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OCR02352 - Wild Arms "Return to Dust"


djpretzel
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This is a pretty unique mix - it uses the guitar to help achieve the spacey distant feel in the song, but uses it in a less prominent way. The vocals are used to great effect here, and the soundscape really provides an understated role. The beats dropping into the song about a third of the way through morphs the song into a progressive electronic song that goes wild. It's a great return of Stephen Kennedy, and it's surprising how much he has progressed from those KFSS days. A great job by him here and special one at that!

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11MB? Wait a sec; what's the new cap on file submissions? I would've assumed it was 10 after bLiNd's submission earlier, but now you've got me intrigued.

So admittedly, I hadn't heard Stephen's Batman track. But I have a vague familiarity with his work for Majestic Mix, so I shouldn't be considered completely out of the blue.

It starts out pretty creepy with some nice gate and ambient processing over the original choir, before shifting the soundscape over Stevo's guitar playing with the melody, gradually shifting in more electronic sounds within this soundscape. This build soon culminates into a late-80s-euphoria groove at around 2:30, wasn't too keen on the transition into it, but the enhancing of the soundscape since has managed to make it worthwhile for me, whether it be Stevo's acoustic guitar solos (that one to close the track was similarly pretty), further shifting with the soundscape with some tasteful polysynth attacking and some sweet sweeping strings later on. It may have taken more of a liberal direction with the choir's melodies as the track drew on, but the vague similarities taken on throughout still make it shine through.

I know that Stephen may have wanted the electric guitar part to sound more mechanical, but I personally believe it comes down to the strength of the sample. And to be fair, I don't think it has the right kind of expression to give towards the track, so I'm not sure if it was a wise move. Luckily its presence is sparse at best, so it may be seen as a passing blur.

Regardless, it's a very surprising track to close out the album's initial mixflood with, and with the 10 year gap between posts, it's a sign of saying that one should never officially call it quits with the OCRemix community if their heart is still there. A neatly interpreted track from the Two Steves™ :)

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What an intriguing way to start off, with a loud choir followed by some mechanical whirring as acoustic guitar plays. The guitar with the mechanical sounds showed a great contrast of human and inhuman, and then adding some tense elements along with the choir was great. Good hook for getting things started before it opens up and gets that beat going. The arrangement and production was nice and it didn't really feel like it was more than seven minutes. That's how enjoyable it is. The way all those different facets joined together made this one of the best tracks on the album (that I've heard so far. I'm not even half-way through this massive thing!) Awesome return by Stephan Kennedy and once again, Stevo delivers. Great job to both men.

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One of my dreams come true that this is up at OCR after 11 years. The Batman song doesn't even count to be completely honest. Stephen is far from that now. If you guys can find the PMM albums online, get it and take a listen! I also have all the official copies. I can always share it.

I e-mailed Stephen about his post so hopefully he drops in to say hi.

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Ego stroked? (Check)

Thank you all for the comments. I always enjoy getting feedback, even if it is negative. It's so interesting to see how people have different taste in music, much like food. Even if I think I've made a chocolate milk shake, there is always someone out there who won't like chocolate...as hard as that may be to imagine. *chuckle* (this analogy is not directed to anyone particular)

That's what I love about music. Taking out the technical aspect of things, One mans trash is another mans treasure.

Should I submit some of my unreleased stuff I made during my hiatus? It's not quite as good, but maybe someone can enjoy it.

Thankyou Jade for your encouragement.

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I did the biggest movie-style double take on this one. I listened to every track today without looking at track names or artist names to get an unbiased opinion. When I was digging this and looked down I didn't even process it. Hence the massive double take. So awesome to see Stephen come back. This is one of the three tracks I loved from this project. Great work and hope there will be more from Stephen Kennedy!

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Another completely amazing track. Again, I was pretty curious what could be done with such a minimalist source in an 8 minute song, but damn these guys made it work. The opening choir and vocal samples throughout were very well done. That was one of the things I loved about the OST and was curious as to how prevalent they'd be on this album. Very nice acoustic guitar work throughout too! The electronica transition around 2:30 caught me off guard a bit, but I loved it. It really helped keep the track fresh and proved to be an interesting combination with the acoustic guitar. Overall I love this song!

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Gorgeous intro and nice guitar playing. Very pretty and epic with the choir coming in and the added electronic elements around 2:00. The beat drop at 2:33 feels a little sudden and awkward to me. That said, awesome touches like at 2:45. All the guitar sections later continue sounding great, and I like the violin(?) at 6:50. Nice track

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  • Liontamer changed the title to OCR02352 - Wild Arms "Return to Dust"

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