DarkeSword

Yeah, we don't really accept those.

First, I just want to say to everyone else: lay off. He's allowed to request whatever songs he wants. Stop your mini-modding. As for purplecowdoom: As an artist, let me tell you: reviews are certainly worth beans. I always appreciate when a listener takes the time to leave a few comments about my work, even if it's just as simple as, "That was pretty cool." Reviews are not really for recommending mixes to other people; they're for giving your opinion on the song to the artist. Similarly, I'm not sure I understand what you're talking about when you say you need expensive programs to help with WiPs (especially concerning graphic design; I have no idea where that's coming form). All you need to help with WiPs is a pair of ears. You go to the WIP forum, listen to something someone is working on, and give them feedback/your opinion. That's all you have to do. Anyway I just wanted to clear stuff up.

Kind of disappointed nobody actually sent me anything for this. Looks like our judgecount is going to stay low this summer.

weed, what you're hearing is the choir clashing with the trailing reverb of the bell line, specifically on beat two of the measure. Plus the staccato choir is clashing with the sustained choir lines. I think that this has a really nice sound to it, but like weed mentioned, it's a little wonky in terms of choir harmonies. There's also the issue how conservative it is. Instrumentation is certainly a viable method of arrangement, but for the purposes of OCR, I don't think it can be relied on as the primary method of arrangement. Part-writing is very important, and I think that lifting not just melodic lines, but harmonic and continuo lines, out of the source doesn't really jive. There's certainly a lot of personalization here, I'll give you that, but I'm afraid that the combination of issues is a dealbreaker for me. Really wanna hear this tweaked up. NO, resub

Yeah it really follows the structure of the originals far too closely, and coupled with the Batman movie theme incorporation, it doesn't really jive with the standards. Still, a nicely executed piece of music; drums and guitar are particularly nice. Anyway, gonna have to say NO on this one. Hope to hear from you again. An aside, not having to do with my vote: The smattering of Joker voice clips also gets old pretty fast, to be honest. I'm not a fan of their usage here.

You're not really thinking about how your patterns fit together. It sounds like you came up with a few cool sounding patterns and utilized the standard beginner's arrangement technique: add patterns, subtract patterns, add patterns, subtract patterns. Never mind the fact that the arpeggiating lead gets old fast and is pretty weak in establishing the hook of the melody. It's just meandering the same old syncopated pattern over and over again. There's absolutely no development in here; you've got 1 minute of material stretched over 6 minutes. Sorry, but you've got to do way more with the arrangement; Jenova is too little too late. NO

Which is precisely why you'll never be a judge. Aside from the fact that it's a cover, there are a lot of balance issues between instruments, especially when flute and oboe attempt harmony and countermelodies. Too crowded. The samples really aren't that great either; they're only about as good as the ones I use. But like I said, without the attention paid to balance between voices, they don't really deliver as well as they could. So no, it probably would not get a YES from OCR judges. It's not a production, it's an arrangement with some serviceable samples.

SR 3rd Season is confirmed.

I'm a huge fan of the Lost Odyssey soundtrack, particularly the song Neverending Journey. Simply fantastic work. I wasn't impressed at all with Blue Dragon, but Uematsu is back on his game for LO.

Yeah this one is almost there. I agree with the comments about the snare; pull it back or soften it up and you're good. What I don't get is why you start of with this great piano line and then switch to a whole bunch of non-piano stuff for most of the mix. I was really disappointed when the piano took the backseat to the other leads. I think that once you hit the Place of Peace stuff, the sample quality makes this end up sounding a lot like BGM from some old Falcom PC RPG, that is to say, the xylophone is kind of exposed. Something with more meat to it might be a better choice there for those syncopated lines, but that's a totally minor gripe. I think the punchiness of all the instruments wears on the listener after a while. You might want to consider highlighting winds and strings in the soundscape in lieu of all the different kinds of piano and chromatic percussion pieces. Really though this is quite enjoyable and I think that if you just tweaked a few sections with regards to dynamics you could make this really shine. NO for now, but please resub

The arrangement here is not much more than a sound "upgrade" of the original. I put upgrade in quotes because the texture doesn't really work here; your leads come across as very shrill at times and the balance between instruments is off. That white-noise snare's sustain is just too long and sticks out. The arrangement basically just goes through the motions. I agree with the comments about the 2:25 section; quite creative, and I think that if you grabbed a hold of that and took the song further into that kind of dreamier, atmospheric texture, you'd be onto something. Give it some thought. As it stands now, though, I'm gonna have to say NO.

