Liontamer Posted August 27, 2008 Share Posted August 27, 2008 ReMixer name: Zardonic Real name: Federico Agreda Email address: zardonicst@gmail.com Website: http://www.myspace.com/djzardonic (or http://www.gorepriest.tk) Name of game(s) arranged: Chrono Trigger Name of individual song(s) arranged: Secret of the Forest (Guardia Forest) Comments about the mix: my will was to recreate the vibe of this great game with such beautiful music, into the catchy groove of drum & bass for club playing, giving it a powerful sound with subtle latin percussion for a caribbean atmospheric feeling. I hope you enjoy it. --------------------------------------------------------- http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=ct - "Secret of the Forest" (ct-111.spc) Slight measure of synchronicity in encountering this track right after "Zebes Rising" was posted, since I felt the approach was pretty similar. Hearing this encoded in VBR would have been pretty cool, since it seems a little lossy-sounding. Seems like 3:39 completely retread :44, which was weak in the overall picture, but was ultimately fine. There was a pad added into the second iteration that beefed it up and added some subtle baseline intensity. The grooves were well-constructed; how can you hate. The arrangement was personalized and substantially interpretive. By paying subtle attention to dynamics (e.g. 2:55, 3:28) and countermelodies (e.g. 2:19-2:55, repeated from 5:15-5:50) to spice up a relatively straightforward DNB piece, we had a good example of a genre adaptation that actively rose above a boilerplate approach and was instead something substantive. It's not gonna win a prize for most melodically interpretive approach, but the personalization was there. We'll see how the others feel. YES EDIT (9/9): On second thought, the NOs are right. Listening a few more times, I thought the arrangement ideas, while conservative were still well adapted. But 3:39-onward really needed to do something more with the piece and not feel so retread-ish. Given a closer look, this IS substantive, but the ideas got beat into the ground and reused too much. As is, the piece is too long to repeat this much and not come off underdeveloped. Swapping out some of the more verbatim supporting writing with new ideas, and developing & personalizing this more beyond this good genre adaptation would take this to another level and not squander the goodwill built up in the first few minutes. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anosou Posted August 29, 2008 Share Posted August 29, 2008 Cool soundscape right of the bat. I always think leaving a metronome-sounding element is a bad idea but that's a highly personal opinion. It's a good concept, I do like the DnB, but right off the bat this seems very repetitive, let's see of you can get past this then. The counter melodies (way in the back at Larry's timestamps) were all good but could've been given more room to really show you have new ideas. Getting at around 4:15 it feels I've heard this track around 5 times already. Changes in the bassnotes/chords would really help to make this less repetitive, the small bassline quirks at 3:39 is not enough imo. The changes made to the melody are interpretive but the rest of the track sounds about the same all the time except the drop-offs at 2:57 (which still uses the same bassnotes and background arpeggio.. which is straight source). The beats are also very static apart from a few drop-offs and the same elements are used to build it back up. If the beat and melody are gonna hold this track up I think they could be more interpretive and varied. Production-wise this is fine. It sounds a little lossy, like Larry mentioned, but it's minor. It also sounds a bit cluttered at times because of the high sizzle and reverb from the beats, could town that down a bit but it's not major. Overall I don't think the arrangement is ready yet. Even with the dynamic alterations (0:00,2:54, 5:07) this is just very repetitive. There could definitely be some more sophisticated source usage and variations of the beat and instrumentation. Even an original section with different chords would do! Click around anywhere in the track and you'll encounter mostly the same elements playing mostly the same thing. I didn't think the new pad at 3:39 was enough to look at this as a new section when the arrangement already has flaws. So, with some variations in the arrangement (changing chords, instruments and varying stuff up in general at times) this would make a good addition to OCR but I don't feel comfortable letting this on just yet. Sorry. NO(resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palpable Posted August 31, 2008 Share Posted August 31, 2008 My take is basically Anso's take. I liked the sound of the song, I think it's a good concept but I don't feel that it's quite ready yet. Zebes Rising is a good comparison, but I think that song had a lot more in the way of detail and dynamics, thereby altering the feel of the source material. I thought this song didn't do enough for 6 minutes. The beats were repetitive, and the new backing parts weren't prominent except for the new counter-melodies that Larry noted (some of which were just mimicking the background synth that's from the original). Some changes to melody, some changes to the beat, dynamics, and texture, and maybe even making it shorter would probably put this over the top. I think the production is where it needs to be and the overall concept is solid. I'd like to see another shot at this. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fishy Posted September 9, 2008 Share Posted September 9, 2008 I really enjoyed listening to this. It is a bit on the simple side, but its still got lots of energy and the source definitely works in the style. AnSo does have a point though, for the length, there really aren't many change ups in what's going on, you can argue that what's there overstays its welcome. Also you'd expect something this length in this genre to build up a few times or at least at the end for en epic finish, but it just kind of stops without warning. I think if you condensed this to about 4 minutes or so keeping the more interpretive counter-melodies etc, and sorted out a nice epic ending, this would be an easy yes from me. I'd like to go with Larry but the points brought up do stand. There isn't really enough going on to justify the length and putting it in danger of being "boring" by the end of it. Hope you resub, cause this is obviously going to be a nice OCR addition. NO resub plz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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