prophetik music   Judges ⚖️

really neat original. that short synth tone is really unique. opens with some bells and ambient synths. it doesn't sound like most of the things being played are the original, but rather following a similar structure. the beat comes in at 0:28, and the strings that eventually come in also are outlining a descending pattern that isn't the same notes or particularly close to the original. same with the eventual synth arp. beat drops around 1:22 for a bit, but comes back unchanged. there's a recap of what just happened, and the opening bells come in too, but still no source. we get something that's again reminiscent of the original at 2:03, but all that includes is movement from the 5 to the b6 and b7 - none of the 5 b6 4 5 pattern that permeates the original, and also none of the little 7-8 lick that stands out in the original as well. we get another break at 2:44 with some choral elements, but the same taiko and synth elements in the background are still there. we do get some more unique strings after this when the same beat comes back in again, but nothing from the original. there's a fun stutter effect in the strings near the end, and then it's done with the arps fading out (over a very long time, this probably should be shortened by half if not more). unfortunately this doesn't really appear to be a remix of the Cradle Under the Star theme, but rather something inspired by it or reminiscent of it. there's no actual original material that i can hear in the track you've submitted. so that's a dealbreaker right there. separately, it's really obvious in here where you copy/paste each individual element's block of material - the synth does the same thing every time it shows up, the beat is the same, the taiko element is the same, etc. even the fake scream transition sfx is used repeatedly. that much repetition becomes really noticeable really quickly when you listen to something more than once. spending the extra time to make each entrance of an instrument unique is absolutely worth it. if this was a complete arrangement of the original, i'd probably still reject it due to how muddy and overly dense the representation is, and how much repetition is used. i think that the original's neat and there's definitely legs for this style of arrangement. trimming the fat and making it more clearly related to the original will definitely help craft a better overall product. NO

big guitar-driven intro, as expected from the artist. it gets right after the melodic material, and there's some manipulation there. i don't her a ton of bass, which is unfortunate, but it sounds like the rhythm guitar occupies a lot of that space. there's a nice chorus break at 1:01 that, while it isn't quieter or different instrumentation, functions as a good separator between the first and second runthroughs of the melodic material. 1:34's another runthrough of the melody, and the instrumentation here is pretty empty as the rhythm guitar and bass are both pretty high relatively speaking. some pad work or mixing up the rhythm of the backing elements would make a big difference there. there's another chorus section, a solo break that's pretty solid, and then an ending that didn't make much sense to me at all - both in how it resolves to a non-root chord and in why it's so sudden without any real closing element. and it's done. i think this is pretty borderline, to be honest. the rhythm guitar work is pretty much the same throughout, the overall arrangement doesn't really take many if any risks, and the ending is blasé. but i think the overall band sound for the melodic and chorus sections is mostly fine and it's mixed aggressively and fairly clearly. there's certainly things i wish would have been done differently, but this is fun as it is and a fine representation of the original. YES

bass line to start doesn't sound great solo - the lack of difference between the attacks are very obvious. beat sounds nice and i like the other backing elements that come in as well at 0:20. the scratches are solid - i like what's done to the vocal snip before the B section for example. the keys that come in during the B section are also just the right vibe. i wouldn't have minded a bit of wah on the vibes for the B melody. there's a recap of the A section at 1:30 - i wouldn't have minded a bit less of the scratch volume here and another padding element to fill it in and keep the feel moving. C section starts at 1:55 and this is also a bit in need of a padding element. also the snare here is pretty loud compared to everything else. the autopan at D (~2:41)is a lot and disconcerting on headphones - it would have been nice to have half the distance in that pan. it settles down a bit at 3:27 and is a little easier to take there, but it's still a lot. i like the additional sustained element put into the melodic material there. we get another recap of the A material and then the track's done. overall this is a fun ride! really interesting example of the style you're going for. i wouldn't have minded for the autopan to be less and the snare to be a bit dirtier (and probably a bit quieter), but overall this is a solid take on a pretty theme. nice work. YES

i YES'd this before while commenting on the samples not being 100% across the board. i don't need to do as much of a write-up this time around as most of my positive comments stay the same. 1:57's fast movement in the low instruments is still a little sluggish (but that isn't changing without some serious cash in the samples), and the arrangement is still dynamic and exciting to listen to. part 6 (the half-time melody movement in the bass instruments) is my favorite part. this is still a clear pass for me. YES

