Malcos

Of all the transitions, the one at 3.09 is the most jarring. However as DS said it is more of a gear change, a deliberate setting of a new tempo - not easy to do well, but here it works (just). Top quality production here. The re-arrangement in this is on the line of slightly altered source with totally original elements, which were integrated well. YES

Very good vocals and rapping! There are some specific issues here that if resolved will definitely get me to vote yes. Although the instrumentation is quite sparse, I think it works (it is hip-hop after all!) up to the point where the vocal parts cut out around the 2.50 mark. The lead parts could have been made much more engaging. At 4.20 the kick volume decreases, presumably to make way for the ending. However, the ending just cuts off. Perhaps a delay would have sounded better so that the sound tailed off or something, rather than just abruptly cutting it off, I don't think it worked in this case. I think this is really good, just needs a little more tweaking. NO(Please resub)

The overall tone sounds hollowed out, and the texture is very sparse in places. This feels underdeveloped in terms of both production and arrangement. There is skill here, but it needs to be further developed before reaching the OC bar. NO

Great arrangement and orchestration. However, although the horns sound ok, the high brass section really sounds exposed at about 2.30, and is nowhere hear the quality of the other instruments. Although the arrangement really stands out to be great, that brass really should have been better. The strings that follow the cheap sounding brass also sound cheap themselves. I know arrangement comes before quality, but here the remixer is not doing themselves justice by using these poor samples, I'm sure better sounding ones can be had for free. NO(Great candidate for resubmission)

There's no doubt that this sounds good. However, as others have already stated, this is not really what this site is about. Violation of standards... NO

The percussion has a nice strong impact here, although the strings don't quite come up to the same level in terms of quality. I think the vibraphone/xylophone could have done with a touch more reverb to allow it to blend better with the other instruments. The arrangement here is very well done, using the Myst 1 theme as the intro and the others as the main section; this approach means that the transitions work well. While not melody intensive, a lot of original elements have been added here and gives the same film-like atmosphere as the sources. Even though it is a 'medley' in that it uses several sources, it works as a piece in itself rather than a mishmash of songs, and does it extremely well. It is for this reason that I am passing this. YES

Finished! www.malcos.co.uk/DSP_Refill.zip

Almost finished......

This sounds like a cover version, except for the solo part which is great. Other than that solo, I call rippage. NO

I tried to do a scratch machine but it wasn't working at first, then I gave up and started making a glitch machine, and then I ended up making a scratch machine...lol. It's an insert effect and you run the audio through it. Then you can use your midi keyboard on the scratch combi and press a key every time you want to 'scratch' the incoming audio. At the same time as the audio is being 'scratched', the original sound is muted (although there is a version of this without the muting) so it sounds like you're actually scratching the audio. I used a delay to do it, taking advantage of the weirdness that happens when you change the delay times with the DDL-1. Does what I said make any sense? I'm trying to make the explanations as clear as possible for the manual.

I like the drum beat and groove, although there is quite a lot of reverb on the low frequencies, which does muddy the kick somewhat. The downtempo vibe can still allow for some dynamic movements, however here the feel was the same throughout. Some more original elements, some more variation, would make me say yes. NO(Please resub)

'If it is your choice to reject this mix, I know that you only do so in order to uphold the standards of your site to the best of your abilities. Know that I understand that rejection is not a personal attack on me...' Well that's refreshing to hear. Basically the mix has already been fully analysed/judged by the remixer, but I'm going to give a little breakdown anyways lol. The intro melody wasn't quantised with the soft underlying beat at all - it didn't sound absolutely terrible, and it was resolved once the intro was over, but perhaps that drumbeat could have been left out. The 80's snare doesn't fit with the 90's style techno, and this is one of the biggest issues with this submission. The synths, sampled piano riff and other melodic elements worked very well together. The bassline sounded stereo chorused, which wasn't pleasing (mono that bassline!) Overall this is not too different from the original and the production could be much better, especially in relation to percussion. This is not bad, your musical ideas are good, but your production and mixing skills need some more work. NO

Just a little demo to whet the appetite, 8 days till release... www.malcos.co.uk/ref/Scratch_Demo.mp3

I emailed Peff and got his blessing to use his beat repeater and xfade combinators as the basis for some of the combis (as they already were lol), I will give him full credit in the documentation/manual. If you want to share these, let me know and I'll put them in the refill. If anyone else wants to contribute, just send the combinator file(s) to me by Wednesday 8th August with an explanation of how to use it as a text file and I'll put it in a seperate folder in the refill with your name on it.

My internet connection status icon keeps changing from the usual one (the two screens) to what looks like an inverted T. Any ideas as to why? Many thanks in advance. EDIT: Ok it's stopped doing it now. Not that anyone will read this lol.

Yeah I think they will get less listeners by doing something like that.

11 days to go. I made a very strange scratching combi today, and it sounds very weird and I'm now disturbed . I'm near enough finished, bar documentation and anything else I might come up with by accident...

I'm listening through headphones at the moment, so this won't be 100% accurate lol. I feel that the bass guitar needs a little more oomph, and there are times when the compression makes the whole song duck somewhat (0.43 for example). Everything else is very good indeed. However the marc strings near the end sound a bit cheap. Don't forget to remove that portion of noise at the end on the mastered version. This has a good chance at passing. How did you do the drum track?

Ohhh dear lol. I received nothing for this round, nil, nada. I'm very busy myself these days, which is why I've given myself such a long time for my refill that I'm doing at the moment, so I'm guilty as well lol. So should we continue this? I know the source files in this 2nd round were not easy to work with, could that be the reason that we had no subs this time?

Some of this is rather cookie cutter. The piano sound wasn't of very good quality in the intro - other than that this has a good energy level and the production is ok. However, for me there needs to be some more flair put into this in order for it to pass, there doesn't seem to be anything to set this apart from the rest. Apart from the original being clubbed up, there isn't much more to this. I'm not saying it is the original with just a 4/4 beat on top, but this feels undeveloped in many ways. In order to provide more energy and drive, perhaps the remixer could add more prominent/rhythmic hats and a sharper more defined clap with the main beat. More variation and original content would move this up a few notches. Not bad, but needs more. NO

Ok this should be released in about 3 weeks time. Avaris is working on a few more combis and fine tuning his previous ones. We're both working on demo songs as well as documentation, as I think some of these combis will need quite a bit of explaining! Any ideas for instrument combis? I haven't got many at the moment...

Someone created a Reason radio station, still in it's infancy. Just thought I would spread the word... http://www.reasonradio.com/

Whew, I'm finding this round very challenging indeed. These songs are not easy for me to work with.

When the drums came in it was like an anticlimax as I expected something with more energy. Ultimately this sounds unfinished and underdeveloped, with not much direction to the arrangement and a thin texture. NO

If you're talking about drum beats, then Reason has a drum machine module. It also has a matrix sequencer, although that can't do chords.