Rexy Posted September 27, 2020 Share Posted September 27, 2020 Hi, I'm Laurent from the Grospixels team. I'd like to submit the latest song we made : the intro theme from Nicky Boom, composed by Alain Lambin (who also did the game's graphics). Nicky Boom is a 1992 french platform game for the Amiga, published by Microids. Here are the informations :- - ReMixer name : Grospixels - Real name : Laurent Roucairol (along with Jean-Christian Verdez, Max Noël and Olivier Tamagna who are from the team but don't play on this submission) - Email address : - Website : https://www.grospixels.com/site/remixang.php - Userid : 29807 - Name of game(s) arranged : Nicky Boom for the Amiga - Name of arrangement : Intro Theme - Name of individual song(s) arranged : er... it's the song playing during the game's intro, I don't think it has a title. - Composer : Alain Lambin - Link to the original soundtrack : Comments about the mix : The original is, I think, quite a relaxing and moving tune. I did the cover by myself because other Grospixels members are not presently available. I wanted to pay a tribute to this charming game and this very nice music, aiming at simplicity. In 2008 I tried a submission at OCR and was rejected, wich was a shock and refrained me from trying again until today. I think our productions sound better now. The main inspiration behind this arrangement is the slide guitar : I wanted to use my bottleneck and gain some confidence with it (I'm no expert). I also wanted to use vintage analog synth sounds : Moog, Mellotron and Hammond organ, since I'm mainly into seventies music. The arrangement is pretty faithful to the original, wich I hope is a good choice. I think this music is not very well known, so the priority might be to make people discover its original melodies. As for the software, I used FL Studio and mainly freeware plugins (except the drums, programmed with EZDrummer). I programmed the keyboard parts and played bass and electric guitar with an amp simulator. I hope you'll like this recording ! Best regards, Laurent, from Grospixels Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jivemaster Posted November 2, 2020 Share Posted November 2, 2020 Interesting choice of source. Things start out with drums, bass, a tremolo guitar and accompanying lead and synths. Things pickup up at 0:53, with some additional lead work. At 1:10 we get a breakdown of sorts, where the synth and bass get a slight exchange, with the guitar lead coming in soon after. At 1:36 we transition back to some similar territory from earlier. There are a couple of problems with the mixing here — prominence of parts doesn’t match their roles. The guitar lead is too soft, and the accompanying synths are too loud. At the same time, the bloopy synth lead is easily mistaken for a backing synth, which makes it difficult for the listener to understand what the focus is. At 2:27 the pace picks up, with some some nice guitar solo work, but the synths are still too loud. The section at 2:52 is better for lead volume. I think the mixing should be revisited. We get another breakdown to a slower section at 3:19, with additional guitar soloing. At 3:45, we pick up again as things get close to the end point. The ending is fairly short but gets the job done. Arrangement is ok with a number of changes over the original. The mixing with competing/mismatched volumes is the main issue for me here. Have a think about the purpose of each part, and use that to guide the listener’s focus. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prophetik music Posted February 10, 2021 Share Posted February 10, 2021 i like the intro a lot. the initial feel is a lot like what blue man group's music from their first album sounds like - if you replaced the initial synth with tubes, i'd think it was them. the guitar especially sounds a lot like it. i like the tone of both the slide and chorded guitar a lot. the breakdown at 1:10 is a great break as well, although i noticed that the crash cymbal doesn't sound super great here (it's very high-freq and doesn't sound very real). at 1:36 things pick up a bit. unlike jivemaster i didn't have a problem with the balance here as compared to what's going on in the original - i can still hear the different parts without too much trouble, and i didn't think that the lead synth was a backing part at any point. i do think at 2:27 the backing synths are a bit loud, but it's more an issue with a lot occupying the same octave so it's hard to clearly differentiate between them. spacing some of the parts out a bit would help a lot here. there's another nice breakdown at 3:19, which comes up and goes through a recap. this recap does sound pretty similar to the earlier sections that have similar stuff - admittedly by this point i was hoping for some variation in the lead synth and didn't hear any. the ending is very suddenly clumsy - the synth sounds out-of-time which may be an artifact of how your DAW handles time changes, but it doesn't sound right at all - and then what sounds more like an orchestral cymbal roll leads us out. the arrangement is solid throughout, although i'd have loved to hear more change in the melodic line that's in the lead synth, and there were a few times that parts all overlapped in the same octave and some spacing would have really helped. additionally i didn't have any real issues with production outside of a few nitpicks. there were some things i didn't like (the crash cymbal and later cymbal roll didn't sound good, and the ending really is very clunky), but overall i think this one is pretty competent. the guitar's really nice throughout and i can hear everything without too much fuss outside of 2:27. nice work =D YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sir_NutS Posted February 17, 2021 Share Posted February 17, 2021 (edited) The mix here is a bit off balance-wise. some background elements seem just a bit louder than they should, some instruments sound slightly flat within the mix (specially backings and synths) and the whole track could have been cleared out a bit so it doesn't sound as.. clupmy/muddy around the mids/low-mids but, I think the mixing issues aren't deal-breaking here. I think the instruments and textures fit each other and the arrangement well, and the production issues could be considered nitpicks. The guitar tone I liked a lot, has kind of a surfer rock guitar lead feel to it. Arrangement-wise this is solid with some stellar guitar lead performances. The synth performances aren't as impressive but they are serviceable to the track. I feel like the second half of the track was much more interesting arrangement-wise than the first which is neither good nor bad just an observation, as the lack of energy in the first half is complemented well later I think. Overall this was really enjoyable, and I think it belongs in the front page. The imperfections don't bring it down nearly enough for a rejection I don't think. YES Edited February 17, 2021 by Sir_NutS Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DragonAvenger Posted February 18, 2021 Share Posted February 18, 2021 Agreed with the YES gentlemen here. There are some balance issues, but I think they aren't a dealbreaker. There were a couple of times where I did want the bass to come out just a touch more as well, but hardly worth going back for. I really enjoyed the combination of instruments, and the overall bubbly nature of the track. Both energetic and relaxed at the same time. Fun track. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emunator Posted March 2, 2021 Share Posted March 2, 2021 This track starts off rather understated and sparse, but with each instrument and tone standing out in its own way. For example, I thought the drumming was a ton of fun with some excellent use of fills throughout, and I appreciate the back and forth between the bubbly synths and the vintage guitar lead. The guitar tones were adeptly chosen and extremely vibey across the board as well. I see where the other judges are coming from regarding balance, but I felt like it was overstated in terms of how much it impacted the quality of the final product - overall, this is definitely above the bar in my book. Well done! YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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