the synth riff is immediately recognizable. i also like the big bass and the fun 90s synth guitar near the end. the arrangement itself is definitely nowhere near developed enough for us, unfortunately, although i like the changes you've added in the second half. an easy and quick way to expand the arrangement would be to have some chordal movement right away - going from the Fm to, say, a Db chord within the opening 30 seconds, then to a Bb or Eb would help move the progression along a lot and add a surprising amount of breadth to what you've got here. i actually don't think you need melodic material, although that's another easy way to add uniqueness to an arrangement - i think that just varying the chord progression (or, y'know, having one at all) earlier in the piece would be enough. that'd lead naturally into breaks and builds as well, and some level of added dynamics would also really help the track not feel same-y throughout. kick sounds a touch heavy next to the bass, and imo layering the bass with a less noisy version with more fundamental would help give it a bit of punch that it doesn't have. some window dressing and this is probably good enough for us. just needs more body to the arrangement and you'll be there. NO

opens with some vocals over guitars. the guitar parts sound really nuanced and nice here, and the vocals sound pretty indie. there's a huge build into 0:46, and i love the pause on the chord that is used for this. band tone is great and in your face, especially the kick beater which i really like. bass guitar tone is lost a little. the characteristic CT funk sound starts at 1:05, and there's some fun backing elements here to keep it fresh. lead guitar at 1:36 sounds fantastic. the panned rhythm elements in this section are IMO too panned and are distractingly wide, but i like what they're doing. there's a big break at 2:03 with some nice percussive elements and little blurbs in the instrumentation. the vocals here form a nice pad to everything else. another big build into 2:37, and i again like how driving and heavy the kick especially is here. 3:02's a hair-raiser, and the immediately following section is fantastic - that first chord is excellent. layering in the synth lead from earlier with the last piece of the melodic content as part of a harmonized end line is great. there's a final chord and it's done. what a ride! the opening was a little worrisome given the vox sounding pretty meh, but this takes off and never looks back. i really enjoy the overall shape of the piece and the highs are just perfect. excellent work. YES

my main concern with the last version was the timing across the board. opening faster runs at 0:12 still rush a bit, but it's not bad and makes it clear that it's live, so it isn't as big as deal as some elements last time around. the faster clapping section around 1:06 really sounds great - it's timed just right to feel like a busker or street performer. 1:27 is oodles better than last time around, and the solo section sounds great. the octave section at the end is a great ending to the track. loads better this time around, very easy vote. nice work! YES

this song again has over a minute of silence after it, similar to your Song of Storm submission. please trim the silence off of the end of your tracks before submission. opens with the original's arpeggio in the piano to open, with a slower overall tempo. 0:14 brings in the melodic line in the cello. there's a few other elements brought in at 0:28 and it gets pretty overwhelmingly loud for a bit. the piano break after is straight from the original and doesn't sound modified, and then we get a full band sound at 1:15. there's some fun elements here - the electric guitar's tone is great, and i like the downtempo feel in the bass. none of the instruments sound particularly real or balanced as everything's just layered in, but the idea is fun. the melody drops and the arpeggio is in the guitar for a bit before a sudden stop, and it's done. from an arrangement perspective, there's not a lot here that isn't in the original. i like the band feel that comes in at 1:15, but there's no new countermelodic elements, no personalization or chord changes - nothing that is Hupusu, just stuff that is Alexander Brandon but in new instrumentation. so that'd need to change before this could be considered. separately, the instruments are not particularly good - there are way more free options out there that'd really improve this, including string and piano soundfonts and VSTs - and the mix is dense because everything's just layered in with no effecting or compression or EQing. so there's a lot to work on here! but i think that the feel you get at 1:15 is great, and a good example that you know what you want to get to and it's just a matter of learning the steps along the way. i'd encourage you to take a look at the Workshop discord or forum on the site so that you can get some suggestions and start learning to improve. NO

this is 26 seconds long with 28s of silence after it. it's a neat tech demo concept but isn't close to what we could accept here unfortunately. there's nowhere near enough development of arrangement to meet our arrangement requirements, and the instrumentation isn't what we'd expect to see either. i'd encourage you to review the Standards - notably points 1.2., 4.2., and 5.2 - as they detail what we expect for our site. if you fleshed this arrangement out some more and looked into some of the free VSTs and sample packs that are available on the web, i definitely think you could turn this into something legit! but what's here isn't there yet. consider the Workshop discord or forum for additional resources. NO

