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Sonic Rush Adventure - Coral Cave remix


Best Dude55
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Hello everyone, so I finally got all of my VSTs re-downloaded, and decided to take another look at this remix after seeing the new Sonic album released.

It's been over a year since I've really done any music stuff, so this new version probably won't be the best. To be honest, I didn't change much from the last version, just a few things here and there. However, I figured since it's been about a year and a half since the last post, there may be other people on the forum now that may be able to add their thoughts in addition to the other posts so far. Here is a link to the newest version: https://app.box.com/s/bw7lfimge7681g2fu62ofppxvgd4zmg6

Thank you!

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  • 2 weeks later...
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  • 7 months later...

Well, I apologize for yet another bump, but I just can't seem to walk away from this remix.

I went out and bought a pair of studio monitor headphones and an external DAC to try and improve what I can hear for working on this. I've made a couple changes, mainly related to mixing, but I would still really appreciate suggestions!

https://app.box.com/s/xfg85hfbx77tfw4d40m7wfg1t4e8pwsn

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  • 2 months later...

Wow, you've been at this one for a while! I tried both version 6 and 8 alongside each other, and I must say that there is obvious improvement in the sound quality in your latest version. I doubt I could offer anything that previous listeners have already said, but I personally enjoy the song as a pretty dang good cover. If it's deviation from the original that the judges want, I suggest that some playing around with the melody as the song goes on would be an easy way to keep the listener engaged. You know, first run through is faithful, second is more ornamental and interpretive. Would love to see this make it past the judges panel and into my OC library!

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  • 1 month later...

Well, I listened to the current and previous renditions, the slight changes and such sound good to me. I don't know if it is original enough to pass the judges, though. Have you tried submitting it already? If so and it didn't pass, my condolences. Try to think about what you are trying to say with this mix and what you can do with it (besides make a sweet cover.) What kind of flairs stand out to you in dance music? Is it trilling melodies, catchy counter melodies, making two notes into six, epic builds ups, etc, etc, etc? Play around with the melody or rhythm, be bold and break from the slick mold you've made. YOU CAN DO IT!

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  • 1 month later...

Thanks for the input!

And I haven't submitted this to the panel yet. With how long things usually take to get through the panel, I'm basically too nervous to submit it unless I'm more than say... 90% confident it'll pass, haha. I do admit though, when I originally started this remix, I was right out of high school after having been in band for 4 years, so my musical ear was a bit... better back then. So basically, I'm struggling quite a bit coming up with new ideas since I haven't really done much music stuff in a few years. However I can't just leave behind 3+ years of work and $400 of audio equipment I got specifically to get this onto the site, so I really want to try to see this to completion. I appreciate the advice though! I'll keep trying to come up with... something!

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I'm not a judge, but to my ears this version has plenty of personalization, with its emphasis on leads and arps over groove in the original. Apart from the ending, I don't feel like it's missing anything arrangement-wise, I was plenty of interested throughout and there was a lot of variety in small and large scale (again, if you ask me).

Mix/sound is pleasant and e.g. the leads are decidedly on top of the mix, easily listenable like they should be.

There's a bit of harmony clashing here and there, for instance at 1:49 the backing is in different key than the descending arpeggio thing. I'll try to find time to timestamp these. I saw I said this already a couple of years ago, oops..

Now back to the ending, it definitely sort of peters out. I've had a couple of arrangements myself where I got feedback that the piece just ends, for a couple I made little codas that resolved properly and that seems to have worked well enough. You could work what you have here into a more assertive coda that ends with a nice resolving chord, instead of things kind of fading out, I feel like there's at least the seed of that there. Or perhaps you could try to make a build-up into a climax at the end there.

For my money, once the harmony clashes are sorted out, this is really great listening (and makes me want to re-play the game ...), and definitely making the ending more confident is also worth working on. Again can't speak for evaluation, but this is very close to a fine VGM rearrangement and very close what I'd feel comfortable submitting.

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Thanks so much for the input!

I was at MAGFest this past weekend and went to one of the OCR panels, and got some more inspiration to work on this more tonight. I mainly just changed the ending like you had mentioned so that it hopefully isn't as abrupt and such. I tried to sort of giving it a bit more energy before easing it out, and ended it on a (hopefully) better chord. I haven't quite gotten the time to work on the harmony fixes yet but those will probably be next!

