Liontamer Posted May 28, 2009 Share Posted May 28, 2009 Remixer & real name: Nathan Rich Email address: vanishdoom@gmail.com Website: http://myspace.com/nrichmusic Forum userid: 25305 Game: Final Fantasy IV Songs remixed: The Airship Composer: Nobuo Uematsu System: SNES Comments: Tackling a composition that is essentially only 30 seconds long and arranging it into a worthwhile, interesting tune for the FFIV album project only became a daunting task when the deadline inched closer and closer. I had given a couple botched attempts at the Airship theme until I stumbled onto a bouncy, euro-dance style that meshed incredibly well with the flighty, repetitive melody we've all come to know and love. Notably, I opted out the "uhn tiss" style drumtrack for something you'd more likely hear on a hard rock song, giving the remix a unique flair. Because of this, guitar tracks were definitely in the blueprints to help bring out the heavier edge, but never seemed to present itself in a way that wasn't fairly obvious and in bad taste. My only gripe with this arrangement was the lack of source material at my disposal, leaving me to experiment a lot with some original melodies and hooks to help fill out the song. Despite this, I'm extremely pleased with how the production came out and am deeply honored to have been a part of the FFIV project to begin with. -------------------------------------------------------------- http://snesmusic.org/v2/download.php?spcNow=ff4 - "The Airship" (ff4-29.spc) Opened up pretty interesting, so I was intrigued with where it would go. :15-:19 started getting dissonant, though, which had me wondering what was up, then BAM :20 hit me in the face with some chorused (but vanilla) synths and even more dissonance with some phasing sounds. What in the world...? A lot of those sound choices from :20-1:44 were brutal. That burst of synths from :24-:26 (repeated :34-:37, :46-:49, :56-:59) sounded dissonant, 1:17-1:20 also IMO. 1:50 had an EarthBound vibe that Andy pointed out with cooler sounds, but then back to that ugly synth stuff at 2:10 along with some fakey guitar plucks. Yeah, the synth design here is a huge downside to this. There was no synergy with the parts at all, and the electronic stuff sounded generic with overboard effects. Can someone else explain to me what happened here? I'm sorry but, besides a couple of brief sections, there was no subtlely at all with this. The synth choices were generic, the mixing was grating & unbalanced, and there was more than one's fair share of dissonance in the opening minute. Sections like :00-:19, 1:44-2:10, 2:30-2:50 & 4:18-4:43 had potential as far as textures, but it was difficult to focus on any strengths of the arrangement when the execution was so whacked out. In the meantime, you can work on gaining more experience with the synth sounds. For this, I'd potentially take the more laid back sections of the arrangement and build the rest of the track around that mood & style, Nathan, where it seemed like your ideas were clicking more. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anosou Posted May 28, 2009 Share Posted May 28, 2009 The only real dissonance I heard was at 0:15-0:19.. The rest is just colored chords that tend to sound out of place. The synth stab at 0:24-0:26 for example sounds iffy because of the detuned sound itself and how loud it is. The only thing that really makes this seem unfocused and dissonant imo is that your mixing is really wack. You're putting a LOT of emphasis on some of the arpeggiated synths and the chord stabs which overshadows the bass and melody and feels out of place.. 1:17 is borderlining dissonance but that's because you can't hear the bass that establishes the new chord. Also all sounds are chorused which makes this sound very muddy and unfocused. I didn't think all sound choices were bad, quite the opposite. The bass/guitar sound around 2:10 was pretty damn cool imo and meshed well. Most of the synths work but needs to be mixed properly. Arrangement was a bit strange though. You're missing out on a LOT of source when focusing on your original ideas. 'The Airship' might be short but you haven't even used all of it. The main hook of your track is your original stuff (0:43 for example) and even if you've got hints of the source chords there it's not identifiable and dominant. You've got a lot of kinks to work out here. I didn't think it was a completely lost cause but the mixing is wack and the arrangement doesn't even present 50% source. Sorry man but this is a no-go. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palpable Posted May 31, 2009 Share Posted May 31, 2009 I can pretty much just copy Anso's comments. The dissonance was fine, but where was the source in this? I heard it for about a minute, and then a lot of your own thing, which has more of an inspired by sound than anything directly referencing the source. It all transitions well, and overall I like your new writing, but I don't think the song is source enough to meet our criteria. I also enjoyed the sounds used, but the mixing drags this down. It sounds very distant and muddy, and the jump between the quiet and loud parts needs to be smoother. The quiet parts are barely audible, so they should come up some. Even if the arrangement was passable, the mixing would make this a NO, so this one ain't happening - sorry, Nathan. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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