*NO* Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3 'Ninjazz' *RESUB*

[Liontamer]

Original Decision: http://www.ocremix.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=84566

Game- Ninja Turtles 3

Title= Ninjazz

Remixers= Koelsch1, Zyko, DrumUltimA

So a few months ago, I was reading something Zircon wrote about inverting waves to cancel out parts of songs. I applied this, and managed to remove the sax parts from Ninjazz. It also helped that I found the drumless version zyko had sent me. So I re-recorded the sax, and had DrumUltimA lay down some stuff. Then I wrote up a keyboard part.

[The Orichalcon]

Something in this mix sounds out of tune to the rest of the mix. I don't know if it's the sax or the guitar. The drums sound good, even if they are heavily reverbed, I could live with that. The bass is good.

The sax playing is sloppy at best, I know you can play better than that, Koelsch. Things pick up from 2:30, but the parts prior are just bad. I didn't hear the original, so I don't know if you've changed anything. But if your playing was as it is after 2:30 right the way through, this would be a lot better. The stuff from 5:15 and on is good stuff, nice freestyle playing that you can just chill to.

Fix up whatever it is that's out of tune, work on the timing in the mix so the sax and guitar aren't so sloppy, and maybe tone down the reverb on those drums so it sounds like it's not being played in another room. Then we should be swinging.

NO

[big giant circles]

The volume is too inconsistent on the lead sax. I'm talking from note to note, where adjacent notes would be too loud or soft next to each other. I'm not talking about overall dynamics. Some minor tuning gripes. Mastering on the drums could use some work. A little too much reverb, makes them sound kind of far away, but yet the crashes tend to be overbearing at various places.

Arrangement is aight. Nice funk. What's with the fuzz there at the beginning? Was that intentional?

Main qualm here is the production. Sax is too dry, initially, especially during the "verse" portions, fronting a guitar and drumset that are both heavily saturated with reverb. Sax performance, though decent, is hindered by volume issues and some muddiness that ensues the reverb. It's a painfully tedious process, but you'd do well to go back and fully automate each individual track down to each second before your final render.

NO tweak/resubmit

[Liontamer]

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/tmnt3.zip - Track 1 ("Let's Go Turtles")

Recording quality still sounds pretty hissy, but that wouldn't stop a killer arrangement and performance. Drums at :38 definitely sounded like they were in a completely different place, plus the tone IMO didn't gel with the sax. Bass work seemed pretty cool, but was drowned out a bit, partly because the hizz covered it up. The sax harmonization was still a bit shaky/raw in terms of the timing, and the performance probably should have been smoother and less dry, but it's a legit step up from the previous version.

From 3:04-4:36, the electric guitar work and bass was a lot more audible and contributed well to the freestyling going on. There's just something though about the sax and weed's guitar not sounding right as tandem leads. Hate to seem like I'm putting it all on Koelsch, but it's his sax that's squeaky and dry here.

Arrangement is solid, but the sax needs to be modified to better mesh with the other instrumentation both on the performance and production side. If you also adjust the sound balance and effects so that the various parts sound like they're all in the same room (as none of the 3 players sound together IMO), this would be golden. Perhaps have another mixer take a look at the separate recordings/files and give you their input.

NO (borderline/resubmit)