Emunator Posted June 19, 2023 Share Posted June 19, 2023 (edited) Remixer name: byrdbass real name: Leland Byrd email add: website: https://twitch.tv/byrdbass or http://nuggatron.com User ID: 37736 Genre: Electronica Name of arrangement: MarioSka Name of original: Super Mario Bros Overworld/ Underworld Theme Comments: This was made as a celebration of the Mario Decathlon hosted by TheSalsaShack on twitch. Edited June 22, 2023 by Liontamer closed decision Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emunator Posted June 19, 2023 Author Share Posted June 19, 2023 There's a lot of creativity to the arrangement here. I'm hearing a ton of unique adaptations and syncopation that gives this a personalized spin on the original source material. The plucky mallet leads really suit the melody well. I like the concept here a lot, but the execution is falling short in a couple of key areas that I think need to be addressed before this could be posted. First, there's some notable panning issues where the right side of the stereo field is much louder than the left, which makes this an uncomfortable listen on headphones. Even if you are panning things left or right to create more of a stereo space, the final result needs to be more balanced overall. Typically, elements like bass, which are there to ground your soundscape, shouldn't be panned too much off to one side - this is definitely throwing things off. You can still achieve greater stereo presence by double-tracking instruments with slightly different recordings and panning them left/right, which might be great for the guitars in this case. The drums unfortunately sound very stock in terms of quality and don't really have a lot of personality to the tone. There's some fun syncopation and grooves throughout the track, but I would encourage you to seek out other samples or consider applying more effects/processing to your existing samples, such as compression or saturation, to punch them up and give them a little more flavor. The same could also be said about the bass sample, which is a pretty basic tone that doesn't have a lot of personality to it. The last critique I have is regarding the structure of the song. Your transitions between the Overworld and Underworld themes are not very smooth, and feel like a hard jump every time you switch sources. Beyond that, once you hit 3:27, the track doesn't really introduce any new ideas or concepts, but still goes on for nearly 2 more minutes, which causes the arrangement to feel like it's dragging. I would also say that the Underworld theme section in general feels underdeveloped and doesn't go anywhere - it just finds a groove and rides it for nearly a whole minute. If you want to use this section as more than just a cameo, it needs to have more to say. Countermelodies, original soloing, or additional instrumentation are all ways you could explore fleshing out this segment of the track. There's a solid foundation here, but I'm afraid there's a number of issues holding this back from its full potential. I would suggest seeking some feedback from our community via the Discord or the Workshop forum to get more specific tailored feedback if you choose to pursue this track any further, or for future submissions. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted June 20, 2023 Share Posted June 20, 2023 Sounded like the SMB2 ending theme chord progression being alluded to from :12-:24, which was a fun coincidence, though the timing of everything sounded clunky and mismatched until righting itself with the "Overworld" theme taking the foreground. Mixing seems jacked up to start, unfortunately, not just the panning Emu brought up. The bassline is too buzzy and was utimately louder than the melody and supporting faux-guitar line as well; it all just steps on each other instead of having synergy and sounding like they're sharing the same space. I liked initial the arrangement treatment though. By about 1:15, I was wondering when the rest of the track would arrive, because the textures were so basic and relatively empty. The sampled pizz strings sound so bad in terms of the fakeness of the sound being so exposed and the writing being too repetitive. Poor transition into the "Underground" theme at 2:25, and then arranged in a way that didn't feel melodious because of the original writing by the lead that was filling the gaps in between the pauses of the original theme. Then another abrupt theme transition back to the "Overworld" theme at 3:26 and it's all the same writing ideas as before just being repeated again aside from different bass and drum writing, albeit about the same level of intensity and complexity. There's so many different directions you could take this in to better develop this, and there's definitely nothing that could be done as it to pull it up above the bar here. I'd try though to apply whatever takeaways you can regarding mixing & textures, variations, and transitions. Some decent initial ideas -- and that shows promise in and of itself -- but there's 0 cohesion here right now. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted June 22, 2023 Share Posted June 22, 2023 That extreme panning is a dealbreaker. The instruments are panned too hard left and right. You can create a more cohesive soundstage with gentle panning, and even better by just EQing the instruments so they don't conflict, and/or making some instruments more narrow and others wider in the soundscape. There are phase-cancellation issues with this track and the correlation meter is pinging to the left more often than not. I believe this is the result of the extreme panning of instruments. Bass is panned so oddly. I hear the top end of it (and some of its mids too) on the right, but the lower/mids of the bass are sitting wide in the soundscape which sounds super weird. Bass needs to absolutely be mono below 150-200Hz so you could start your mixing fixes by applying a monomaker to the bass sound below 150Hz and pan the entire bass 100% in the center. Also, the writing in this arrangement is very simple, verbatim to the source, and repetitive. The section from 2:26- 3:26 is a full minute of the exact same thing with nothing new added or removed. The main sections are repeated verbatim. The same instrumentation (and panning!) is used all throughout the arrangement. The arrangement goes on way too long, considering it is so repetitive in writing and sound choices. The entire thing is too conservative to source with very limited personalization. The instruments sound robotic and blocky, most especially the pizz strings but the guitar and mallets as well. The drum groove does not change by much, ever, once established, so the arrangement has the same energy all the way through. I love the ska concept! But this arrangement needs much more work in writing, adding variations and personalization, humanization of sounds, and mixing/panning. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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