OCR03206 - *YES* Final Fantasy 9 'Birth Under a Blue Light'

[DragonAvenger]

Game: Final Fantasy IX
Name of arrangement: Birth Under a Blue Light
Song: Zidane's Theme
Original Composer: Nobuo Uematsu
Remixer: Knight of the Round, Justin Wilbanks
Real name: Justin Taylor, Justin Wilbanks
User ID: 43205
Link to Original: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLZfselgtlQ
Link to submission: ATTACHED
Genre: Poly-rhythmic Groove Thrash

THIS IS A PROJECT TRACK!

Justin Wilbanks (from Indiana metal band Betrayer) and I have been wanting to collaborate on a track for a while. So after realizing there were still a few months left to submit a track for Fishy's FF9 project, we decided to tackle Zidane's Theme. I've always enjoyed this track, and since it is a pretty significant track to the OST, choosing it was a no brainer. We took the backing track to the source and tweaked it a little, and used it as the main melody/riff for the first half of the song. The second half of the song is pretty conservative to the source, but its such a good part that we didn't dare change it much.

We used an Agile 8 string guitars to record all guitars. For rhythm, we used an ENGL Fireball head, then re-amped through a Fractal Audio Axe-FX Ultra, both going into a VHT Fatbottom cab. We then also re-amped the guitars into Line6 PODfarm.
For lead guitars, we went straight into the Axe-FX Ultra into the VHT cab. Drums were programmed with EZdrummer (cymbals) and Steven Slate Drums (kick, snare, toms). Mastered with Izotope Ozone3.

Random Fun Fact: 4:26-4:35 and 4:48-4:56 features a 13/16 over 4/4 polyrhythm. The guitars/bass/kick drum are playing in 13/16 and are playing the pattern of "1 and 10" while keeping the rhythm notes intact, while the snare drum and cymbals are staying in 4/4. I chose "1 and 10" to represent the I and X in the title of the game. Go Poly-rhythms!

Edited September 9, 2015 by Liontamer

[Fishy]

<3 u Justin.

This is an utterly ridiculous remix. I'm sure a lot of people won't 'get' it, but it's awesome and I don't care.

YES

[OceansAndrew]

8 string guitars are for weaklings. If you don' t have AT LEAST 11 strings on your guitar, tuned to low Z, you aren't really metal.

Seriously though, the only issue i have with this is that the leads are a little lost underneath the brutality of the polys. Great playing in the rhythms, it sounds very tight. I almost wish you did even more with the 3:20 section, and extended it, because that heroic progression with this style sounds really good. Incredibly powerful submission here, i like it a lot. It's a challenge to make metal that sounds so brutal but still remain very accessable. Nice work, guys.

yes

[halc]

haha I definitely do not listen to this kind of music very often. I suppose one of our judge-perks is being forced to listen to music we never do, and then try to write about it. well, they say variety is the spice of life, and for what it's worth, this track certainly rocked my face off. really solid execution here guys, with impressive performances and a solid arrangement to boot. really loved the old-timey breakdown about two thirds of the way through and then the epic 6/8 fanfare section after that. OA nailed it on the head when he mentioned how well that bit fit with the style, it definitely has a ton of power and emotion behind it. really, really great mix here, boys. keep up the good work.

YES

[DarkeSword]

It seems like such a dichotomy hearing something so grungy and hard in a major key. Odd!

Sounds good to me though. Really clean playing, rhythmically speaking. Timing in the performances is very tight. Great arrangement too. I love the part at 3:30, with the really strong melody and the switch to 6/8 time. Meter changes are seamless. Really nice work.

YES