OCR01856 - *YES* SD Snatcher 'Difficult Move Indeed'

[Liontamer]

Hello There!

...Ok, so much to tell:

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name: commandcom

userid: 26178

I'm Jorge Mira, a composer / sound designer located in Madrid (Spain). I've been involved in music bussiness since 12 years or so... Worked on studios as engineer, freelance composer, arranger, etc... since 2003 in wich I founded my own Digital Signage / Production company, from where I do my cinema bussiness and my "other bussines" in multimedia.

Maybe It's easier to link my IMDb profile, so most questions about me get answered:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1697604/

The fact is that I've felt the needing of doing a tribute album since I was 20 or so (I'm 35 now, so It's been a while) and, of course, one of my tribute targets would be VideoGame Music, as it has influenced me beyond any measurable reason.

I learned so much from those games that I felt they deserved a recognition...

So my greatest influences come from the MSX age, and, of course, Konami Games.

I made up a list, maybe 8 years ago, about the key tunes / games. And one of them is, as you may guess, SD Snatcher (Konami, MSX2, 1990)

This was one of the (now ultra famous) Hideo Kojima productions: In fact, it is a remake in an RPG style of "Snatcher", a previous game.

I'm absolutely sure you've hearded about / know for sure these two. In any case, here is a good link for info about them: http://junkerhq.net

If I had enough time, I would re-interpret / remix / re-assemble just about 90% of the work done by Konami on the MSX. Maybe you're unfamilier with the fact that Konami did implement a special soundchip in some MSX cartridges (named SCC) that provided 5 extra poliphony channels to the 3 already present on the computer itself. This gives a hint about how much did Konami care about sound and music in their games.

And that was the fact of SD Snatcher.

(...)

The ReMix:

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The intro for the game consists of 3 episodes: The song choosed corresponds to the second one, the "Title Sequence" one.

Since I hearded it, it resembled me of Mission:Impossible, James Bond and Charlie's Angels all at the same time (I wouldn't be surprised if those were the exact references Kojima gave composer Masahiro Ikariko to work with)

So, there was the Adam Clayton / Larry Mullen Re-Mix of the Lalo Schiffrin's Mission Impossible theme.

And that was the idea! Slow it down, 007-ize it, Charlie-ize it, Orchestra-ize it!

And that was quite clear years ago, untill last week, when, finally I found the right tim to do my "Push Space Key (A Tribute to Konami) EP".

I just finished to set up my new 2009 rig and needed an excuse to test it...

What did I use?

- Nuendo 4 / Reason 4 are my main tools.

- EastWest Symphonic Orchestra (Orch. bits)

- Colossus (1 layered bass, several persussion items)

- Trilogy (1 layered bass)

- Atmosphere (2 pads)

- Storm Drum (several persussion items)

- Virtual Guitarist Electric Edition

Arranged / Mixed in the N4, mastered (light one, preserving dynamics) in WaveLab / Ozone2

(...)

Almost there:

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The track name is "Difficult Move", and my mix is called "Difficult Move Indeed" for obvious reasons you'll find into it in the "Charlie's Angels" part.

I focused in 3 of the 4 parts of the song. re-inforcing the pressence of the "Mission: Impossible" part and just giving a hint on the 007 / Charlie ones.

I like to make these mixes feel they actually could be IN the game, so not trying to get them that far away from their original universe and making them proud of their origin.

Also, I'm trying to "pop-ize" them, so anyone could find an structure to relate to, even if they are not aware of what tey are listening to.

Basically: so everyone can enjoy them by today standards.

The other 2 games I'm covering for my tribute album are:

Salamander (MSX Version,1986) (3 tracks)

KingKong2 (MSX2 Version,1988) (1 track)

+ 1 track more from SD Snatcher.

Best Regards,

Jorge.

Jorge Mira

Diseñador de Sistemas | www.asvideo.net

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Thanks for providing the source. Good stuff. Glad to see a Snatcher series mix; what the hell took the community so long?

SCC Memorial Series Snatcher Joint Disk - (203) "Difficult Move"

The strings in the intro were pretty exposed, IMO. Source kicked in at :09 in more of an espionage style. Something about the sound balance feels off. The sample realism on the strings and brass left a little something to be desired. The second iteration of the melody at :59 felt very retreadish and I really didn't like how robotic the piano sequencing sounded at 1:23; definitely could have been improved, but it was more a background element that I can live with. The arrangement ideas there were solid.

The dropoff at 2:13 for the next iteration of the source was kind of odd, but the percussion picked back up at 2:23. 2:33 needed to do something different and succeed, focusing more on the wahs and strings for the finish.

The execution could have been stronger in a lot of ways, in terms of the realism and the dynamic contrast. I'm liking the concept of the arrangement, Jorge, but there's a lack of refinement that leaves the mix sounding like average execution with good samples. No issues if this passes, but it could be more, IMO, and isn't quite there yet.

NO (borderline/resubmit)

[Liontamer]

J-hosted source

[Palpable]

I like this one. You hit the nail on the head adapting this piece to the style of the spy songs you mentioned, and the new background writing and complementary writing gives this a great balance of new and old.

I don't think there's anything wrong with the samples used here (in fact, I think the sample quality is higher than the typical sub we pass), although sometimes the articulation is a little unrealistic and repetitive, like Larry mentioned. Spending a little more time on that would have knocked this out of the park, and probably given it more repeat play value. As it is, I think it's worth passing anyway. It gets by on having a great mood, very good production, good variety of sections, and solid writing.

YES

[DarkeSword]

I don't think there's anything wrong with the samples. This is a pretty groovy, piece of work. I love that timpani roll; it's like "HEY LISTEN UP, WE ARE DOING SOMETHING BIG HERE." Piano section does a nice job mellowing things out. Double-time section right after gets me dancing.

Very cool stuff.

YES!~

[CHz]

SD Snatcher is my joint.

Liking the adaptation. Works pretty well in this style, and the middle section at 1:23 was nice. No problem with the arrangement here, good stuff.

Productionwise, there's definite room for improvement. Found myself wanting more dynamic contrast, mainly in the big string sections in the beginning and end. Those hits wouldn't all be at the same volume. It feels like the track could really be building up to something big at 0:59 and 2:23 in particular, but it comes off a bit repetitive instead. The piano sequencing could be better, but it blends well with the track and it's not there for very long, so not a big deal.

I think with more work this could be better, but none of my production concerns are really holding this track back. 's good.

YES

[zircon]

I definitely get that classic "espionage" feeling here. I love the original writing and the arrangement is very creative. If you told me this was on the soundtrack of a new James Bond game I'd believe you. On the production end, the strings and brass aren't perfectly realistic (could use more reverb, in my opinion, to help them sit in better) but otherwise things sound pretty slick and well-balanced to me. Awesome stuff!

YES

[anosou]

Had no issues with the samples here. They could've been bettern integrated with some reverb like zircon mentioned but this is way above the bar for me, especially coupled with the strong backing section and percussion. Thought the melodic elements (piano and synth) at 1:44 were a bit weak compared to the backing, especially since they are an important part of the track arrangement-wise.

The arrangement was hot. Good energy and contextualizing. I don't agree with Larry regarding the stiff piano sequencing, I think it works very well. However I agree with 'Ili and Larry regarding the need for more dynamic contrast. This feels like it's in background music (which obviously isn't strange) and could use the extra variation in dynamics.

Overall though, this was above the bar both in terms of production and arrangement. Very nice!

YES