This song was originally created as a way for me to learn how to use LFOs, as I've been comfortable in DAWs for years, but never really produced anything meaningful--and if you can believe it, never knowingly used LFOs. Serum 2 had dropped a few weeks prior to me starting on this, and everyone lost their minds over the plugin, going as far as crashing the download servers. I wanted to not only familiarize myself with Serum 2, a tool that the entire amateur music industry seemed to collectively soil its pants over, but also to learn how to use LFOs in a way that is both textbook and also wide-breadth application, so that I can use them more in future projects. I also really, really like Half-Life, for all its janky glory in 2025. It's a formative game for me. The core, lead synthesizer to the remix, audible from beginning to end with very little breakage, is based on something not even the original composer created: it was a stock sample from a trance music sample disc from the mid 90s. I decided to recreate it from scratch so that I could manipulate it as I saw fit. Given the game's propensity to use samples for a large part of its soundtrack, I feel it necessary to clarify that there are no samples whatsoever from the original game song in this remix. The lead synthesizer alone utilizes six LFO channels, each on a different programming (retrigger, duration/how many bars, etc.) to automate its various textures and filters. This was the point of the exercise. Nearly every other track in the song uses 2 to 4 of their own LFO channels, and the rest is either sampled (sourced from my Splice back-catalog, 909 kits, or whatever else I had onhand) or oscillators tweaked to imitate the timbre of real instruments (the electric guitars, for example, are not sampled guitars--they're distorted and shaped sawtooth oscillators). The original song is a lot simpler, and has a more obvious A-B-C sequence of structure, like verses to a lyrical song, but not really. I decided to try and unify some of these sections together so the song sounds less like four separate ideas concatenated together, and more like a song that evolves and riffs on the same cool sequencer lick. Thus, the song is more of a buildup, reaching a bridge section which drops most of the percussion except for a Daft Punk-esque tambourine, and a crescendo climax which integrates faux electric guitar and the heavily chorused/flanged synthesizers typical of Half-Life music. Vocals are a mixture of scatting/improv vocal samples and a gospel choir thrown in there, because it's the closest in feel that I could think of to match the as-yet-unknown vocal sample of the original song. For mixing, I tried to ensure each instrument channel had an EQ register of its own, but there was always bound to be some overlap as instruments sound pretty bland and unconvincing without their harmonics. The climax of the song had to be compressed to ensure all the loudness of the various lead instruments coalescing together didn't destroy anyone's speakers. This part is the weakest part of the mix by far, but Half-Life 1 music is very in-your-face and dare I say aggressively 90s, and I don't feel bad about it being loud--I just hope it doesn't lose too much of the plot. I'm not a music producer, I just like OCR and Half-Life. I'll accept any feedback and make changes as the review staff see fit. Games & Sources Game is based on the outro/credits theme to Half-Life 1 Original song here HL2 also sampled this song for its own credits theme, but it was fairly different in that version, different enough to be its own song (and very short, only around 30 seconds) Both songs are by Kelly Bailey The main synthesizer hook, audible from the very beginning, in the original game's soundtrack was a sample from the disc entitled Trance Formation: Creative Essentials Sampling CD - Volume 6, track 19, sample 3, "Trippy Seq. 3 F 120." This sample was recreated in my own style for the remix. A large quantity of samples are used in the HL1 soundtrack, none of which are used in this remix--I tried to source my own or create my own. A list of known samples from the original song can be found here.

opens with some very light piano. the hammer tone of the higher octave of the keys around 0:17 sticks out a bit, but that's a VST limitation more than anything. there's some really nice sequencing in the approach here - starting with the higher octave, moving to left hand block chords, and then by a minute in moving to a more flowing left hand, with more personalization in the right hand - it's a really nice flow. 1:30 adds in some third-hand panned elements which give it a bit of a spacey feel for a bit, a neat addition. 1:42 brings in a new, fuller orchestration that also features constant motion which i think helps convey the feel the remixer was going for. 2:33's focus on the IV-vi movement is really nice and helps emphasize the really nice original elements that make this a nice song. around here though i noticed that most of the right hand had been hammering for over a minute at about the same velocity, and it starts to be a little uncanny valley/machine gun. there's an absolutely delightful transition and key change into 2:58 (genuine smile there, it's great), and we get some noodles that are ultimately a setup for the ending. there's an extremely light doubling in the upper octave for the last line that i wish was a bit louder because i love the idea, and then it's done. i don't think this is too conservative for the site at all! i think there's some real fresh air in this arrangement and approach. really appreciate the couple specific times you really changed it up (like at 2:58), and wouldn't have minded more of that, but what's here is great. YES

