big giant circles

I definitely see what you're saying there, and I suppose I agree with the principle, but it's been my experience that high quality sound libraries require just as much effort to get to sound good as free stuff. It's generally a myth that high end orchestra stuff sounds "just like a real orchestra!" right out of the box without good writing and especially good tweaking/mixing/mastering/fx.

*edit* I totally clicked on the wrong thread in the forums to post in. Mah bad.

Geez, Sam incarnate? Wait, Sam is still alive... Clone then? Awesome work. This sounds like DP stuff to me. YEP

Pretty conservative remix for the most part. I was getting worried it might be a little too much of a mere trance cover/adaptation until the breakdown section (with the announcer) kicks in, and that seemed to break up the similarity just enough that I was satisfied with the arrangement. There's kind of an odd, lo-fi feel to the sound during that part, and I guess for the sake of the intended cinematic feel, it was ok. I mean, after all, it's supposed to be a crowd of soccer fans going wild while the announcer commentates and all that, so I'm cool with it. The production sounds very clean, I have no problems there at all My only real criticism of the track would be that the ending seemed a little bit abrupt, and probably could have turned out a bit cooler than it did, but on the whole, I think this is over the bar and will make a nice addition to the site. TOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRRRRR (GOOOOOOOOOAAAAAALLLLL) (I do think it's funny that the track is about Ireland, but yet the theme is very much German. I was kind of expecting Ulian pipes and penny whistles at first)

I can see why OA digs this Very cool sounding track, and I'm only about half way through it so far. Great job with the Indian-Electronica crossover. Amazing how the opening tabla groove manages to sound so electronic. And the pad synth was a good substitute for the sitar. Remix has a lot of energy and a pretty solid flow to it, I'm definitely enjoying it! One note, you've got to be careful on your big swells/hits. You can't just stack all your sounds on top of one another at loud volumes, because you get clipping/over-compression, and that did seem to happen pretty much everytime there was a loud swell/hit. Since you're pretty new to the game, I'll let 'em slide, but please be more mindful of that in the future. Learn to automate your volume levels and utilize compressor plugins so that everything plays nice together when it's time to share a limited space on the loudness table. Can't say I heard any gripes with the arrangement. Seemed a bit conservative, but I didn't ever feel the need to dissect it during any of my multiple listen/comparisons. With respect to my gripe about the volume peaks, welcome aboard, I say. SURE

Eh, I'm not gonna lie, this is some of the worst overcompression I've heard in a submission in a good while At times, it about blew my ears off, even when I had a pretty nice listening level already set, and it was working great on all the other music I've been listening up to this point. Geez, you've gotta get that under control. I'm fighting the urge to start some big giant rant about the damn music loudness war, but I'm not going to (aside from that remark anyway.) I certainly don't intend to sound harsh, but I'm going to be pretty direct this review. The mixing and mastering is absolutely slaughtering the overall quality. There are more than a couple parts that are entirely too loud, the mix sounds like I'm listening to it either through a metal tube, or in the next room, or down a long hallway, depending on the moment of the song. The drums are completely buried the entire time, and when they are heard, they're too muffled and spacey. For the chip sounds, they're so loud and dry that they contrast kind of unpleasantly with the more organic textures, which are generally much wetter. The arrangement sounds like it's pretty cool, and the performance as well. But the mixing is just so horribly amateur that I just can't bring myself to give the mix a go. Sorry fellas, clean this up, get the volume under control, and bring it back. I absolutely dig the concept, but you've got to make sure you polish it up before shipping it to the consumers. RESUBMIT

I guess here's a bit of an update, if anyone's interested. Though it doesn't actually tell me anything I didn't already know, at least it was a speedy response (on Christmas day, no less!) Bummer. I hate waiting, especially when the wait length can't even be approximated. Oh well, c'est la vie, I suppose. Poop.

