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As a former trumpet player, that trumpet sample stabs me clean through the gut with its attack. An arrangement like this calls for something with a much more delicate articulation, even in the higher range. I've never understood why people who sample the instrument persist in recording that blaring, heavy attack. Aside from that, this arrangement shows a lot of depth, despite its straightforwardness. Nice woodwind writing, especially flutes. Unfortunately, I have to agree with the judges that voted NO. There's an issue of dynamics and balance here; not in terms of arrangement but in terms of production. The trumpet sample is far too exposed whenever it plays and everything else turns into a mish-mash wall of sound. NO, but resubmit this. an arrangement like this needs to be on OCR. you've got your concept, now work on the execution.

I felt this was a little lacking in the high end, but it's not a deal breaker. Great beats, nice arrangement, along with some great countermelodic fills. i liek it YES

LUCKYYYYYYYY

Looks like I'm getting it tomorrow. I wish "release" dates weren't ship dates.

This is what I called the "Cycle of Mediocrity," years ago when VGMix2 launched. There was a lot of that "crap-praising" going on, just for the sake of making people feel good about their work, even if it wasn't great; those people got a bit of an ego boost and would praise other folks' so-so work. It just continued like that. It's difficult to combat in an official capacity without adding yet-another-layer of bureaucracy to the whole process. I've had vague ideas about pre-approval/sponsorship before submission, but it only serves to make things even slower.

You should probably read the first post in this thread.

I really liked how I was portrayed in the fantasy story. Wish there was more. :\

Release date everywhere says August 27th, so I'm pretty sure it's out today. Of course, it might be one of those stupid ass "we don't get it until tomorrow" deals.

Anyone get it yet? I'm hoping to pick it up after work today. The music will likely own my soul, so I hope to remix something from it and go for the hat trick.

Amen, brother.

If you don't call all of the malicious things that people wrote about Jill "attacking" then you probably don't understand the definition of the word.

:roll:

Oh I'm not arguing that the way the it actually played out was the way to do it; remember who got stuck dealing with the backlash on their own? People would have been given a timeframe, some warning, but it didn't play out that way, because yes, there were staff members at Magfest who really despised Unmod and wanted it gone ASAP. But here's the thing: even with advance warning, backlash still would have happened. There's no question in my mind about that. All the offensive, abusive, and outright malicious things that were posted that night would still have been posted, even with advance warning; it just would have been spread out over time, and I think we'd still be dealing with it today.

90% is a pretty exaggerated statistic, don't you think? And all that stuff about renaming UnMod and/or phasing in was discussed heavily, long before any of the really bad shit started to go down from either "side." The deletion of UnMod had been in the works for quite a while (on the order of months to a year), and the moderators (back when guys like Gray and I were mods) spent a lot of time figuring out the best way to do it. And when I say "best," I don't mean "best" for the people who made being a mod hell, I mean "best" for the interests of the site and the community at large. Renaming the forum wouldn't have changed anything. Outright deleting the forum made a lot of people get pissed off and leave; people that had made it clear that they didn't give two shits about anything related to this website except for UnMod itself. I'll probably catch a lot of shit for saying this, but good riddance. I think I've earned the right to say that, after the bullshit I had to put up with the night the forum got deleted. Yeah, I know other people left that did care a little. I'm sorry to see them go. But despite everything OCR's gone through, the community always survives and grows. People still make music, talk about music, play games, have compos, do meetups, go to concerts, etc. etc. etc. I prefer that kind of community far more than what UnMod "offered" by a long shot. But what do I know? I'm just a shitty judge.

I think the real question here is, "What didn't happen to UnMod?" Right guys?

You couldn't possibly be more obvious.