Other artists/credits: jnWake (Electric Piano, Lead Synth, Organ) roqdrummer (Drums) streifig (Lead & Additional Guitar) Nivan Sharma (Lead & Additional Guitar) Justin Wilbanks (Drum Recording & Editing) Besides the arrangement, I also handled the bass parts, rhythm guitars (and some additional guitars), vocals, and mixing and mastering. I was inspired to arrange this song after seeing the band F8-Bit perform it live. At home, I picked up my 6-string guitar and started playing some arpeggios reminiscent of the chord progression in the second-to-last section. In reality, I was playing a guitar part very similar to a part I came up with for one of my band's songs that happens to have a pretty similar chord progression; that part was ironically inspired by Chrono Trigger/Cross and Yasunori Mitsuda in general, so I thought it would be poetic to use it as a base to start my arrangement. My guitar was also tuned to Eb standard, and I was playing the section in Eb minor, even though the original section was in B minor, so it results in a wildly different key than the original for the intro; once the band kicks in and the original first section kicks in, it transitions to G# minor, a half-step down from the original, and it remains a half-step down throughout the song and the two key changes found in the song. The structure is more or less like the original, aside from some added bars in some transitions, as well as the last two sections each having a repetition; the OG second-to-last section starts with a more laid-back variant much like the original, but then it explodes into a bombastic, epic version, featuring streifig's huge lead guitars. Then, with an extra sick drum and guitar fill, the final section starts without the melody and instead has a beautiful and melodic guitar solo (handled by my longtime vgm friend Nivan Sharma!), before finally coming back to the original melody (with an added harmony!), and an extra little set of rhythmic jabs and a drum fill to send it off. Style and genre wise, I labelled this as Prog Rock/Prog Metal in my YouTube upload title, as I typically do on my channel as the best-fitting label, but I also took some inspiration from some post-rock/space rock with the shimmery and big reverby guitars (big reason why streifig was invited onto this project!), as well as more alternative metal and post-hardcore music when it comes to the driving rhythm of the drum part I gave to Roque, and the kind of rhythm guitar parts I came up with; the arrangement inevitably became more proggy with what I got back from Roque though, as well as the bass and keyboard parts, and the rhythm guitar parts aren't especially noticeable or at the forefront with the melodies and other embellishments added on top. This was originally done as a submission to Dwelling of Duels in March of 2025 for one of its Free months. Since then, I recently did some mixing/mastering touch ups and finally uploaded it to my own YouTube channel at the start of July. Games & Sources Chrono Trigger - Chrono Trigger Chrono Trigger - Schala's Theme Chrono Cross - Radical Dreamers ~Le Tresor Interdit~ These two are not the focus of the arrangement, and are just referenced as easter eggs that are pretty subtle, especially Schala's Theme; the main melody is referenced in the intro section by a guitar kind of in the background, and Radical Dreamers is referenced in the second quieter section in the middle and the bigger section right after that by a few instruments; first by a shimmery clean guitar + vocals doing the Chrono Cross melody (which is important in the game's story), and another background guitar doing the main melody; then in the bigger section, the CC melody is played by the lead synth. In both sections, one or two guitar parts reference the guitar arpeggios. Wasn't entirely sure if I really needed to note these sources since they're just easter eggs, but maybe better safe than sorry.

I just love this song and I had to do an arrangement of it Games & Sources Tyrian 2000, Composition in Q

The song is a very short arrangement of the Song of Storms from Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, it's abou 54 seconds long, I chose to make it short so it can be used maybe as a ringtone or a short background song Games & Sources Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, Song of Storms

the original decision thread is here: source breakdown remains the same. changes for the resub: - tried to tighten the timing in general, especially in the middle section - changed some of the shaker patterns to add more dynamics, - unmuted the handclaps track i've recorded for the original version special thanks to Argle in the OCR discord for helping me fixing the timing. Games & Sources Sky Shark - Stage 2

