OCR01773 - *YES* Banjo-Kazooie 'Malevolent Mansion'

[zircon]

Hey man, thanks for doing this. Here's the submission info, the title being "Malevolent Mansion":

Audix (arrangement, production)

Ordinarily, Pendulum and Banjo-Kazooie's soundtrack would seem to be just about as opposite on the music spectrum as you could get, but I felt that Grant Kirkhope's great BK score--especially Mad Monster Mansion--would lend itself perfectly to frenetic Pendulum-inspired dnb/rock, with the usual necessary orchestral work.

The snare in particular took some time to develop, but I think the end result was worth it. I took special care to keep the original melodies somewhat intact, trying to use the uniqueness of the arrangement and interaction of melody lines and harmonies to define the creative side of it.

I had finished the majority of the track when I realized that some good metal guitar would really push the rock factor. I had worked with Neko on one of the tracks on my recent album release "One Day Millennium" (www.protagonistrecords.net/audix), and knew it was just a matter of time before we collaborated on an OCR sub. He laid down some licks that sounded great, and after some final production tweaks on my end, it was done.

Neko (guitar)

Only took about a day and a half to lay the guitar tracks down, the project was kind of dropped into my lap at the last minute. But that's a good thing, I work best when there's pressure

Production wise, I did my standard thing; quad tracked the guitars (boo double tracking!), and beat the hell out of my guitar. And yes, that is a low Ab note you hear in the 1:16 section -- I love 7 string guitars

[Palpable]

Yeah checks out to me. Great energy, lot of variety, and a good take on the theme. Lot of the melodic stuff is intact but there's significant structural changes and new backing parts.

YES

[Liontamer]

http://www.zophar.net/download_file/12172 - 47b "Mad Monster Mansion (Normal)"

I would have preferred richer-sounding strings, and the lead synth at :25 handling the source tune melody was blandly produced.

Honestly, the arrangement is good, but the overall energy level and depth of the sounds came off as missing something up until at least 2:24. There's a final level of polish missing to the whole thing that makes the track sound empty despite all of the stuff going on. Maybe the other Js who produce beefy tracks can follow-up on that. I also thought some of the treble was a little grating and that the soundscape got a bit cluttered once Justin's guitar work kicked in.

I mean, I hate to sound blasé on this, but I'd rather this got touched up before it was posted, because it sounds like a great late-stage WIP, but a WIP nonetheless. Regardless, I'm not merely passing it because of the time issue (that doesn't matter to me), but because the track's still strong, and the production was still capable despite the gripes. The arrangement more than carries it, and I liked the creativity of the interpretation a lot.

YES

[Palpable]

Honestly, the arrangement is good, but the overall energy level and depth of the sounds came off as missing something up until at least 2:24. There's a final level of polish missing to the whole thing that makes the track sound empty despite all of the stuff going on. Maybe the other Js who produce beefy tracks can follow-up on that. I also thought some of the treble was a little grating and that the soundscape got a bit cluttered once Justin's guitar work kicked in.

I felt it was a tad skewed to the high frequencies and could have used more bass content, so I think you explained your own problem with it there. More balanced sound might have given it more energy. Nevertheless, I thought this was very minor and the production is still definitely good enough.

[big giant circles]

Pretty obvious call here. Fantastic expansion of the original. This is right up there with Monstrous Turtles. Both could sit nicely on any custom Halloween OCR playlist.

I was chatting with Greg before about DnB, and how fun it is to make DnB tracks, he definitely brought it to the table here. And Justin's guitars only add more kick to this cup of awesome.

YES

[anosou]

Yeah, this is quite an easy pass.

Arrangement is good, production is okay too. I think it lacks some oompf in the drums (where's them bass frequencies?) but it's not a dealbreaker even though it's Drum'n'BASS

In the end the arrangement carries this one, like Larry said. I won't go conditional but I urge you to check the balance/mixing some more with your future works. Still, terrific work.

YES