Hate to rip off OA's vote pretty much word-for-word, but he pretty well nailed it Even though it's not one of his stronger tracks, it still has many of the endearing qualities of a Willrock track, lots of synth love and lots of energy. I would have to say the production and EQ (especially on the drums) is my biggest D: Sounds like there's a CRAZY amount of high end on your snare and toms, and it's kind of ear-piercing (especially on phones). Gotta clean that up, mang! Granted how productive Will is, and how he's been cleaning up his production lately, I think this shouldn't be a huge problem for him RESUB

It's worth noting, that even though he didn't mention it in the submission email, the remixer quite prominently featured a riff from the Brinstar green area in Super Metroid. Anyway, cutting right to the chase, I have essential two critical gripes for this song: -Too long. -Too repetitive. Trim it down to about 4 - 4 1/2 minutes. There's just not enough in here to keep the song interesting for 7 minutes. And for the repetition, maybe change up the drum pattern and add some fills, and try to not stick to default FL Studio-sounding drum hits the whole time. Not a bad start, but you gotta change it up and keep it concise! NO

I think Stickerbrush is like the Ice Cap of the DK series. Good tune, but I swear, everybody goes for that one. Nothing wrong with that at all, I'm just saying. I can't say I was really wow'd in terms of the arrangement itself here, but this does have some sparkly qualities that make it an enjoyable piece regardless. Some of the textures/instruments, and even the writing itself at times sound very Ziwtra-ish. The distorted, filterswept leads kind of reminded me of his Emotions track at times. I really enjoyed the glitchtastic, st-st-st-st-st--st---st-----st------stuttered ending as well. Great stuff I actually didn't mind the abrupt ending, honesty. Were it any other style than glitch, I almost certainly would have. But I'm indifferent. I'm cool with it whether it's "fixed" or left as-is. Nice work, Ross! YES

I was gonna say, those sound like live horns, and then I read the submission email Pretty rockin cover, fellas! Love to hear more stuff from you in the future! I thought the mixing/EQ could have used some work, but this is still nothing short of enjoyable, and the performances ranged anywhere from adequate to pretty darn awesome Unfortunately, as already stated, we aren't really in the business of accepting covers, and aside from the solo section, that's pretty much all this is. Perhaps a suggestion when making things more "OCR-friendly", try to work in some solos into the actual melodies themselves. It's the little flourishes and expansions that occur within the melodies that really show off the ways one can rearrange a classic theme into something more their own, while still remaining the overall spirit of the source Anyway, great stuff, sorry we can't really pass it on a technicality, but I hope to hear more from you guys! NO

I'm definitely on board with Vinnie and Andrew on this one. For all the stong moments, there are some equally weak ones. I'm not quite sure what to make of this remix on the whole. Not that that in and of itself is necessarily a bad thing. I usually enjoy when remixes don't lend themselves well to simple categorization, because it tends to show off more creativity. I think that's the case here, but again, unfortunately, everytime I thought a particular section was totally off the hook, the next section would retort with a resounding "meh". It's a pretty bi-polar mix like that, it seems. I'm going to try to sum up some suggestions/comments quickly, pretty much echoing what's already been said: -Do something about that intro. -Work on adding some appropriate "wetness" to certain instruments. -Clean up that section from 1:27 - 1:42 -The transition at 1:43 was great, but I'm not really impressed with the EP right after (the tone or the sequencing). Try something else, I guess? -I thought 2:19 - end was pretty cool, can't say I have any problems with it. Nice work there Hope to hear this one resubmit, I've never heard the Shatterhand OST before, and it's pretty dang awesome! Keep at it! RESUBMIT

Alright, I'm getting pretty annoyed at Garritan right about now. I am really sick of seeing this garbage: http://www.garritan.com/stradivari.html http://www.garritan.com/cello.html I have been seeing that message for at least a couple years now I believe. I really want these, and I'm still a bit puzzled why they were even discontinued in the first place, especially since they're simply losing sale opportunities all this while. And being kept in the dark for so long is just obnoxious. It's like they're the Duke Nukem Forever of virtual instruments. Anybody else noticed this shameful display of feet-dragging?

also, since there's only one (sometimes two) guys handling the inbox, it's more important for them to always be moving songs to the panel. At the very least, once it's to the panel, we can start chipping away at it. Before it gets to us, it's quite literally dead in the water. Any progress > No progress, wouldn't you agree?

