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OCR03173 - Lawnmower Man "Cyber Mower"


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That introing A-note groove is bright and reverberific. I think the first contrasting E note comes in just a little late (by maybe 4 As), but no biggie. It's also nice to hear F take A's place alongside the source melody's first entrance for a double dose of variety.

3:13 is my favorite part - it feels wonderfully sad and lost as it portrays an interdimensional dystopia. (The shimmering bell-like synth is a lovely complement, too.) Of course, such a section wouldn't be possible without the delicate, furtive mini-transitions preceding it, like the virtual reality-ish section at 1:53, the windy, "tapping" echoes at 2:22, and the shaky, "not long for this world" rendition of the source at 2:29, so I gotta give props to all those players that make the coming emotional impact stronger.

I also notice that while the "phasing" sounds at 3:52 rise in key and frequency to the point where they sound like a laser gun or alarm, 4:41 sounds like a deliberate inverse of that. If that was intentional, cool.

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I like the way the track opens up with basically a jazz chord ostinato with filter modulation. It gets a little repetitive with that though, since that goes until 1:09 without changing between that many chords, so that chord repetition could have been remedied with a few more chords interspersed within that timeframe. So, 1:09 is where the track started getting more interesting for me.

 

When we get there, I appreciated the shift at 1:24 to more of a "Big Beat" type of feel, although the dropoff at 1:39 was rather sudden. Even something like a change in the drum pattern near 1:39 to signal it would have helped. When we did get to 1:39, that was the highlight of the track for me. Finally we get some meaningful dynamic contrast, IMO. The bass could have been heavier there, but no big deal (you had basically a low, detuned saw, whereas something closer to analog and/or FM is what I would have done instead).

 

From 1:39 until 3:55, the flow was great, and worked well. In fact that is my favorite part. The siren transition was OK at 3:55, but I would have done something closer to a resonant FM tone instead (sounding somewhat bubbly, in other words); just something to consider as an alternative at some point.

 

The solo starting at 4:06 was a good change of pace and did incorporate originality. It was making a lot of jumps, though, and in that sense it makes the melodic contour sound somewhat meandering to me. Maybe some spots in the solo there could have a few long notes so that there's more of a separation between phrases, if that makes sense. But that doesn't really make it a bad or not-good solo necessarily. I understand if you wanted to keep the empty feel of space. It's good, and it just could be a tad better.

 

I do like this overall, but in the future, I think you could work on the amount of repetition you have, and when in your structures you can incorporate more dynamic contrast for maximum effect. Nice work!

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 3 weeks later...

I love that line at that beginning of the track, as it has a lot of starting energy, but it seems to linger just a bit too long until things finally kick off and release at about 1:10. Very 90's computer sci-fi sounding to me, which takes me back to some of my earliest game memories on a computer, so while not the same system or even game, it was cool to hear something in that vein again. The section that followed into it's second and third minute was definitely awesome and had a nice balance to the beginning and the ending of the ReMix. Only thing I didn't care for was the siren transition, but that's mostly on me and I would have loved it more if tweaked in speed or tone just a little differently. So yeah, great balance, nice arrangement and solid enough production. Super debut, dude, a great mix indeed!

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  • 4 months later...
  • Liontamer changed the title to OCR03173 - Lawnmower Man "Cyber Mower"

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