I've been reluctant to submit anything I've worked on for my recent "Reflections" project because most of the music for that has been stripped-down piano arrangements that are fairly conservative and close to the source material in their approach. This particular project for me was much more about visuals and storytelling and nostalgia, and I've found that the more traditional piano cover approach works well for that media. While my rendition of the "Leaflands" theme from Octopath Traveler II is similarly fairly close to its source in the structure, I was happy with some of the arrangement choices I made, and it covers an absolutely beautiful original piece from a soundtrack that has as of yet received little love on OCR. This particular arrangement in the context of my project is meant to convey a feeling of remembering past holiday gatherings and the wistful realization that the family and the world of those times is in many ways lost forever. The original melody has such a feeling of childlike awe and a tinge of longing that for me it worked beautifully as a piano rendition as well. If the arrangement is too close to source for OCR standards I absolutely get it. No harsh feelings for anything that's not up to the standards set for the community. But it's such a beautiful song from a relatively under-represented OST, I figured I would sub just in case it worked out. Either way, enjoy the listen, and thanks!! -Mike Games & Sources The Leaflands Octopath Traveler II Composed by Yasunori Nishiki

i was up and down on the first version of this one for a while. i didn't like the solo but liked the concept, and wound up actually changing my vote from YES to NO at one point as other folks weighed in. opens with some light synth rolls - nothing startling here. band comes in at 0:26. percs and bass sound a lot better than it did before iirc. melody here is a little square - no timing personalization, just everything on the downbeats. tsori comes in at 0:51 and i really think he could be both louder and have more verb on his instrument. it's lower in the range for this part mostly, and it doesn't speak as well as it could. there's also a touch too much formant on his tone so it's a little sharp compared to the rest of the very lush backing elements. i like the doubling at 1:17 though with the guitar - that's a neat sound. tsori shows off a bit of range at 1:36 which is nice. the descending chromatic line in the background is right in the same range though and that conflicts and sounds confusing. there's a bit of a lick from the trumpet and then it moves to a new lead at 1:42. i wouldn't have minded a cymbal crash or sfx on that transition. this felt like more of the same by this point as we hadn't really had a significant background change in 90s. the lead's so chill that dropping the percs or switching it up there would have been a nice change. coming out of the solo section at 2:19, we get a big change in the backing elements which is nice. there's some light airy pads with the trumpet on top, and from there go to a back-and-forth section between the guitar and trumpet which is really nice. guitar in particular is great. 3:14 is a drop and we get some chorale-ish chords to play us out, and we're done. there's a lot cleaned up here. there's still some funky notes occasionally, and some of the balance isn't quite there, but what we have is a solid take on a great theme. mix is much cleaner this time around. YES

excited about this one, it's a great concept and a great list of musicians, and an outrageous track. opens with a very heavy, intense opening right away with multiple lead instruments. trumpet might be a bit buried. there's a huge fall-off at 0:40 with some interesting effects, and the keys bring us into the melodic material. i love the delay on bringing in the drums there, that's fantastic. really like the drum pattern in here, as well as passing the melodic line around. similar positives on the trumpet/guitar intro at 1:22 - and the unison section! oh, that was great. really like the pairings of acoustic and violin, and trumpet and guitar. the interplay of melodic and solo elements in this section through 2:15 are great - really enjoy the variety and the way that parts are passed between. 2:15's a big break back to the acoustic guitar for the lead. this quickly kicks it up soon afterwards. and i like the key change there to help it feel fresh and different from before. there's a huge build and even a silence break before a very appassionato chord at 3:17 - i think the silence was a bit much, but i like the focus on this section and the half-time feel to help it sink in. there's another big break and we get some keys before a big, turbulent section starting at 3:55. there's a lot of difference here than before's band sounds - lots of more rhythmic elements to help it drive forward. your storytelling here is helpful to understand what's happening. the recontextualization of 4:41's theme is really nice. the last minute or so is a pretty intense blow - really great work by minusworld to keep it so intense on the lead part. the ending hits - i wish the sustain was longer! - and then it's a few chords to finish it along the sfx from before. this is a real whirlwind. i'm so surprised it placed as low as it did in DoD - the storytelling and direction of this is fantastic. it sounds excellent and it's a tight mix overall for a variety of instruments. this is an easy vote as expected. YES

