*NO* Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Hyperstone Heist 'Aim High' *RESUB*

[Palpable]

previous decision

Hello, here's a resubmission of a rearrangement from Shell Shocked project for consideration as an individual release.

ReMixer & real name: Eino Keskitalo

e-mail:

forum id: 20708

ReMixer name: Tuberz McGee

Real name: Callum Kennedy

e-mail:

forum id: 44165

Names of games arranged: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Hyperstone Heist (Mega Drive), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time (SNES)

Name of Arrangement: Aim High

Names of individual songs arranged: High Score Display (THH), Warming Up (TiT)

MP3:

FLAC:

Previous submission letter applies. Previous decision: http://ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=45739

Thanks for the great & precise feedback. There should now be:

- some actual low end

- better bass drum & some layering on the snare

- less mids on the bass (hopefully still enough)

- unscooped mids on the guitar (and clavinet)

- some lead sound change at 2:30

- more stereo separation and eq of lead stuff

To quote our illustrious project leader Kyle, "Wow, it's actually quite a bit of an improvement, and I thought it sounded good before." As painful as a NO (resub) is, it's worth it. I hope this makes the cut.

LT Edit (6/4): Here's the source usage breakdown copied from the previous decision with the timestamps adjusted.

00:00-00:19 intro (original)

00:19-00:48 HSD parts a & b, fairly straightforward

00:48-00:53 "proggy bit" 1 (based on last bass notes of HSD part

00:53-01:12 HSD part a with slightly modified Warming Up chords used on the clavinet to the right

01:12-01:22 HSD part b

01:22-01:35 proggy bit 2, with original chord changes

01:35-01:39 lead-in to Warming Up bridge (original)

01:39-02:19 Warming Up bridge, chords and bass used (slightly modified), with original synth solo

02:20-02:29 lead-in back to HSD (original)

02:29-02:58 HSD parts a & b

02:58-03:31 proggy bit 3, definitely goes into original territory

03:31-03:40 HSD part a + TV-theme outro

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Edited June 23, 2014 by Liontamer
closed decision

[Palpable]

This was my first time hearing this sub and it threw me. There's a lot of weird writing going on, from the stop/start guitars, carnival synths, and proggy connecting sections. By the end of the song I was getting into it and on my second listen through, I completely got what you guys were going for. Very creative approach. Reading the comments back from the last vote, it sounds like you fixed some of the problems. The low-end wasn't much of an issue here - it sounded filled out. The guitars were a little buzzy and the drums somewhat plain, but it wasn't enough to prevent this from passing.

YES

Edit (6/23): Vote changed, see below.

Edited June 24, 2014 by Palpable

[Chimpazilla]

This version is definitely better. You have addressed several of the issues I had: the bass sounds louder/better, the mixing is cleaner and the leads are more up front where they should be. The drumming sounds better too. The rhythm guitars still sound extremely weak and thin, and they aren't really impressing me, but they seem to fit within the mixing of everything else and they aren't causing any mud. I think it's a pass now, and I still love the creative writing and arrangement.

edit 6-4-14: Yep, this is a cool song. Production is a pass. Track is too liberal though, Larry's evaluation is correct.

NO

Edited June 4, 2014 by Chimpazilla

[Nutritious]

I haven't heard the old version, but I do hear what Kristina is saying about the thin guitars. In general, the soundscape is a bit harsh in some of the high-mid frequencies.

This is certainly different. Almost like rock music meets a broken music box.

Some of the bells are resonating a bit loud in my earphones, which can cause fatigue after a while and actually made me turn the track down.

Nice arrangement work, which balances out some of my production crits. This is quite unique and sort of odd, but it works.

EDIT: vote switch, see below

NO

Edited June 5, 2014 by Nutritious

[Liontamer]

Well, the track's enjoyable, but this is a VERY liberal take that relies more on rhythmic similarities than actually following the source melody. It'd be perfect for something like Turtles in Time: ReShelled if the aim was to have a "soundalike" where permission wasn't given to use the original music.

It's like hearing a commercial using a knockoff James Bond theme where the timing's the same but the notes are different to avoid legal problems.

Example - "Agent 070" James Bond soundalike: http://www.audiosparx.com/sa/summary/play.cfm/crumb.1/crumc.0/sound_iid.659939

Flat out, THAT was the vibe I got hearing the "straightforward usage" of the Genesis source.