Poor Mallow. Rather groovy and cerebral. I love that smooth rhodes and the contrast with the percussion. Very tricky stuff. Science lesson voice clips are always fun. Fantastic drum programming. YES

Really captures the spirit of the Halo soundtracks. I've always enjoyed that tribal+orchestral mesh that's defined the music from those games, and this mix really continues that tradition. The arrangement evolves nicely. I'm not crazy about the sampling of the choir, especially since it's from something unrelated to the source. However, it's not the meat-and-potatoes of the mix; just icing on the cake. God, I'm hungry. Anyway, great mix, though I don't want to encourage other remixers to sample from other media. It's a very tricky thing to do without ending up relying on the sampled material too much. This mix pulls it off well enough, but it's usually just better to avoid it. YES

That's the bass sample Larry. YOU GET THE !!! Larryhate aside, he is correct; things sound far too mechanical here. One of the advantages the piano had over other keyboard instruments when it was developed was that it was capable of producing a dynamic range of sounds, from soft to loud. I'm sure you already know that. So apply it! Every piano note in your piece plays at the exact same velocity. Adjusting velocities is one of the fundamentals of good sequencing. Don't ignore it! Arrangement isn't too bad though. NO

Lotta reverb. Maybe a bit too much? I do like the use of the StarFox 64 samples. That game had some solid voice acting, and the "Let's Rock and Roll!!' did get me a little pumped. Nice. This is pretty good trance. All your standard highs and lows; soundscape and texture isn't anything new, like Jimmy said, but sometimes you just gotta go with what works. Arrangement is nice too. Solid. Starfox fans and trance fans will like it. And maybe some other folks too. I know I did. YES

oooh my ears... It's such a nice arrangement, but in terms of execution, it's like you took a great vinyl and rubbed steel wool all over it. I have no idea how that analogy makes sense, but I'm using it anyway. Lots of production issues here, as Larry and Jesse have already covered. I really like the arrangement, but good sequencing is important, especially with that piano. It sounds too plinky and robotic. Don't get me wrong: robots are awesome. But they are terrible at playing piano, so humanize a bit. NO but resub

Samples in this song are in need of a major upgrade, especially those electric guitars at the end. The sustained strings are a bit too loud and have too much presence. The sequencing is very mechanical, especially in the sax. I'm pretty sure I know what sax sample that is, and you can sequence it a lot better. There's a lot of high instruments in this song; it's really missing low-range and strong mid-range; the only thing really covering that is your sustained string section. Drums sound really weak. The electic piano playing throughout ends up making the soundscape very crowded. The arrangement was a bit aimless, and I felt that the inclusion of "Beautiful Morning" in particular was slapped in. I didn't feel like the chords really lined up properly for that insertion. Chords could have been adjusted, as well as killing the repetitive lead phrase to let Beautiful Morning's melody stand out; there's a reason the title of that song has the word "beautiful" in it. NO

WHOA! Viola + rock = win. I love everything about this mix. Wonderfully mixed, wonderfully performed, and the arrangement just takes two great songs and integrates them seamlessly. NICE WORK YES!

Agreed, though griping about BOW movements is a bit specific, don't you think Larry? It's a sample; it's an attack, not an actual bow movement. YOU GET THE Larryhate aside, I will say that the strings occasionally have a weird pitch modulation going on. Look for a better string sample. I agree that the dynamics and contrast in this song are nearly nonexistent; it sort of just sits there with some left-hand eighth-notes and strings repeating over and over again. This is another song that you just get lost in, but not in that good way. And then it ends. I'd love to hear the piano's range explored a little more. You essentially stuck to the same octave in the left. This might sound like a ridiculously obvious statement, but a piano has a lot of keys. Use them. And don't be afraid to break away from the arpeggios in the left hand. How about some runs, or a strong, syncopated statement of the chords in order to accent certain parts of the melody? There's so much more that you can do compositionally. Take some more chances. Also, don't use so much reverb. NO

Inclined to agree with Jimmy here; when you realize the time signature, everything that initially sounded disjointed locks into place wonderfully. I disagree with Larry about the overcrowdedness; I feel like while things get a bit chaotic, there is enough space for each element. I like this a lot. It's very groovy and develops nicely. YES And I'll thank you all in advance for not accusing me of thirteenbias, kthx.