I don't think the link changed since it just updates the file, but I'll post it here again anyway!

https://app.box.com/s/x1vnb945exx6xhhuumqopja088nf11bs

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  • 1 month later...

Alrighty, so I've gone through and did my best to try and find harmony issues and fixed what I could discern at least :P

I suppose since I've come quite a ways on this remix, and it's been a little over 2 years since my last mod review on this, I'll mark this as ready to review. I'm still pretty nervous about that high bar of the panel, but I really appreciate all the feedback from everyone on this so far!

Here's a link to the most recent version: https://app.box.com/s/wwcxigeyz703wlhjtz77z4xwqmbtem66

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  • 1 month later...

I see a lot of bumps in this thread. :D

eval

I'm immediately struck by how bright and loud it starts. You might want to tone that down slightly. Doesn't take me long to hear that it's too loud. I don't mean the loudness itself is the problem, but it leads to problems because the mix isn't made to be this loud. Do some EQ cuts to lower frequencies the tracks don't need (lows, mostly). Decide which tracks are foreground and which ones aren't,  and give the lead instruments a bit more room by cutting their important frequencies from the background tracks a bit. That should give you a cleaner sound without you having to turn down the master.

Instrumentation is simple, reminiscent of the original Sonic games. I don't mind. But the mixing would have to be better for this to pass.

Arrangement starts off very close to the original. But with new melodies, then new sections, new stuff I can't connect to the source. It sounds like Sonic stuff, but I can't say whether it's from this source, from a different source, or is original additions. Someone better versed in the Sonic series' music might be able to provide better feedback on that.

I think this is a good mixing practice track. My advice would be to keep working on the sound, perhaps redo the levels and effects entirely (do take a backup save first), get your mixing skills up to par. Whether this track will pass after that or not, those mixing skills will be useful for other tracks.

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[This is an automatically generated message]

I've reviewed your remix and have returned it to Work-in-Progress status, indicating that I think there are some things you still need to work on. After you work on your track and feel that it's ready for submission to OCR, please change the prefix back to Ready for Review and someone will review it again. Good luck!

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  • 5 months later...

Thanks so much for the review! My job and other obligations have kept me very busy for the past few months, but I was finally able to sit down and take another crack at improving the mix some more.

I wasn't totally sure if I was going in the right direction with what you said, but I did quite a bit of tweaking with the different channel's EQs, to try and minimize interfering frequencies and things like that. I think it might be a bit more clear sounding now, but then again my ears are fairly untrained so that may definitely not be the case, haha. Either way, here is the current version of what I have for the remix!

https://app.box.com/s/lvpvf96fu27nt0j7omtvlw400opx7iqi

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Hi! It's still loud. It's still bright (not a big deal anymore, though), and there's still background-sounding things in the foreground.

The glissando at 0:07 sounds great. It's appropriately background-y. Compare that to 1:24 when I don't know what's lead and what's background. If you sort that out, it'll sound better overall. Cleaner. It's okay to move instruments from foreground to background and back depending on the role they have, but then it's good to have an eq or reverb mix to automate that you can use to push the instrument in either direction. 1:03 sounds good in this regard, you move the previous lead back to make space for the new lead melody. 1:10 is a mess in that same regard.

The foreground-background separation is the main thing I'd complain about for this track. Eq and reverb are important tools for pushing things forward or backi nthe mix, but the most important is the track level. Loud things get attention. And your leads get a lot of attention when less would be enough, 2:18 has a really loud and clear lead. It's clear enough, it doesn't need to be this loud.

I know it's tricky to figure this balance out. But here's some things to listen for. It does sound clean, so probably cleaner than before; good job on that. I'd still want the track levels sorted out. Background things softer. Foreground stuff that doesn't need to be _as_ loud also softer. Depending on where in the track it is and what it needs.

I'm noticing a lot of things that have become second nature to me are difficult for less experienced mixers to grasp. It's easy for me to say "make the loud things less loud when it's right to do so", but then I'm assuming you can tell. And that takes practice, listening, experience. Refresh your ears and come back to this, see what needs to change, change it, refresh your ears again. I can't offer any better advice than that. You're on the right track, now comes the ear grind.

Edited by Rozovian
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