OCR03947 - *YES* Streets of Rage 2 "Las Calles de la Rabia"

[Gario]

• Your ReMixer name: PokérusVGM
• Your real name: Patricio Thielemann
• Your email address: 
• Your website: https://pokerusvgm.bandcamp.com
• Your userid: 31369

 

• Name of game(s) arranged: Streets of Rage 2
• Name of arrangement: "Las Calles de la Rabia"
• Name of individual song(s) arranged: "Dreamer"
• Original Composer: Yuzo Koshiro
• Comments: Yuzo Koshiro is a beast, holly crap! I really love this tune, and I wanted to make a much "slower but equally intense" version of this track for so long. I hope you enjoy it a lot!

 

 

[MindWanderer]

Production and performance are on point, as expected.  Excellent bass work in particular; it's well-emphasized.  Several clever variations on the theme.

That said, this arrangement is 6 and a half minutes long.  I'm not at all sure it has enough ideas to fill out that space. 2:31-3:34 is over a minute of breakdown, which drags.  The organ, bass, and hats are too loud during the keyboard solo from 3:34-4:37, which has the effect of sapping the energy out of it.  And everything after that is mostly a rehash of the first sections, just with a simple extra harmony line.  As a result, I had a hard time maintaining interest throughout.

I think mostly the quality is there.  If it does get sent back, I'd shorten that breakdown, tweak the balance during the keyboard solo so that it sits in front, and add something to the last two minutes to make them less similar to the first two minutes.  Definitely room for improvement, but I'm OK giving this a

YES (borderline)

[Liontamer]

To me, the tempo and relatively samey pace did have this drag for me as well; this was a flatter/duller energy level than I expected for such a long piece, but that was more of a personal taste thing. Any suggestions for tweaking the arrangement would be more like "nice to have" things rather than anything fundamentally wrong with it. The only thing that stuck out for me that I would have changed was the one spot where the time sigs briefly changed from 2:10-2:26; it didn't serve much purpose and broke the flow of the piece, but I'll live. Other than those crits, this was a reasonably personalized arrangement and the mixing was solid. Great source tune choice, and I like how Patricio gave it a grittier energy.

YES

[Sir_NutS]

Sort of a classic rock approach here, I like it.  The synth work is simple but it works.  Loved the triplets section.  Even though the track is a bit too long, the arrangement is interpretative and fun, so it kept me entertained for the most part.  The performances are pretty good.  This should go straight up to the front page, let's go.

YES

[Rexy]

Ooh, I remember this!  I gave it some airtime on SEGA Mixer Drive E240 not long after it won the Dwelling of Duels Koshiro Month.  It floored me then, and I'm especially pleased that you decided to submit it to OCR as well.

Anyway, the steady approach and emphasis on swung rhythms opened up a lot of opportunities to perform the theme in these different constraints - so much I'm breaking them down into bullet points this time.

• The guitar is expressive and added in some extra/altered notation along the way.
• Sprinkling references to the melody during the bass solo (2:32-3:34) is a great touch.
• The guitar-synth harmonies from 4:40 onward were pleasing to the ear.
• And I'm afraid I'm going to have to disagree with Larry on the "time signature changes" at 2:10-2:26, as the call-and-response between swung rhythms and straight triplets drew my attention in anticipation to the next segment over.

The only problem that I had with this was more of a sound wall thing in the synth solo from 3:34-4:37.  I felt the guitars, organ and drums sounded more squashed here than the rest of the track - as if they had compressors pushed to their limits due to the number of instruments involved.  It's not a dealbreaker for me at all as the rest of the production is clear and well balanced, but it is some food for thought if similar sections get written in future works.

All in all, it's a clean performance and very interpretive arrangement of one of Koshiro's works.  Once on the front page, I can see this as another example of a mixpost that excelled both here and at the DoD.

YES