For example, the main verses of both tracks, leaving out the first 5 notes of the source that were left out of the arrangement:

Source: C#-B-A-Ab-A-B-E (:01-:03), C#-B-A-A-Ab-F#-Ab-Ab-E (:06-:09)

Arrange: E-D-C#-A-B-C#-B (19-:22), E-D-C#-B-A-Ab-B (:24-:27)

Hell, I dunno music theory, but I DO know when I don't hear a similar enough melodic treatment and the intervals aren't the same even when the timing is. It's like this the whole time, I'm getting a pure "soundalike" vibe, and I can barely give any credit to this track.

About the only times I felt I could give the arrangement credit on were portions like :39-:48, 1:12-1:21, 2:49-2:58, where the bassline from the original is more explicity referenced as a background part.

Even at 1:41 at the seeming shift to the "Warming Up" SNES theme, the way the notes are changed sounds like it has jack to do with the source material beyond a minor resmblance. 2:00-2:15 vaguely sounds like "Warming Up" and not in any overt sense.

This vote so far is giving this track a HUGE benefit of the doubt over sounding well-executed rather than sounding like an identifiable arrangement of these two themes, and it's a drastic mistake.

Vinnie, Kris, Justin: Someone here please demonstrate how the notes of the melody or any other part of the Genesis source OR the SNES source are being used with clear A-to-B connections. I need to be shown where the substance is first, and as far as I'm concerned, it's a very uphill battle to call this anything but a copyright-circumventing "soundalike."

In the serious business world of judging, I'm fighting this all the way. This is an awesome piece of standalone music, that's essentially a wholly original track, and I think we've fallen VERY far off the mark on analyzing arrangement if this somehow passes.

I'm willing to be proven wrong, but this kind of inadvertant, benefit-of-the-doubt, sounds-kind-of-like-it vote has definitely happened before and I've had to flip a table. And I'm definitely flipping a table right now. Absolutely not.

NO

Edited June 4, 2014 by Liontamer

[Chimpazilla]

I've done my own assessment of the source's main-melody note progression, vs. that of the remix, and I come up with this:

source progression: A-B-C#-D-D-C#-B-A-Ab-A-B-E (0:01-0:03) and A-B-C#-D-D-C#-B-A-A-Ab-F#-Ab-Ab-E (0:06-0:09)

remix progression: E-D-C#-A-B-C#-B (0:19-0:22) and E-D-C#-B-A-Ab-B (0:24-0:27)

Larry's right, no match. The only place I've found a legitimate match is here: source 0:19-0:24 = remix 0:40-0:49. Nine seconds.

Guys, we have totally dropped the ball. The original NO votes are all primarily aimed at production which needed improvement. Now that the production is improved in this version, we have all engaged in groupthink and assumed that source was fine. Larry is right, this is a no-go. Changing my vote.

Still, cool original song.

[Nutritious]

In light of Larry's vote above, I've gone back to this and been A/bing it for the last 15 minutes or so. I do (somewhat) remember my vote process on this one and listening to the high score/arrangement melodies together and noting the similar 'feel' and 'sound' between them. That said, while I don't think this is necessarily as obvious as implied above, I totally see where he's coming from and agree with his analysis.

Buck stops with me as I did note the arrangement work specifically in my vote. I'm gonna have to be much more careful in the future to analyze deeper than 'sounds like' OST.

[DragonAvenger]

This is super quirky, and it's a ton of fun to listen to. I gotta give it a NO, though, based on Larry's breakdown and the hard work he put into really sussing this out. Really really hope you revisit it that one more time, because it definitely can be frontpage material.

RESUBMIT, PLZ (no)

[Palpable]

So the melody part of the original source has a harmony as well:

Lead: D D C# B A G# A B E

Harmony: B B A G# F# E F# G#

There's always a minor or major third between these two so the note pattern is pretty well established. If Callum and Eino had added used a differnt harmony with similar intervals as the lines above without actually using either of them, I'd be hard pressed not to count that as arrangement. The pattern is pretty clear here, and I have counted that kind of usage in the past.

Their melody: E1 E2 D C# A B C# B

The first note is actually an octave low, but the next three notes form another minor/major third harmony with the original line. However the following three notes make a different interval (but still follow the same ascending pattern). The last note is completely different. Further repetitions of this figure only change the melody even more. The reason this sounds so similar is that it is similar on the surface, and I didn't look more closely at it than that. Larry and the other judges are correct though; it isn't similar enough. When a harmony of the original melody is used, it needs to stick extremely closely to the original intervals in order to be considered dominant source IMO.

NO

Edited June 24, 2014 by Palpable