Yeah, Jon nailed it. This song doesn't really have a purpose except to meander aimlessly over drumbeatz. Like Vinnie said, there's no direction at all. Add to that the fact that the entire soundscape is harsh and everything is mechanically sequenced and I'm left not knowing where to begin with fixing it. You and I have discussed what it means for a song to have direction and cohesion before, and I've shown you examples, so try to take that to heart before sending another piece our way, because what Jon said was right; thusfar, your submissions have all suffered from the same basic, fatal flaws. NO

The opening beats remind me of ziwtra's Blue (Shooting Star Mix), which is not a bad thing. I agree with Vinnie though; while I absolutely love chromatic percussion, I think that you could use some variation in your lead instrument. I felt like I kept waiting for this song to open up with a more expansive sound with some kind of sustained synth handling the melody. The song kind of felt like it was on auto-pilot after a while. Certainly a pleasant auto-pilot, but auto-pilot nonetheless. I'd like to see a refined resub of this, but maybe we can leave this mix up for more votes? I can see other joojes giving this the BIG Y. NO refine resub

Timing in the harpsichord is really sloppy at points. There's not a lot of balance between instruments and everything else sounds really mechanical. Violin sample's weak attack really gets exposed. You need better samples dood. I get kind of a Danny Elfman vibe from this around the middle, which is cool, but its really lacking in the execution department. Work on humanization and balance. NO

Yeah agreed with Larry. This is just a cover of the originals. Fun, but not nearly interpretive enough. NO

Yeah I'm just going to close this out by saying that you gotta make the stuff you submit here YOUR arrangement, not someone else's, even if it is from an official source. Anyway this is a fun track, but it's way too close to the original. Larry and 'Illi basically hit all the pertinent points, so there's no point in reiterating. Nice job, but NO. Hope to hear from you again in the future though.

Yeah I gotta agree with Larry's latest comments; when you switch gears the song really loses something; I think it's that percussion you're using. It's a really weak snare sound, and I think that after listening to it more, the conservative of the arrangement gets exposed there. I kind of like the overcompressed sound the percussion has starting out. Anyway it's not bad, but I think you could do more in terms of interpretation; some more original lines and countermelodies would help. NO, resub

I think this ended up sounding like the music equivalent of a page filled with doodles; good ideas, but underdeveloped. I agree that you need to get a little more creative with your writing and try to really expand on the source. I like the old school electro sound, but make sure you don't end up sounding like you're just trying a whole bunch of different presets. Choose some sounds and work with them; don't fall into the trap of trying to constantly change up the lead to a brand new instrument everytime the melody is iterated. Anyway it's not a bad sounding piece but it still needs work. NO

Gotta agree; this needs to have a meatier sound. Vinnie is right; the whole soundscape is thin; you need to have more than just a gated lead, pads, and oompah bassline. I don't think the transition to the breakdown section was too bad, except that once the breakdown starts, things get THINNER sounding. The percussion sounds like it's run through a hi-pass filter at points. Needs work. nO

Hey guys just so you know I'm going to be going by Darke Sword now. MIND THE GAP

What exactly is verbatim?

Drums are pure boom-chick-boom-chick; zyko's right, they're very weak. WHERE ARE THE HI-HATS? Maybe I just can't hear them, but kick, snare, and ride isn't cutting it. I'll also agree that the texture is really flimsy. There's an emptiness that's pervading this mix; I think it has to do with the thin sound of the synth guitars. They need to be a lot beefier. Plus everything else supporting it sounds like an old SNES game. Not really helping in terms of a substantial texture. I dunno man, hit the EQ and fill out those drums. NO

Clipping is HORRIBLE in this. WHYYYYY? That said I think the arrangement is great and I think that working within the boundaries of the chord progression works. This is Maridia through and through; Jesse's right, it follows the typical structure of jazz: head, solo, head. Considering the nature of the source tune, I'd hazard to say that the chord progression is one of the defining aspects of the Maridia song to begin with; I mean we're not talking about something as ubiquitous as I vi IV V here. I think I can only name one other song off the top of my head that goes up a tritone, and that's because I just remixed it (Into the Thick of It). I think this is wonderfully chill, and a great take on the source. YES, conditional. Fix the clipping.

Eh, it's Bach, it's public domain, and it's stylistically similar. Isn't a lot of Castlevania music inspired by Bach's stuff anyway? Anyway I think the track is pretty rockin'. The organ sample's not great, but it fits into a supporting role quite nicely; never too exposed. If the Bach stuff in the beginning warrants a veto, then I'm fine with that, but to be honest, I don't really believe that it's an issue in this particular case. Nice. YES

This is exactly what this song needed. Freakin' great man. I love the break down at 1:45. MORE PLEASE!