Emunator Posted April 30, 2022 Share Posted April 30, 2022 (edited) CONTACT INFORMATION REMIXERS: classic_gamer_76 / Tera C. Music / VelkkuEvilBastard / Dextastic / Pixel Tea REAL NAMES: Kevin Blondel / Tera Catallo / Veli Matti Suhonen / ??? / Duncan ??? E-MAIL ADRESSES: / / / / WEBSITES: https://soundcloud.com/k-vin-blondel-480441550 / https://teracmusic.com / https://linktr.ee/velkkuevilbastard / ??? / https://ko-fi.com/pixeltea USER ID: 33015 / None / 35294 / 34446 / 33998 SUBMISSION INFORMATION GAME: Castlevania: Symphony of the Night REMIX: A Lullaby ORIGINAL SOURCE: Nocturne (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txKc3yN1WLU) PLATFORM: Sony Playstation / SEGA Saturn COMPOSERS: Masanori Oouchi (Lyrics) / Michiru Yamane (Music) STAFF: Vocals: Tera C. Music Guitars & Bass: Veli Matti Suhonen Piano: Pixel Tea Drums: Dex Programming: Kevin Blondel Arranged and produced by Kevin Blondel Mixed and mastered by Veli Matti Suhonen LYRICS: Here a goddess of happiness cries An endless timeless lullaby Sings her song of the dream she has The sadness fills her eyes End of love, love is gone No more dreams to dream about so life is done If it's so, cut the thread It's time to let it go Tears they flow to the thirst of the gods The oceans roars drowned out by rain Blameless wolf carries on alone The silence now sorrounds him Sooner than dreaming ends Morning of the dawn will bring another day Turn around, you have found A different place to dream COMMENTS: Though originally composed for the PS1 title, I always thought the song would fit the ending of the third Game Boy game. I chose to re-arranged it in way that would both compliment the powerful fighting skills of Sonia as well as her gentle personality -- which seduced Alucard back then and made her such a loving mother to Trevor. A huge thank you to everyone involved in this project, who took the time to record and perform each of their respective instruments... but also had the patience to wait for so long to get it eventually done. You guys are the best ! Edited October 14, 2022 by Liontamer closed decision Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MindWanderer Posted May 25, 2022 Share Posted May 25, 2022 Wow, not what I was expecting, for either a SotN mix in general or a mix of this source! What a fantastic little rock ballad. The instrumentals are pretty different from the original, but since the remix is dominated by the vocals, which are melodically identical, there's no problem with source usage. The vocals are very hard to understand. Tera's pitch is excellent, but her enunciaton isn't as strong. The choruses, in particular, when the guitar joins in, are completely indecipherable. I can only make out "dream" and "a different place to"; I wasn't even sure it was still English for a while. The balance also favors the guitar too heavily; even if her enunciation were cleaner, I think she'd be hard to make out. While that is a major criticism, it's my only one. The performances are otherwise stellar; the arrangement is creative without going off the rails; production is otherwise on point. I'd love clearer vocals, but 1) I don't think we're going to be able to get them, and 2) I don't think it's enough to sink this otherwise fantastic submission. Strong work. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarkSim Posted June 28, 2022 Share Posted June 28, 2022 Super cool reimagining of this source, with great performances. It's a shame the vocals aren't able to be clearly heard, although the tone of the voice sounds beautiful, and fits the genre perfectly. Not sure if some tweaking on the production side could bring out the lyrics more clearly, but it might be something to look into. My major problem with this track is the mastering, which has left in a ton of clipping. It's clearly audible in the choruses for extended periods. While I appreciate there is a dynamic range in the track and it's not an over-compressed sausage waveform, another pass over this to remove the clipping is a must. There's also a strange overall character to the sound, which seems to leave it feeling both loud and quiet at the same time. I notice there's a lot of sub-bass present in the 30-35Hz range, which could be contributing to the sensation of the track feeling loud, without contributing too much to the overall clarity of sound. I think addressing some of the sub bass would go a long way to fixing the clipping, and if the vocals can be cleaned up any more, that would be appreciated. Other than that, excellent work! NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prophetik music Posted July 11, 2022 Share Posted July 11, 2022 hey, what a fun idea! the performance is great, and it really has a nice overall structure. there's a lot of breaks that are enjoyably placed and sound good. the full band sound is detailed and the singing performance (while pronounced terribly) sounds good and is nice to listen to. darksim is right in that there's way too much sub-40hz for this style. also, a big part of the issue is that there is a ton of fundamental in the rhythm guitar, alongside the very loud beater tone. there's a ton of product in the 40-200hz range which should be notched more effectively via EQ to get some more space for everything else (like, anything above 4k would be great!). i do also think this needs more compression - this style doesn't need huge dynamic shifts as much as it needs a more consistent volume throughout. i like the breaks provided, but feel that the louds should be brought back a bit and the softs brought up a bit, if that makes sense. snare could come down quite a bit. i can't understand a word the singer sings, but tbh it's actually stylistically pretty on with most JRPG vocal tracks (not that i consider this a positive, just that it's thematic). it reminded me a lot of something from persona actually. it'd be great to emphasize the 2.5k range or so to help her voice sit over the top of the mix rather than just trying to make the fundamentals louder. fix the clipping and this is a slam dunk. it's definitely possible that just trimming back the sub freqs is all this needs and the other mastering complaints fix themselves with just that. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted October 13, 2022 Share Posted October 13, 2022 No hate on the source tune itself, but it's pretty different from the rest of the soundtrack, so this wouldn't have been the source tune I was expecting when seeing Symphony of the Night as the game. Good energy in the intro, though I'm not recognizing much from the source tune. Sampled piano at :36 sounded pretty exposed. Tera with the vocals arriving at :48; loved the chorusing at 1:15, though the vocal lines were fighting to be heard. The voice as an instrument was nerfed there and indistinguishable from the other instrumentation, so it was a case where you couldn't make out what was being said. I'm not saying the vocal lines need to be super clean and upfront, but the way these parts mud together undermines the track. That's different from understanding the lyrics, which is a nice-to-have but unnecessary, especially with the lyrics handy; vocal performance flowed nicely. That cruddy piano line there again from 1:39-1:50; no body to the sound and the timing's so stiff. New verse at 1:50 and I like all of the other instrumentation as well, it's just a case where the mixing's not clean enough (it doesn't need to be squeaky clean, just letting the parts be more distinguishable by not occupying overlapping frequencies. After the soundscape cleared up at bit from 2:46-2:56, it sounded like there was an unintentional buzziness connected to the guitar or bassline; it wasn't a huge gripe, but I also heard it at :12 & 1:14 as well as I listened through again. Definitely something that would be nice to eliminate. The overall performances are definitely strong; loads of energy in all of the performances with only the mixing and that one minor piano line dragging the presentation down some. 5:10-long, eh? Needs at least 155 seconds of observable source usage to pass re: the source tune being dominant in the arrangement per our Standards. Unless I'm overlooking some connections to the source's instrumental, it sounds as if the arrangement's instrumental essentially doesn't reference the source at all, leaving 99% of the source usage coming from the vocals. :48-1:39, 1:51-2:17.25, 2:20.25-2:43.5, 3:23-4:11 = 148.5 seconds or 47.90% overt source usage The majority of the arrangement seemingly is not invoking the source tune; if it's under 50%, to me it's not primarily a VGM arrangement, even though I enjoy it. If I'm missing a connection, please let me know and I'll be happy to revise my vote. If I'm correct on my timestamping though, consider adding in some countermelodic or other writing during non-vocal sections to briefly reference the source tune and nudge it over the top. The structure of the track itself wouldn't need to be touched in any way. Otherwise, in a vacuum, I enjoy and appreciate what I hear; the energy is great and the performances are strong, and everyone here feels the same way. The mixing's not ideal, but I wouldn't hold the piece back for that as is. DarkSim mentioned (and showed an imaged demonstrating) clipping. That said, I didn't hear anything hurting my ears or coming off oppressively loud, so I can't personally say the overall levels hurt this. I'm strictly a NO on needing more VGM source tune usage in the arrangement to make the majority of the track directly derived from the source tune. If the source files aren't gone, consider some of the production aspects brought up by the musician judges as well as throwing in some more references to "Nocturne" within the non-vocal areas. This certainly has a place waiting for it here with some tweaks to fully realize the potential. Nice work otherwise, Kevin and crew! NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted October 14, 2022 Share Posted October 14, 2022 This is a lovely rock arrangement of this source tune. I agree with Larry that the source use is just too light since the vocals are the only connection to it. Larry had some good suggestions about adding a few countermelodies or other writing to reference the source tune throughout the piece. The vocals are really lovely and beautifully performed, but because of the mixing, I cannot discern the lyrics. The mixing is extremely flat and mid-heavy. I'm not seeing (on SPAN) anything egregious in the sub-40Hz range, although I suspect the low-lows of the piano and every guitar are stacking up on top of the bass to cause the overall low end to lose focus and be too loud. The master is hot, although I don't hear any artifacts. SPAN shows me the master is indeed clipping, and this seems to happen often when the final ceiling is set to 0db. I always set my final limiter to at least -0.5db to assure no clipping happens. I would probably let the mixing and mastering slide if it weren't for the source-lite problem, but all of this adds up to a resubmit for me. If this track does not pass, I suggest fixing the mixing by EQing lows out of everything that isn't kick or bass, so the low end isn't overloaded (which kills your mastering headroom). You'll also want to do a gentle EQ notch (wide-ish Q, 3-ish db GR) in all the midrange instruments somewhere between 1000-2000Hz (figure out where her fundamental is and that's the number) to allow the vocal to shine through. Right now, the vocal mushes into the soundscape. Make sure at least her primary vocal has 60-90ms of predelay on her reverb so she sounds up front. The guitar that accompanies the vocal when she sings is competing with the vocal for space in both frequency and panning. Panning that guitar much wider and letting the vocal take up most of the middle of the soundstage will go a long way toward cleaning this mix up too. Please fix this up and get it back to us! NO (please resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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