You filthy hooker you, you stole my pun. WAY TO RUIN MAH CHRISTMAS VOTING SPREE I keed, I keed No really though, I wanted to use that pun Alright, well, I have nothing new to add then at all. Great work fellas, I've been a long time fan. Back since I first heard the OMF mix. Keep it up, remix moar. YEP Honestly, I'd still say this is probably DP material despite the ending (which wasn't THAT bad or anything). Vinnie, re: manning the inbox:

Shoot, I feel like I totally dropped the ball on this. I remember listening to this like a month ago, and it must have been really late at night or maybe after a long voting session, because I could have sworn I already voted on it. /hangs head sheepishly. Sorry about that dudes. I'm a little torn on the mix. I think it's a fairly strong mix overall, but cutting to the chase, I tend to fall in pretty close with Andrew's vote. I think you've got a great foundation here, absolutely! I think the solid, 1-chord "rhythm" guitars was probably the most distracting to me. I'd definitely consider redoing those with something with a little more "chugga chug chugga" if you get my meaning. Drums were a little bit thin, but overall I didn't think that they by themselves were the single obstacle holding this one back. That said, if there is any way you could quick EQ them to give that snare just a little more edge, that'd be awesome. Maybe bring out the highs just a bit more to give it some more sizzle, perhaps. Anyway, gonna go ahead and wrap this up, but as Andrew said, feel free to hit us up if you can quickly touch this up, and we'll slap it back up here for a quick resub, bros! Keep at it! You're super close! (borderline) NO - RESUBMIT!

I understand what you're saying for sure! However, just think of it like I do. It's better to spend a little extra now, and stock up on a good variety for the year until next year's holiday sales I mean, seriously, this stuff would cost us hundreds of dollars if we bought it any other time. I did the math last night, and I bought about $332 worth of games for $83. I mean, that's like the cost of one new release and an expansion or something normally!

It's got it's pros and cons, but it's well worth $5 just for the art style and music alone. The story is completely half-baked, but once you get used to the physics and handling, the game play is 'aight. I'm sure you've burned $5 in far worse ways I just bought a crap load of stuff including: -The Eidos Collector Pack (mainly for Arkham Asylum, which is on sale for $33.49 from the usual $50) but hey, the entire pack which contains 20 games which is normal $100 was only $50 for the whole thing, I figured I'd splurge. I'm sure there's some gems in there. -Star Wars Jedi Night Collection for $10 -Stalker for $2 -Borderlands DLC for like <$7 -Assassin's Creed for $10 -Painkiller Black for $5 I think that's it for now. I'm sure I'll buy more for their 1-day stuff before this is all over. HAWX is on my list, I'm just waiting to see if it goes well for one of the one day things. I might buy Ghostbusters too. I heard it's only kind of meh, but I like the movie, so we'll see.

Original Decision - http://ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=25493 **************************** Source stuff in the original decision thread. I think this addresses the bulk of my primary concerns. The mixing isn't quite flawless, but again, I think it fits the context really well. And the newer version seems like it's reduced quite a bit of the clutter from it's predecessor. It's a nasty dirty sounding remix that bears lots of energy in a pretty cool way. I'm pretty ok with it. YES

may your wildest dreams come true. Happy bday man!

Ouch, that's not a very good deal. Though it's not made anymore, so perhaps they feel justified in charging that much. I tell you what I would do, is I would give 'em a shout and let them know that Omni's been out for a while, but you're willing to take Atmosphere off their hands if they'll give it to you for a reasonable price. It's probably fine to just be straight up and let them know that they're not likely to sell it at that price while Omnisphere isn't that much more and offers like 10+ times more content. Good luck, let us know how it goes if you go that route.

I wish I had time to officially contribute to this. Instead, here's some Xmas music I did last year ago. Can't really post the download links since I don't own these, but here's some holiday music for you guys. Happy Holidays from Big Giant Circles!