when signing up. They should choose their top 5 choices. If there are multiple picks for the same character, I will randomly determine who gets which pick. To prevent attempts to game the system, I will be be breaking 5th-place ties first and going backwards up the list. Dracula: Dance of Illusions Death: Evil's Symphonic Poem or Heart of Fire The Creature: Den of Worship or Walking on the Edge Golem: The Tower of Dolls or Stone King Golem Doppelganger: Riddle or Resonance of Malevolent Souls Isaac: Young Nobleman of Madness Joachim Armster: Melancholy Joachim Walter Bernhard: Dark Night Toccata Brauner: Esquisse of Violence Albus: Sorrow's Distortion Medusa: Cross Your Heart a.k.a. Crucifix Held Close or Stalker Akmodan II: Wicked Child or In Search of the Secret Spell Carmilla: Repose of Souls or Carmilla Elizabeth Bartley: Calling from Heaven Celia Fortner: Evil Invitation Stella and Loretta Lecarde: Dance of Sadness Simon Belmont: Theme of Simon Belmont Alucard: Dracula's Castle or The Tragic Prince Trevor Belmont: Beginning Grant Danasty: Clockwork Christopher Belmont: Battle of the Holy Richter Belmont: Divine Bloodlines Eric Lecarde: Iron-Blue Intention Nathan Graves: Awake Leon Belmont: Lament of Innocence Hector: The Curse of Darkness Soma Cruz: Castle Corridor Julius Belmont: Don't Wait Until Night a.k.a. Can't Wait Until the Night Sypha Belnades: Mad Forest Maria Renard: Slash Charlotte Aulin: The Hidden Curse Jonathan Morris: Invitation of a Crazed Moon John Morris: Reincarnated Soul Shanoa: An Empty Tome Teams Participants pick their own teams when signing up. They must also choose a Castlevania-themed team name, but they can wait until after their characters have been determined to do so. Please do not pick excessively long team names. Helping Out I'll also need artwork (album art and signatures). If that's up your alley, please let me know. I can cobble something together myself, but it won't be the prettiest, so if you can help out before the first round, that would be great!

Yeah, the slow attack on the choruses does stand out, and the samples, especially the brass, could be better, but I think it's good enough. The arrangement of the sources is clever and engaging, overall a nice job of breathing some life into an overused leitmotif. A solid addition to the Tripp collection. YES

It does that in subsequent 2D Mario games as well, adding bongos and Yoshi voices in places. And in the New SMB levels that have water in them, the music changes when you're in the water. Speaking of SMW, I always loved the little fish that jumps out of the water every time you walk over a bridge. Such a tiny thing, but such a cute little touch to add life to the world map.

Yep, the copy-paste repetition is a dealbreaker for sure, it's overly conservative, and of course it needs a real ending. Those aren't my only concerns, though. It's mastered quite loudly--normally OK for metal, except that it's causing heavy pumping and distortion, even in the quieter acoustic intro. I see it peaking at over +0.4dB. That intro also has a buzzing sound to it, which sounds like a mechanical or recording issue with the guitar. Perhaps one of our guitarist judges might know what's causing that (although it's a minor issue, ultimately). Certainly the performance quality is well above the bar, but I'm afraid this doesn't match what we look for in terms of interpretation, and I feel that the mastering needs another pass to get rid of the pumping and get everything below the 0dB mark so it doesn't clip. NO

I think the production issues that concerned me before have been cleaned up, and it's definitely more dynamic and interesting than the earlier version. I really like the new original content The percussion could still stand to be varied more, though, and 1:18-2:36 is still a little on the monotonous side. The hook here is just so simple, it needs a lot of extra stuff to hold the listener's interest. Doubling the lead an octave higher and slightly changing the timbre of the saw arp aren't enough. The original content comes only at the end; it works really well there but it's too late to break up the static beat and repetitive melody. I think this is close, and it's definitely a vast improvement, but I agree with Larry and Deia that it needs a bit more variety and creativity earlier on in the arrangement to be interesting. NO (borderline, resubmit)