Tetris: Blocks Of Madness,

[TooCoolForSchool]

Hey, guys. I'm a guitarist and a long time fan of OCRemix, I made this song hoping to submit it. I did submit it and it either didn't get to the judges or it was completely ignored. Which sucks because I've been waiting months checking it practically every day hoping to see it go up and see what everyone had to say about it. I hate my life.

Anyway, hope you guys like it.

https://soundcloud.com/toocoolforschooltheband/tetris-blocks-of-madness-1

[TeraCMusic]

This is pretty cool! I find it strange that they would totally ignore your submission... Can you try to talk to someone and see if they have received it?

In terms of the song, I think it is a nice interpretation. However, it does seem that the Judges really emphasize making the song your own and trying to stray away from just using the melody as is. This remix seems a BIT too repetitive for me, but it is a really good start! I hope you get some more feedback on this thread, sorry that I cannot offer amazing technical advice

[timaeus222]

It wasn't ignored. The mixing quality just happens to be high enough that it should be evaluated, for which you'd have to wait more than 2 months. It is NOT a 2 month guarantee, it is a 2 month minimum guarantee. The reality is, it's 2 months to a year or so before acceptance, and even then you'll have to wait until your scheduled day comes up, and djpretzel prefers to keep that scheduled day a secret so people don't try to add to his workload in inopportune spots.

Interpretation is an integral part of OC ReMixes. This sounds like a straight cover with some sort of super long solo. While remixes are good to go with enough personalization, ultimately with covers this is much more emphasized and important. A simple cover with a lot of personalization may make it, borderline.

Although this has some personalization, this is basically a looped rhythm section with soloing throughout. The bass mixing is muddy to the extent that it's not very possible to hear what's going on in the bass sometimes, such as 0:53 - 1:19 and 1:32 - 2:12. That muddiness lasts for 56/174 seconds, which is 32.2% of the track. Mixing clarity is a big part that contributes to enjoying a song.

1:33 - 2:54 is basically a solo, and guitar solos are supposed to be special events for showing off. 81/174 seconds is 46.6% of the track used for a solo, which, in my opinion, gets repetitive and doesn't show meaningful expansion of the source; instead it pushes the source usage to the back and puts focus on the lead guitar player, who is not exactly of the essence of Tetris. It gets to the point where we consider whether or not buried source + solo = too liberal.

Other nitpicks would include the fade-out ending, the thinness of the guitar tone, the cluttered stereo image, and the subjectively scattershot arrangement.

These issues about the muddiness and clunky arrangement are pretty significant, and would be enough for a rejection. It's not as if I'm trying to discourage you or anything, but it's important to get that OCR staff have lives of their own. They don't evaluate thousands of mixes in a month, and they don't have a tiny backlog that they get lazy on. Patience is pretty important in getting a submission on OCR, and open-mindedness is especially important to help you improve and get to the point where it becomes easy to predict whether or not one of your own remixes has a good/great chance of being YESed.

Edited January 27, 2014 by timaeus222

[DarkDjinn]

Your playing sounds good, but yeah it's very repetitive and sleepy in the beginning. I also can tell you're using Drumkit from Hell (right?) and I'm not a big fan of the way that it sounds (personal preference, lots of people love it). I use EZDrummer but I'm a really big fan of the Metal Machine EZX.

Maybe a key change and a bit more of your own melody would make this stand out a little more. Also, and I'm listening to this as I type, the kick is getting really covered up once the electric guitar comes in. I think it sounds pretty decent overall, just could use some fixing up here and there

[TooCoolForSchool]

I appreciate your sensitive ears. To tell you the truth, this was rerecorded many, many times and any muddy sound is ENTIRELY the fault of my cheap equipment and not my mixing abilities as these are all recordings of actual instruments, and I can not yet afford a three thousand dollar amp. So it's one bass, one guitar, one $200 amplifier and a $50 dollar mic. I even sent all the tracks to a professional mixing and mastering engineer and he couldn't do any better. In fact the quality as it is now is only as good as it is because it is very well mixed.

And as it is a remix of a video game soundtrack, and a very simple one at that, it was supposed to be somewhat repetitive to retain the charm of the original. The bridge I invented and I changed the timing of the rhythm four times throughout the song.

And as far as the soloing goes, I'm a speed metal guitarist, it's my thing. So it's simply supposed to be an amped up, much less monotonous, much less repetitive metal version without getting to far from being a rad, slightly repetitive videogame soundtrack which is what makes the Tetris theme so cool to begin with.

So I agree completely. I argued with myself for weeks over how much to change and how far away from the original I wanted to wander, and this is where I ended up.

Thanks for the feedback!