Gario Posted March 24, 2017 Share Posted March 24, 2017 (edited) Contact Information Remixer Username: Furorezu Real Name: Daniel Florez Preferred E-mail: User ID: 33297 Name of games arranged: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Name of arrangement: Awakening of the Forest Sage Name of individual songs: Saria's Song Source materials: Saria's Song Comments: A few years ago, I started finding songs like Lashmush's "Breaking Point" from 2014's "Harmony of Heroes" and So Many Tears' "Searching Friends" from "Final Fantasy Tribute ~Thanks~". I loved the clean guitar style from "Searching Friends" and the dramatic slow build-up of "Breaking Point" but I wasn't able to find more songs like them for a while because I wasn't quite aware what genre they fell in or if they even fell into the same genre. Last year, I discovered through Spotify that they could be classified as post-rock and begun listening to bands like "God is an Astronaut" and "If these trees could talk" and I became inspired to create something in their styling of slow tempo, clean bright guitar tone leading to slow distorted guitar. I found myself leaning to adapting "Saria's song" to post-rock because I found that it had a melody that could be very fitting to adapt to such a style since it could either sound somber or happy depending on the way it was played. I finally got around to playing around and recording my ideas once I found the RAT-2 distortion pedal from my local library, which allowed me to give my song the oomph required of the build-up I had been humming for months but also had a warm tone and long sustain, since my other distortion options would have felt too inadequate due to their more gritty sound more apt for something like thrash metal or lacking the oomph I wanted for the rhythm and lead parts. Once I had the distortion all settled, it was just a matter of recording my idea, which I was able to get sorted sorted fairly quickly since this had been floating around in my head for months but I ended up very pleased with the results. Edited May 24, 2017 by Liontamer closed decision Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MindWanderer Posted March 29, 2017 Share Posted March 29, 2017 The approach is pretty cool, but I do have a couple of major concerns. First, I'm not sold on the production. The nice clean guitar up through 0:57 works nicely as an opener, the next part with the distortion guitar is OK, but then starting at 1:25, it's heavily loaded in the mids and gets very muddy. It never does open up to include sounds outside the middle frequencies. The climax, starting at 4:14, is even more severe, with multiple guitars stepping on each others' toes and turning everything to mud. The original content in the middle (2:47-3:15) is very dissatisfying because it's just the two guitars fighting with each other over the same space, with some bland bass and percussion. Second, the arrangement is pretty repetitive. 1:53-2:47 is a repetition of 0:31-1:25. 3:16-3:43 is very similar to 1:25-1:53, with just some different flourishes on the lead guitar, which then repeats with more flourishes but the same accompaniment. I think either of those issues is enough to send this back. The general concept and the musicianship are solid, though, so I hope to hear more from you! NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted May 23, 2017 Share Posted May 23, 2017 Weird opening, more out of a Metroid arrangement or something. That's not a criticism, and I thought it was a cool way to illustrate how different the mood of this would be compared to the original. OK, so :30 brings in the theme, but the approach sounds pretty plodding to start. The bass writing also sounded repetitive until 1:25. 1:25-1:53 hit the source tune's chorus, and the lead felt scrawny with stiff timing. 1:53 seemed to basically retread :30's writing, aside from different bassline writing, and the guitar chugs hitting at 2:20 with exactly the same stuff. 2:47-3:15 went into a different direction with some soloing, before going back to the source tune's chorus; again, I felt the lead guitar tone was scrawny and the timing felt stilted, even though the performance here was more expressive than before. I THINK there was machine gun bass kick stuff going from 4:09-4:37... yep, you could only really make out the drums at the end around 4:35 when other parts dropped out and allowed that part to breathe for a second; otherwise, they were so buried, they barely registered nearly the whole time. This could use another pass on the mixing to clarify some things, and a lot of the lead electric guitar work sounded stiff, so I dunno if you're up for fresh takes on all of that. There was also the issue of needing some more substance/development with the arrangement. Not sure why the arrangement approach was underdeveloped for the first half like this, but MindWanderer was right on his repetition criticisms. I'm actually not against more deliberate pacing, as long as there's sufficient development within the dynamic range you've staked out; this was well in the right direction, just to be clear, but more could be done here, so keep in mind the sections MW mentioned. Good base, Daniel, and I'm liking how you're given this source a completely different character. If you're up for giving this some more expressiveness in the performance, providing more development in the first half, and/or re-EQing this, this still has a lot of potential. This definitely would have been posted back in the olden days of the site, and I think it has a place here, so I urge you not to drop this one. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gario Posted May 24, 2017 Author Share Posted May 24, 2017 That's a unique way of opening this - that out of tune acoustic guitar lead really sets the tone of this track, and I like it a lot. Not enough people utilize purposeful detuning, as it's a really creepy, alienating feeling when it's done right, as it's done here. Great setup, and the idea to rock out the source is a good one. I think the arrangement works well as it is - it's a bit slow in the beginning, but it does take it to town once it picks up, there. The biggest setback this has (as others have mentioned) is the EQ and mixing on the production end of things. The rhythm rocking guitars sound distant and hollow (completely lacking in bass), the drums are mixed pretty quietly, and the overall EQ balance of this track sounds strange. The individual elements don't sound like they take up the correct EQ spaces, so when they all come together it doesn't sound right. The bass guitar is about right, but the rhythm is too focused in the mid range, the lead guitar is really lacking in the upper range, etc. I don't have too much more to say than the others have said - it's a really cool groove which is hindered by the EQ work and mixing balance. If this were polished up in those areas this would be a pretty cool track to post, but as it stands I'm afraid I must agree with my fellow judges. I hope to see it improved and polished further! NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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