such a goofy soundtrack. the melodic line is so angular, all the ascending fourths are an inverse of the bassline so that's really fun. opens with detuned, crispy chords that echo the flute element in the original. 0:17 is where the percussive elements come in, and i agree, they are drowning in reverb. it's a lot lot. bass and melody come in together at 0:32. the lead instrument is a really unique sound with the detuning on it. the vocal clips are real interesting too. there's a guitar that comes in around 1:05 and noodles through the melody, and soon after we get what sounds like an accordion or organ with vocal clips on top. this is another interesting sound profile, but admittedly the feel is getting tired by here after 90+ seconds of the same thing. there's mercifully a break right after this at around 2:10 - this would have been a good time to do a different drum pattern for a bit to give it a break before going back to the original feel at 2:26 when the bass comes back in. the track keeps the same feel with a recap of the original synth lead before a sudden stop for an ending, and then it's done. i really don't care for ＡＥＳＴＨＥＴＩＣＳ that much so this genre isn't one i'm super familiar with. overall i feel that the track is pretty stilted and repetitive, although the concept is neat initially. the effects work on the vocals and leads is pretty impressive. the reverb that's washing the whole track does feel less like the lush, rich reverb i've come to associate with synthwave and other microgenres around it and more like playing a speaker in a bathroom - it's a lot colder and harsher than i'd have expected. so i guess i'm not sure if my thoughts are appropriate here or not. i'll wait to get some perspective from other judges. ??? edit 7/31: i listened to a pile of stuff that emu wrote, and read through the other judge writeups. i need to state that i think that this genre is nonsense and the genre norms that it encourages sound wretched, way more so than sludge rock or crunkcore or other similarly niche concepts, so that's the context of this vote. but comparing lucas's track to his reference track, lucas's verb is far more present (and metallic, it does sound like spring verb, good call kris) than the other examples provided. comparing it to most of the 'chillwave' and 'vaporwave' tracks on emu's reference vid, the reverb is again more metallic - and, more importantly, the instrumentation feels far more separated. the percussion for example feels like it's a totally different song's percs layered in, same with the bass. i agree that the vocal clips are handled really well, and the obviousness of the low-poly approach is clear. but man, this just sounds like something that comes from a kid's electronic toy that took a dive at bath time. the reverb just feels too much. and that's aside from how angular and stiff the actual arrangement feels. NO

not quite 4db of headroom. this is a bop of an original, never heard it before. opens with some keys playing some chord blocks that are really, really loud compared to what's going on in the background. there's some heavily filtered riffage in the background, and eventually we get a bass element at 0:23 that's playing some of the bass riff from 0:13 in the original. there's the melodic element brought in at 0:57, and it's in a traditional detuned piano. there's a bit of harmony after a while, and then the melody gets passed to a new instrument at 1:36. the keys at this part are again really loud compared to everything else. there's a shift at 2:15 to reduce the instrumentation and drop the drums and to layer the lead with a buzzy pad that's much lower. it does this a second time, and then it's done. i'll be the first to note that lo-fi doesn't mean put a lowpass at 3khz on the entire track, which is what's happened here as far as i can see. so from a mix perspective, this needs some definite assistance. i'll page resident lofi expert @Emunator to suggest some more applicable production techniques since he'll be 1000% more detailed than i could be. in terms of the arrangement, what's here is very straightforward and simple. lo-fi doesn't mean that you can't still have a creative adaptation, and what's here is pretty much just a transcription. adding more LTH to it and not leaning so heavily on what made the original track great would be a great choice here. i think the workshop discord can definitely assist with giving some additional feedback and perspective on how to make the arrangement more personalized. this isn't there yet, but it's a neat idea and i think it has legs. i'd love to hear it with a better mix and more personalization. NO

