Liontamer Posted May 31, 2008 Share Posted May 31, 2008 Links to song download: Dedicated web-page: Straight to zipped mp3: Contact Information: ReMixer name: SkyMarshall Arts Real name: Eirik Blodøks Hafskjold E-Mail: skymarshall@whinerz.com Website: http://www.skymarshallarts.com UserID: 23430 Submission Information: Arranged Game: Turrican 2 Arranged Song: Freedom Additional: Original composer is Chris Huelsbeck Original: Comments: This remix is 4 years old now, but I still like it. It is made 70% in FLStudio, 20% in Cubase SX3 and 10% in Adobe Audition 1.5. Turrican has, along with Monkey Island, the soundtrack I identify the most with during my time on my Amiga 500 way back. "Freedom" is the most memorable track, and the one that stuck to my brain all these years. So I had to do a remix. The vocals are actually by one of my speech-synthesizers, heavily edited with various effects in Cubase and Audition. I got so nostalgic making this piece, that I just had to incorporate some of my thoughts through vocals as well. Also, the "Welcome to Turrican"-sample in the beginning is from the actual game, ripped through a Rolands UA-4FX using an emulator. Anyway, other than that it is a pretty straight-forward dance-tune. I really tried to keep the feeling of it all as "close" to the original as possible. I have added several original melodies/leads and backing-pads to it all, but it is mostly the same all over. Anyway, I hope you like it ... or accept it. I still get misty around the eyes when this comes on in my playlist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palpable Posted June 7, 2008 Share Posted June 7, 2008 Your arrangement is not going to win any major points for originality, but I thought this was decent trance. Nice atmosphere. It has enough breakdowns and changes in lead to keep it interesting, though I wish the beat had changed up at some point. There's only so much I can listen to that over a 6 minute track. Also, no offense, but I thought the synthesized vocal section was cheesy. My big concern is with the connection to the original. The first two minutes of this had no connection I could find, since the chords were new. Afterward, your altered melody came in, and that was the only connection I found until the end. I don't think that's really enough for a track this long. The melody wears out its welcome, and if you had switched back to your original melodies, the song probably wouldn't be connected enough. I can't think of much advice to offer here, except working in more of the source, which may involve a lot of rewriting. Production was nice, I liked how the song floated along. The lead at points might have been a little too loud for the rest of the track, and I think if you took it down, you could push the entire track volume a little higher (it was a little on the low side). Whatever you decide to do with this, I think it's a fine song, but not quite right for OCR in this state. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted June 7, 2008 Author Share Posted June 7, 2008 We have a 6MB filesize limit at OCR. Please be sure to encode any future submissions at 192kbps or lower without having the filesize above 6MB exactly. I got the right MOD set from UnExoticA, but I'm just gonna stick to referring to the MIDI, since I didn't hear the source tune anywhere in the Turrican 1 or 2 MOD packs. Weird, because "Freedom" is definitely a well-known theme, so I'm not sure what the issue was. http://malus.exotica.org.uk/download.php?file=exotica/media/audio/UnExoticA/Game/Huelsbeck_Chris/Turrican_2.lha - ? Hate to sound lazy, but reading over Palp's vote, he covered most of the bases here, though I disagree with the source not being used until 2 minutes in. It's there from the get-go. Still, the overall interpretation of the source tune was a pretty by-the-numbers dance/trance adaptation. Yeah, the spoken word section was at 1:26-1:56 just too cheesy, too tacky, and too amateur. Sorry, man. The message is OK, but the voice was the killer there. Plus the drums there were very flimsy. Picked up a bit at 1:59 with the new lead and some added harmonization, but the foundation of the track remained the same. And the rhythmic changes to the lead were pretty much the only thing going on from an interpretive standpoint. I liked the dropoff at 4:06 a lot compared to the rest of the composition, as it at least offered something different with the structure and energy level compared the previous stuff, before picking back up at 4:39 heading towards the finish. The overall energy level is just too static and the interpretation of the original is vastly underdeveloped. You gotta add more dynamic contrast to the piece to keep it fresh, and you need to get a lot more creative with the treatment of the source beyond the stuttered rhythm treatment. Work more ideas into the picture. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarkeSword Posted June 8, 2008 Share Posted June 8, 2008 Nice texture, but pretty much on cruise control the whole time, as evidenced by the percussion and that one pervasive arpeggio. I agree with Larry, the voice in the middle is cheesy as hell and really detracts from the entire song. Maybe if you vocoded it with some chords you'd lose some of the cheese, but as it is now it's no good. Hey I recognize that gating pattern at 2:40! Come on man, at least mess with it a little, rather than just using FL's default chop pattern. In the end there are some additive and subtractive appoaches to arrangement, but it's fairly repetitive throughout. I think some more evolution would help; we see a little of that near the end but it's too little too late. :\ Not bad; I realize it's 4 years old, but it's worth revisiting. Maybe do a 2008 mix or something. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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