*NO* Sonic Adventure 2, Jet Grind Radio, Vectorman, Sonic Spinball & Sonic 3 "SEGA Space Station Big Dome, 2094"

[Rexy]

Name of primary game arranged - Sonic Adventure 2 (but w/ plenty others)

Name of my arrangement - SEGA Space Station Big Dome, 2094

Remixer name - Michael Hudak

Hello judges. Me again. VGM Con 2020 just recently ended and it was cool to connect some OCR faces to names. With those good vibes, I wanted to finish this remix up.This piece is heavily inspired by a lot of 90s DJ club sets that I used to listen to in college (on YouTube...I'm not that old!). What better way to do a medley-but-not-a-medley (or a mashup-but-not-a-mashup) of a big handful of 90s and early 2000s SEGA jams than by re-creating a chunk of one of these sets? But here's the rub: it's set a hundred years later. In a giant space dome. I figured we spent the 2010s riding the 80s retrofuturistic synth-wave, so let's see if we can't get a 90s thing going this decade! I guess I already tried that with my Skyward Sword tune, but...let's keep it going :p

"Space Trip Steps" from the Meteor Herd stage in SA2 seemed like a perfect foundation for this idea, and I had to do a lot of Vectorman as well to finally get it out of my head after 25 years. Really wanted to add something from Vectorman 2 and another Rouge theme from SA2, but couldn't make it work. I apologize for the complicated breakdown. I tried to de-clutter as much as possible.

Name of games arranged in bold. Songs used from them in italics in the order they appear - - - - - - - -

- Sonic Adventure 2 (Space Trip Steps; I'm a Spy) 

- Jet Grind Radio (Electric Toothbrush)

- Vectorman (Day 2: Metalhead; Day 3: Tidal Surge)

- Sonic Spinball (Toxic Caves)

- Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (Knuckles' Theme) – I directly sampled the source tune snares and pitched them a bit.

Vocal sample SFX from Sonic 3's Miniboss Battle music are also used throughout, as are Vectorman game SFX (like when he blows up the delay pedal and then grooves along...and then dies at the end of the song). “SEGAAA” as well......

 

TIMESTAMP BREAKDOWN WITH SOURCE TRACKS

Space Trip Steps is used from 0:00–2:02 & 3:45–5:00. And the pizz violins pop up constantly throughout the song outside of that.

I'm a Spy coming in on top of Space Trip from 0:45–1:00 & 1:10–1:16. (1:17 and 0:35 in the source vid). Again from 4:10-4:23.

Electric Toothbrush plays on top of the big pad 1:49-2:02.

 

Day 2 goes from 2:20-3:04. I used the first 24 seconds of the source.

 

Day 3 briefly hinted at several times starting at 1:47 but starts in full at 3:05-3:37.

 

Toxic Caves 3:22-3:35 (0:55 - 1:05 in source) & 3:46-4:08 (first 7 seconds in source).

 

Knuckles' Theme 3:38-3:44 & 4:40-4:44. 

 

Edited August 31, 2020 by Liontamer
closed decision

[Emunator]

Meteor Herd is a really fun, underrated track from the Sonic Adventure 2 soundtrack, so let's see what you've done with this.

Overall, this is a really cool retro club throwback - very clean production, energetic synth writing, and no shortage of source usage throughout. Although you're working with a simple sound pallet, the production is crisp and clear and all of your synths and drums evoke a very specific moment in time, so I think this works on a conceptual level and was overall a really fun listen!

My biggest gripe is the integration of the Security Hall theme, which clashes in a really unpleasant way. I can't tell if it's strictly-speaking out of key (I feel like @prophetik music would have some good feedback on this and could either confirm or deny what my ear is hearing,) but it doesn't sound good to me.

1:35 and 4:25 feature some really dry synth stacks that also don't mesh with the rest of the soundscape, and end up dominating everything else that's going on during those sections. That could work with some filtering/reverb and lowering the volume, but right now they stand out in a negative way.

Aside from that, I think this sounds good to go, but those two issues are definitely getting in the way of this clearing my bar. This would be a good candidate for polishing/resubmission in my opinion!

NO (resubmit)

[prophetik music]

yeah, the crunchiness comes from a bunch of adjacent notes that shouldn't ever sit next to each other.

the big issues are in the second/sixth and third/seventh measures. top line is the melody, bottom line is what i guessed the chords were based on the bass line and some of the other blurps going on. there's an Eb next to an E (and a tri-tone away from the root, always bad), a Bb a half-step from the root, and a Db a half-step from the C (and competing with the minor nature of the chord, also really bad). then in the next measure, you've got the C right in the middle of the Bb third and D fifth, which isn't as big of a deal because it's effectively an 11th in a properly-voiced chord, but it sounds weird since it's all stacked on top of each other and there's no seventh or ninth to help get our ear there. the second/sixth measure is more egregious than the third/seventh but both are strongly dissonant. my suggestion would be to stretch some of the jumps and pitches a bit to make them fit in the shape of the original but use new notes to make them fit (ie. make the Eb an E, the Bb in the second measure a C, and the Db a D, and then live with the extra 11th in the third/seventh measure, possibly adding a seventh or a ninth in there to voice it clearer.

this section was enough to NO it in my mind regardless of the rest of the piece, but i'll go through the rest since it's actually pretty fun and i liked listening to it anyways.

i thought the opening was great and really set the style in my mind. the weird pitchbending synth early on was actually really fun too and i liked it more than i thought i would. the security theme is the first big melodic section so it being so weird was real bad, but the implementation/synthesis of it was great. the transition at 1:18 was a little weird without a crash or anything on the downbeat, but i liked that at this point there'd been several distinct background ideas displayed and it kept changing. around here the shaker in the right ear started to get grating since it was panned so hard and it was also louder in this section since it didn't change volume to adjust to the lighter background.

the synths at 1:35 are comically loud and crush everything else, so those absolutely need to get fixed. i liked the variety of wet synths that delayed/came in after that, though, and the sfx continued to be used in an effective manner and not too often. you brought in day 2 at the perfect time - the total tonal shift was great. i appreciate that you were able to tie together such a disparate variety of sources without making them feel too broken up. the second half of the mix overall rushes a bit between ideas but it doesn't feel too broken up. i wouldn't have minded a bit more attention to tying them together but it definitely wasn't a problem.

3:45's transition was another good one, calling back to earlier in the mix while continuing to bring in new ideas.

this last minute or so sounds like a big recap section, which was pretty copy-pasted. i wouldn't have minded if you'd layered a few of the sources in a bit more thoughtful manner than just pasting a few bars of each together. the ending is also very abrupt and doesn't make much sense.

overall this is a pretty fun listen with a lot of fun ideas. for a positive vote from me, this needs to have the security hall section cleaned up, some volumization done, and then the last minute or so would need some arrangement work to make it flow better (and to have an ending). this is a great start on a unique track though. nice work so far.

 

 

NO

[Liontamer]

Definitely co-signing with the fellow musician Js on the off-key stuff referencing "I'm a Spy" (which sounded awful), and then Emunator's comment on the dry synth stacks, which also stood out a lot as well. Good energy otherwise, and some creative weaving the various source themes. IMO, just fix the wrong key for the "I'm a Spy" usage and get those dry synths to not so vanilla, thin, and generic and this would be in more, better shape. Good work so far, Michael, this definitely has a place waiting for you on OCR.

NO (resubmit)