opening apes the intro ostinato but doesn't replicate it perfectly. really aggressive band sound right off the bat - guitars sound super huge and beefy. there's a funky note in the vocals in the second verse ("the" in "the right to choose"). we get the chorus at 1:07. the fast riff at the beginning of each line is unintelligible - i can't tell if it's due to timing from the double-tracking of the vocals or if it's just poor enunciation. the tone is fantastic though - this is 1000% the right key for your voice, and the melody line is adapted in a great way to fit what you're best at. the following bridge is a bit of a break, but there's still some flashy vox work here in the descending line. prosody in this section is real goofy in a few places ("beams reflecting" is a big one), and more importantly your pronunciation is really rough - even seeing the words, i had trouble tracking the lyrics onto what i was hearing. 1:43 is going to be divisive - doubling the line two octaves down is certainly a choice, and the significant pitchiness of the second line "test of one's resolve" is really obvious when there's nothing going on underneath it to help ground what's going on. this is something that so few singers could do, so the approach is impressive, and the transition into the following section is great. but i really don't care at all for this section. it's pitchy again after here a bit, like at 2:06 there is straight up a wrong note in the vocal line (sounds like a mistake in melodyne tbh). there's a slick guitar solo after this section and it gets a double-time intensification halfway through. 2:50 the vocals come back in for a recap of the bridge. there's a synth line that's popping out of the texture here sometimes that doesn't quite fit the rock feel. after this is a big drop and build. the vocal line comes out of here into a big final blow with some big harmonies, some big screams, and a big chord to finish it off. there's some huge positives in this. the band sound is big and beefy and great, and the guitar solo elements really are solid and fitting for the arrangement. i think the adaptation is really interesting and much broader than i'd have expected a synth rock to heavier rock transition to be. and ofc cyril's tone is spectacular - just continues to get better as he gets more experienced. on the other hand, the prosody in several sections of this is really messy, and more importantly, i can't understand 3/4 of the words. the section at 1:43 is really something i don't think works at all (but would understand if someone else was totally taken by it, as it's certainly a choice that was committed to). from a hobbyist bar perspective, i definitely think this is over the bar, personal feelings aside. so i'll give this a positive vote, and reach out to cyril to at least fix the wrong note at 2:06. YES

opens with sustains and some (kinda cheesy) descending organ blocks. this is a nice patient intro that'd be home on several of the tracks off of Systematic Chaos by DT. the bass riff into band riffage with the tight kit behind it into a more complex version of the same thing is a classic escalation mechanic. bass tone in here is excellent, really like the bite. vocals come in at 1:31. seph's clean vocals here could use more bite in the tone imo, or even possibly a touch of distortion to add some edge. the guitars are so biting here as is the backing vocals, so something with more edge would have worked really nice. the diction and pitching is great though, even through the melismatic passages. the electric squeal in the right ear at 2:13 is unsettlingly loud and hurt my ears, it's a cool idea but needed to be quieter. i did the "ooh yeah" face at 2:25 - that double-time ensemble section right there is great, and it flows well into the 7/8 section right after it. there's a slam transition at 3:04 into...more of the same band stuff, which was a little surprising - i really expected an exploratory section after such a significant transition. there's a crunch at 3:49 that i thought was clipping but was just backing vocals being fried. after 4:00ish we get the ensemble section we've been waiting for. the organ here maybe needed a touch more room sound on it as it felt pretty dry (might just be the density of the backing parts). there's another 'chorus' section and then we get into an extended break section. this starts with a Tristram-esque acoustic section around the second part of Fleeting Respite that is beautifully recorded and played. i liked the detail on the drum work here as well. there's a few weird notes that don't quite fit in the end of it, but it's mostly not a problem. there's some more of the organ stacks around the big guitar slams (organ doesn't sound 100% in time), and some classic whoa-oh cyril stuff, and the backing guitar rhythm in here sounds pretty dope. i wouldn't have minded more verb on the vocals to help them be more choral and less like Hear N' Aid. we get a guitar solo after this that is excellent, and then a sudden ending that isn't particularly prepped. ending is kind of a let-down after such a big work - i'd actually have been fine with a fade-out as it's stylistically appropriate, but even a bigger fill going into that ending would have been nice. this is a huge undertaking and it's a fantastic result. from a compositional perspective, this is superb - there's a ton of interweaving of the different elements, it's super fun without being medleyitis, there's loads of creative adaptation throughout, and the performance of it is excellent as well. the mix is overall really solid as well despite all the parts - there's a few nits here and there, but overall this sounds professionally produced. superb work. YES

