djpretzel Posted September 30, 2005 Share Posted September 30, 2005 Greetings! Yep, it's been quiet from me for a while; been working on an album and DVDs and stuff. But, to celebrate the release of my new and improved www.mazedude.com, I have taken some time to put together some sweetness for the fans... and per the popular request, I have made a Doom 2 mix, yet again. Plus, all the killer Doom mixage from the Dark Side of Phobos kinda inspired me too. Title: "The End of Hell" Remixer: Mazedude Game: Doom 2 System: PC Original Composer: Bobby Prince And the description and all that is on By the way, you'll notice that Ailsean provided some rhythm guitar for me - but he and I have both agreed that there's no need for a remixer credit on his end, since I did everything else. So just leave it as "by Mazedude," and if people want to learn more about the mix they can read about Ailsean's involvement on my website. Or you could hint at it in the write-up. But there's no need to create an "Ailsean, Mazedude" section or anything. If you want to verify this with him, it's ailsean@oneupstudios.com. Enjoy the gothic industrial madness! Mazedude http://www.mazedude.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Orichalcon Posted September 30, 2005 Share Posted September 30, 2005 Source: http://www.doomworld.com/music/d_read_m.mid - Endgame Music Well we have another prime example of great Mazedude music here. Great sound going here. Powerful drums, excellent synthwork on the lead to give it that groovy mazedude sound. The quality of the mix is, as usual, way above par. It's loud, and it's good loud. Yes, I can see hell trembling before the mighty mazedude as he brings destruction to their domain. Mazedude is the true doomguy. Anyway, the arrangement in this is quite similar to the source as most of mazedude's doom remixes are. Much like gothic sandy this one starts off with a harpsichord and works its way into the meat of the mix with strings, synths, groovy powerful drums, and a perfectly balanced bassline, with the usual set of peculiar sound effects worked into the percussion. There's absolutely nothing to nitpick here. This is the kind of mix I would expect to just be direct posted. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
analoq Posted September 30, 2005 Share Posted September 30, 2005 i was a bit confused as to why the harpsichord was so loud when it's only playing 8th notes while the piano part is so subdued when it's doing something interesting synthvox sample grates on me, but it's fitting given the original. percusion is super. hard industrial kicks mixed with some blippy electro and stuff you might expect to hear at a construction site. ailsean's riffs are the icing on the cake. not the best i've heard from mazedude but it's certainly a pass in my book yes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted October 1, 2005 Share Posted October 1, 2005 http://www.doom2.net/~doomdepot/music/doom%201%20&%202%20midis.zip - Story Music.mid Thanks a lot to Chris for providing the source MP3, as the source MIDI I was stuck with sounds kinda Yiddish. Especially at 1:23 when things start harmonizing. Wonder why that is? Maybe I'm the only one who feels that way. Cool intro, with the harpsichord though it all sounds kind of lo-fi. Melody coming in at :19 is big on the low frequencies and really buzzy. It's really hard to hear the piano in there proving some embellishments. Pretty much a cover with some organ in there until :58 brings in some industrial sounds. Track still sounds really crunchy and cluttered, as if the bitrate were a lot lower. Brief break from 1:52-2:19 before another iteration of the melody in a higher key. Just a mess of sounds cluttering and distorting together. I can see why Sean isn't co-credited, as it's hard to distinguish his work amongst all of the other sounds. Some synth solo action from 3:03-3:37 was a welcome change of pace and featured some additional creative arrangement ideas. The arrangement is cover-ish per Chris's style, but features enough nuanced additions and alterations to pass with no issues. More power to you for this passing, as I'm sure the production choices here are purposeful and other Js are certainly feeling it, but things just sound lo-fi like this was a 64kbps MP3 and terribly unbalanced to me. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vig Posted October 1, 2005 Share Posted October 1, 2005 that choral sample is really cheap sounding. the groove is thick and cool, but i'm at 2:30 and i've heard lots of repetition and frankly i'm losing interest. The solo is okay, but nothing spectacular, and by this point the song has been dynamically flat for 3 minutes. definately not mazedude's best. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Harmony Posted October 2, 2005 Share Posted October 2, 2005 After the brief intentionally lo-fi harpsichord at the onset, I like the switch to a much richer sound for the rest of the intro. In general though, I’m not a fan of the intro through 0:57. In addition to being pretty conservative, the mixing is very odd with the piano awkwardly peeking through in spots, excessive reverb mushing things together, and a general sense of heavy clutter. The percussion definitely opens up the soundfield. I absolutely love the dingy SFX and processing that are used to give us the most engaging element of this mix. Nice break at 2:15 which showcases some of the really cool percussive sounds. The biggest issue for me is the clutter that remains from the intro. This mix isn’t “muddy” but background instruments aren’t clear at all. It’s just a wall of sound that might work briefly but not for the majority of a mix. It leaves little room for dynamic contrast, even in a mix like this that’s supposed to be loud and boisterous. As I said before, I think an excess of reverb might be one cause, but there are also lots of elements fighting for the same mid-low register. Even the leads don’t really stretch too far into the high regime. Additionally, having them soaked in reverb doesn’t help them to stand out much. The solo jumps out at me as it should though. Don’t think that I don’t enjoy this mix. It’s a very intense take on the original and it is full of the sound that makes Mazedude such a revered remixer. I’m just a fan of clarity. You’ve made cacophony work to your musical advantage before ("Battling Organs", even "Mazedude’s Kitchen"), so I’m looking for that again. NO (Please Resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zircon Posted October 17, 2005 Share Posted October 17, 2005 This was a close one. The arrangement was great, no question about it. I was put off initially by the sort of muddy instruments right off the bad - everything, including the vox, was sort of mixed together and it was hard to tell anything apart. However, once the groove came in, the mix really began to shine. Lots of cool stuff happened after that, with the "mud" that I spoke of becoming a sort of musical pad, while the synths and such took over in the foreground. Do I think those guitar chops could have been brought out more? Yes. Do I think the EQing and effects processing could have helped to reduce the sonic clutter? Sure. But I'm not going to reject it based on that. This is a good mix by our standards. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarkeSword Posted October 26, 2005 Share Posted October 26, 2005 I'll agree that it's not Mazedude's best, but it's rather well done. Nice, clonky industrial that sounds pretty clean. The problem though is that like Vig says, it's dynamically flat for the duration of the song. Once the drums come in, that's pretty much it. There's some nice sound design (lead is cool), but I think from an arrangement standpoint, it's gets old fast, which isn't good considering the piece is only 4 minutes long. I'd like to see a resub with some more variation in dynamics. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Orichalcon Posted October 26, 2005 Share Posted October 26, 2005 If this is to be rejected, then I'd like to add my request that mazedude does resubmit this at some point in the future with the fixes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrayLightning Posted October 31, 2005 Share Posted October 31, 2005 This was an extremely tough one. I'm borderline on this. As with many Mazedude mixes, this is an admirable effort, but in my opinion, there's not enough here in my view for me to pass. The arrangement is conservative, more so than the other mixes by the artist we have passed. There's a general structure and format of the original that is consistent in this mix - from the repetive harmonic support (that is apparent with the harpsichord parts) to the flat/lack of dynamic approach of the mix. More expansion here in the melodic or harmonic content would help two fold - with the rearrangement criteria and secondarily with preventing it from getting a bit redundant. This (the arrangement) element is my chief concern. The percussion by mazedude as to be expected is good, as is ailsean's guitar section - this is evident. Outside of this, other than the arrangement issues, I have to agree with some of the production criticisms cited. There's a wall of sound going on throughout here, and everything is a bit muddy and overreverbed. I love my reverb too, but in this case it's a little overboard. The latter issue, I suppose one could argue as subjective. I am hesitant to call them problems per se, but I can't call them positives either. The combination of these two factors (arrangement and production concerns) makes me lean towards a NO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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