E-Bison

Just heard some of the demos from the front page. There are some really creative and interesting tracks on there. I can't wait to hear the final product.

"Tribal Drums: Re-sequenced taiko ensemble loop. Kontakt again." Yup. All the elements had to be sliced up individually and put back together at a different tempo and sequence. Kind of like the amen break in drum and bass. The drums are just... more Japanese. -E

Thank you for the feedback. I am always thrilled when people enjoy a track. In general the quality of the stuff on this site increases every time I turn my back. I had a great time with this track. I'm glad you enjoy the strange transitions. Mephisto: As for the vocal libraries, all custom I'm afraid. Built with Kontakt and IRCAM's Audiosculpt. I've never used omnisphere or any spectrasonics stuff, but I hear it's good. The rest of this track is all over the map. Some material is from archival ethno-musicological recordings, vintage analog synths (EML 500, Elka), some is from old vinyl, CDs, easter eggs from the OST, some sounds I play / sing myself. Nothing too fancy, mostly just texture and mixing. …. and Massive. Overtone singing: One sample layered six times at differing transposition levels / pan and EQ settings. Big Drum: I got a recording of a taiko drum. Reverb + multi band compression + sub expander. Tribal Drums: Re-sequenced taiko ensemble loop. Kontakt again. I suppose my only trick would be that I work hard to hide formant shifts in sampled materials. Hope that clears things up a bit. -E

Xenogears was fun and I was happy to be able to re-live it with you guys. Thanks for keeping it together Avaris. There is sooo much strong work on this project. Holy crap Vagrance! I wasn't expecting something like that here. I love your track. Siamy, Taucer, Ziwtra seriously, your tracks made my day.

Ditto. -E

I like this. Good job.

I'm from WPG! ... But you guys waited till I went to Montreal to meet up. psh. E-Bison

Thanks for the comments and kind words. I appreciate it. I'm glad you guys enjoy the track. E-Bison

Thanks for the advice Liontamer. You're right on about the track not changing enough in terms of sections. I extended the middle breakdown and tightened up some of the other transitions. I think this will help. As for melodic transformation, I have 2 variants of the theme. One is pretty close to the original, the other is swung and peppered with grace notes and some of the intervals are filled out with step motion. Also, there are canonic statements theme A (at the end) and B (in the breakdown) Here is the finished track: http://asmoday.googlepages.com/finalfantasy6allfactoryocremix.mp3 Wish me luck: E-Bison

I kinda forgot about this one... Last I remember I was trying to pull back some of the mastering effects and bring out some more dynamics. I think it's kinda hot... Also, bring out the melody a bit more, that's what people come on here for right? I'd like to do a finished version and post it. To be honest, I'm quite anxious about submitting stuff. I always get slammed for deviating to far from the source material. -Bison

Accelerando? As somone who spends a good deal of time beat matching I'm gonna have to say I'm not too sure about this one. Nothing worse than getting into a sweet groove with your decks then then realizing that one of the tracks just jumped 20 bpm. Not to say electronic music shouldn't have any tempo changes... Just not this one. Save that for all those kids who convert old midi archives into EastWest masterpieces. *ducks a brick* Whatever... You were all thinking it! E-Bison

Thanks for the comments. I really thought the form was pretty straightforward but perhaps the melody is getting lost in the insanity. Form: (Intro)ABA'B(Bridge)A'' I think the solution here involves pulling up some of the melodic elements from the source material. With the exception of sampled/processed factory and machine sounds (which make up almost all the percussive elements) I am trying to keep this track synth based. I feel like a big fancy string patch would sound silly when alongside all this glitch/industrial. I think you are right regarding dynamic range. There is a breakdown in the middle but the mastering opto is pulling it up a lot. Thanks for the comments. Watch for new versions. As always, advice is appreciated. E-Bison

I updated the track yet again. -More Factory Sounds -The Bridge section from Devil's Lab -Removed a little more fancy break beat. http://www.myspace.com/118311029 At this point I am willing to say I think it may be ready for submission. Consider that only 2 of the last 50 submissions have met the OCR standard I'd like to iron out as many kinks as possible. Please, more constructive feedback! -E-Bison

I have always enjoyed your stuff. You've gone for the bit crsher! Good job SGX! A few things: (IMHO) Eq a bit of high end of the bass up a little. Get more definition. The whole hifi lofi thing is working great! I say you should exagerate it even more. Try running some of your lofi stuff through a special reverb that dosen't fill it out with sound added frequencey. Or, pull out a multi band compressor, solo the mid band and crank the compression ratio. Run all the reverb and effects though it. Render the section and use it in the track. This would help exagerate the lofi nature of some of the sections, especialy those with interesting bit rates. Try and get your hands on some fancy non linear reverbs/delays, they would sound spectacular on a track like this. Mastering: Track is slightly lacking in the crispy upper range, this could be due to mp3 encoding. Your rule SGX E-Bison