>5db of headroom. opens with a straightforward version of the original in piano, which quickly adds some band stuff at 0:13. mix is very dense in the low mids especially and is very muddy. sounds pretty low-poly too, like it's been downsampled at some point - it feels like when i used to run 64kbps on my 256mb mp3 player so i had enough room for all my songs =D 0:29, a guitar lead comes in. it's fantastically handled and sounds great. the arrangement up through here is doing a good job of letting the fun parts of the original come through and not getting in its own way. there's a break at 1:24, again with the keys. we get an electro build-up (i really expected edm after that), and then we get another guitar solo that again is great and well-handled. another electro break and there's a recap at 2:08 with the guitar leading again. one more lick in the piano, and it's done. this is a really fun arrangement! it's nothing over the top or complex, but it does a great job highlighting the reasons this is such a heavily covered theme. the lead guitar does a fantastic job especially with the solos. my main issue is the mastering sounds pretty rough. there's a ton of sub-40hz content which is gumming things up, as is a very broad and dense freq package between like 100-300hz. you have a ton of fundamental and not much in the mid to high mid space, which makes it sound really heavy and cluttered. cleaning that up is just a matter of pulling back some of the filtering on the lead elements (the keys sound like they've got a significant low-pass on them for example) and notching in the EQ on some of the other instruments to avoid conflicts between, say, the rhythm guitar and kick. this is really close to being super fun! just adjust some of the mix and we'll be there. NO

opens with a bass riff, and we get some difficult-to-consume riffs until we hear the electric guitar play something that's a little more recognizable. there's a bit of melody at 0:35, but the lead guitar is overwhelmingly loud compared to the other elements so it's kind of hard to tell what's melody snippets and what isn't. there's a phase section right after, and we get some of the ascending riff from the original in the 1:13 section and a few times after. i hear the half-step line at 1:40 as well. there's a transition into an extended bass solo. it's impressively performed and - if indeed fully improvised, really impressively created - and it has, to my ears nothing to clearly tie it to the source, which is going to make recognizable source usage tough. there's a fun transition out of the bass solo that's very In The Presence Of Enemies by DT, and more of the half-step noodles. we get some reinforced melodic elements, and then a not-ending. so, for source - there's a ton of adapted references to the source material in the band sections - it's just very highly adapted. the bass solo doesn't have any source to my ears, so of the remaining ~3 minutes, we'd need about 2:20 of that to be playing Kalle Demos. taking out the transition sections that are just original, I'm pretty sure we're close enough, but timestamping this would be rough given that i don't hear all of the correlations (for example, i can't map the bass to anything). from a mix perspective, there's parts of this that really sparkle - the bass tone and the solo, for example - and there's parts where the lead guitar just totally takes over and the mix doesn't work at all (like at 1:40, where the lead is 2x as loud as it should be). i think the drums throughout are too quiet except the bass beater tone, and the pads in general are too loud. i didn't prefer the band sound as a whole very much actually. reining in the edge of the lead guitar might have helped with that. from a holistic perspective, there's a clear direction for the entire track throughout, and i think that the overall progression is indeed accessible to a degree. i think the solo goes a bit long and the ending is a disappointment (something you corrected in Lost in the Woods!), and i think that a firmer grounding at the beginning of the elements you're going to use would have helped a lot. this is a highly cerebral piece as expected, but once you understand the elements and how they're being used, there's a really clear concept that's being defined and approached here. it's probably too complex for its own good - as expected given the arranger! - but your friendly local alphabet-heavy bass soloist does seem to have done something here that isn't too sideways to fit on the site. YES

i listened to the other source reference that was here and then listened to all nearly 10 minutes of the remix, and was completely confounded by how wildly different they were. lo and behold, wrong source mix =) that makes more sense! opens with a vocal ascending line that fits the theme really well. a beat starts to develop over the next 30s, and around 0:38 we settle into something that is recognizable. there's an intentional lo-fi feel to this throughout - the percussion and keys especially are very low-poly and take a bit of getting used to. the track is way too long to really do a play-by-play, but essentially it's a wide exploration of the ascending riff that starts fairly early on in the source, with an occasional use of the opening descending lick as a break. from an arrangement perspective, there's an impressively broad use of that ascending riff and it's immediately apparent once you actually know what you're looking for. around the middle of the piece, there's some really exploratory outlining of that same riff while keeping it fresh, which is a pretty neat job. similar action at 5:40 or so. around 7:40 or so i started to get a little tired of the variety of repetition (bravo for keeping it unique for that long!) but then we suddenly got some interesting arpeggiated elements. the end is the middle of a phrase though and that was super bogus, i really wanted more there. i desperately want this track in our backlog. there's certainly room to improve the production of this by miles, but dang if this isn't one of the more unique tracks we've had in our inbox at any point. the ending stinks and i wish the kick was meatier, but what's here is so interesting. YES edit 9/15: if this is AI it's a no.