Chimpazilla Posted August 6, 2015 Share Posted August 6, 2015 (edited) Contact Info: Remixer Name- Careless Juja Drums and mixing by Brandon Strader Names: Careless Gorodetsky, Paul Mella email: Website: CarelessJuja.com or facebook.com/CarelessJuja Submission Info: Game - Final Fantasy VI Arrangement name: Devil's Lab Song arranged: Devil's Lab Composer - Nobuo Uematsu Release on the SNES, PS1, and GBA OST: Comments: This was a piece Helios and Careless originally arranged as/for Random Encounter, but never used. After about 6 years we're finally recorded it as Careless Juja. Drums are by Brandon Strader, guitars and bass are by Juja, accordion, keys, and the metal clang sound are by Careless. The metal sound was made by hitting a slab of iron with a 2 handed construction mallet. Edited August 7, 2015 by Liontamer closed decision Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted August 6, 2015 Author Share Posted August 6, 2015 This is short and conservative, yet full of energy. Guitar performances are good. When the accordion comes in at 1:07 though, it's a mess. The accordion is too loud and everything is competing for attention. The accordion at the end works better, it is quieter and not competing. The track is very short and the ending is abrupt, seeming to just run out of steam. I could probably deal with that, but that accordion section (1:07-1:29) needs to be reworked. It needs to be mixed so that the accordion is the focus and not just added noise. The accordion is really cool! Just... not like this. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nutritious Posted August 7, 2015 Share Posted August 7, 2015 Definitely agreeing with Kris' crits on this one. I think mixing is the single biggest issue here. The song gets pretty cluttered at :20 when everything kicks in. The guitars have too much presence in the mid/mid-high range, which is muddying things up. Trying to brute-force the accordion on top of everything else going on just exacerbates the issue. On a more minor point, there's some looseness in some of the performances which could be tightened up a bit, but on the other hand, it does lend a bit towards a stylistic dirty rock type feel, so I'm ok with it. Arrangement is definitely on the conservative side with treatment of the melodies as well general song progression, but there's enough interpretation beyond the original (for example, later on with accordian writing; supportin patterns) to be ok for me on this point. I wouldn't mind hearing some more expansion on some of the ideas you introduced - especially given that this is a short song as is. Overall, good stuff here, but clean up the mixing at a minimum. Moar interpretive content would be nice as well. Also, needs a real song title NO resubmit, please Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted August 7, 2015 Share Posted August 7, 2015 Really glad to hear Random Encounter members is the submissions box. Briefly from :27-:28, the timing was noticeably loose in a bad way, since the beats hold steady, but the rest of what was here lined up well. Definitely agreed that the piece has great energy, and IMO works for a melodically conservative piece. The mixing's definitely pretty messy, and I felt like the drums were too dry, or at least the background wasn't fully filled out. I'm in Nutritious's camp that I would let this arrangement go, because the presentation is personalized enough, but at only 2:11-long with a little melodic interpretation, I'm left wanting more substance regardless. In any case, the mixing criticisms are the main thing holding this back, I agreed with Chimpa and Nutri there. Very good stuff, it just needs to be de-cluttered. Oh, AND a new song title [redux] NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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