I hope this works. Why jump on somebody and tear them down for trying to do something interesting? Aren't these projects supposed to be collective efforts by the OCR community? I've been gone for a long time but has OCR really become that elitist? We should be happy that there are people who are willing to put work into organizing this kind of project. Why those with "star power" wouldn't help a project like this get off the ground is beyond me. E-Bison

I think the low brass is a little powerchordy. I can hear that you are using correct voice leading and stuff but I think if anything, those trombone patches are gonna do this track in. They sound great when used in shorter sections but the held notes sound pretty crazy. Could you find a patch with a little less volume on the held notes? That might help. Perhaps open your voicings a little, this might give a more natural sound to the track. E-Bison

Metroid eh? You have some great sounds! I love the rain stick! But you're posting on the WIP forrum so I would imagine you want some advice. Issues: Too muddy: Pull back some of the delay/verb. If you're digging the wash of reverb thing in the very least you need to EQ the reverb channel away from the bass frq and lower mids. This will give you epic reverb without freq overlap and mud. Lost Bass: Your bass is there... you just need a new one that takes up more of the upper sound spectrum. Find one that cuts more and sound cleaner. Something with a huge Rez filter and High pass cuttof would be wicked. There had better not be reverb on that bass! The big Pad: Run a High pass filter on this bad boy at least 150 hz. This will let people hear all the stuff you are doing. Epic Bass Drum: Totaly cool for your ambient intro, not so cool when mixed with all sorts of other elements. You can't be 100% epic all the time. Less is more in this case. Hope this helps. Oh... And if you can find a way to pull some lofi effect on that piano outro, that might be cool. E-Bison

I did another pass of the track keeping all of your advice in mind. The following elements have been added. - 2 new harmony elements from the source track - More Devil's lab Back Beat less break core insanity - More Structure - A fun musical quote from FFVI - Made some of the synths a bit more epic with Reaktor V and Max/Msp Here is the Link: http://www.myspace.com/118311029 Let me know what you think! E-Bison

More harmony eh? I'll stick a double fugue in the middle, the counter subject will enter on the dominant followed by a sweet ass stretto passage into a rippen'- II6 German aug6 C64 V V7 I - cadencial pattern. More harmony = more human. I also don't feel like it's up to OCR standards. I would agree with you on the back beat thing. I'm sure people want more Devil's lab melody instead of crazy break patterns made of radio static. E-Bison

I'll make the arrangement a bit more fun... Perhaps a standard version of the theme would be a surprise after all that variation. Annoying whistle thing. Got it. Thanks for the comments. E-Bison

Been gone for a long time. 3 years now. Happy to see my CT remix is still being played. I came on here to show off my new videogame themed ska album. After reading comments about my old tracks I decided to post a WIP track for old times sake: It's a glitch remix of Devil's lab. As usual, don't be haitin' because I change the melodic material and form around... It's supposed to be a remix right? Let me know what you think. I'll submit it if you guys think I'll make it through the gauntlet. Here is the Link: http://asmoday.googlepages.com/finalfantasy6allfactoryocremix.mp3 Check out "Princess Mario" at www.myspace.com/tentoomany for some crazy ska/punk videogame stuff from my band. E-Bison www.tentoomany.com

But my band does a lot of videogame covers live. Fans love it and we love playing it. I even got on national television talking about videogame cover bands and our new album. For legal reasons we opted to not to record any of them in the studio. On our last album we got the rights to a Duran Duran track and it was a big pain. I can't imagine how crazy it would be to secure the rights to the Tetris theme or something else like it. Has anybody on here ever tried to get performance rights for this stuff? Recording rights? E-Bison www.tentoomany.com

I haven't shown my face around here in a long time. Glad to see that people are still enjoying my work years after I left OCR. I came back because I produced a Videogame Themed Ska album with my Band www.tentoomany.com I thought you guys would get a kick out of the concept art as well as the subject matter. You can check out "Princess Mario" at our Myspace: www.myspace.com/tentoomany A track about a guy who falls in love with princess Toadstool. There is another Epic Ska anthem for nerds, all about MMOs Link Here Check it out. If you've ever been told you play too many games, this one is for you. http://tentoomany.googlepages.com/Ten_Too_Many_-_Digital_World.mp3 I'm still composing and producing a lot. Nothing that would do well on the OCR boards, even if it sometimes is related to videogames. The Album is called "Multiplyer Madness" One look at this picture and you'll see why we got our name and where we got our title.

Hey Guys! Thanks for the Great Reviews! I'm glad most of you enjoyed the track. All your kind words make me want to do more VG stuff. For those who didn’t like the track. I’m sorry. If it's to long / repetitive or whatever. The structure made sense when I put it together the first time. Thanks again. Keep your eye out for my FF1 Trance Stuff. I hope to do some interesting stuff with those themes, now that the game has been re released.