Liontamer Posted April 19 Share Posted April 19 Earth Kid: Final Fantasy VII was my very first RPG, which I started playing at age 7 back when it first came out. It absolutely changed my life. I had a blast playing the remake, too, and the new original song, Hollow, blew me away at the end. The lyrics - which are essentially about grief - resonated with me personally. I'd wanted to cover it for a while and I first had the idea 3 years ago, but was finally able to finish it last year. The style of this arrangement was influenced by classic rock ballads with folk elements. I played the Irish bouzouki, piano/keys, accordion, harp, and got some practice with belting, which I've been doing a lot more of over the last few years. Erika contributed guitars, bass, and drums, and really helped bring my vision to life. I couldn't have pulled off the sound I wanted without her! I also incorporated a couple of references to other FFVII tracks. The harp arpeggio (...harpeggio?) during the guitar solo is inspired by the Prelude, and the one during the second bridge was modeled after the harp part in Dear to the Heart. During the second and third choruses, the accordion (doubled by the harp and mellotron) briefly quotes the melody of On That Day, Five Years Ago. I realized while arranging that the chord progression in the chorus kind of worked with that minor key version of the main theme, so of course I had to do something with it. I've been wanting to explore rock and metal genres more in my music lately (going back to some of my old roots), and this was a great outlet for that. It was a very cathartic song to work on, and I loved playing and singing it. I poured my soul into this track, and I hope you enjoy it! Erika: This track was a lot of fun for me to play on. I usually only do distorted rock/metal styles, but for this one I also played acoustic and clean electric. I enjoy how the layers turned out with the acoustic and electric guitars stacked on top of each other, it really adds some depth to the rhythm section of the arrangement. I also did something new for me, which was writing and playing a 3 part harmony for the guitar solo. I rarely do harmonies on my solos, so going for a 3 part was a fun way to change up the way I usually approach solos. My exposure to FF7 is much more recent than EK's, but I still have this fondness towards the game that is similar to that of games I played 20 years ago. Getting to work with her on this arrangement was a blast, and I'm very proud of how the song came out! Credits: Earth Kid: Vocals, Piano, Irish Bouzouki, Accordion, Harp, Keys (Mellotron, Organ), Arrangement, Mixing Erika Richards: Acoustic Guitar, Electric Guitar, Bass, Drum programming, Mastering www.youtube.com/EarthKid www.youtube.com/@ERichards Games & Sources Game: Final Fantasy VII Remake Composer: Nobuo Uematsu Lyrics: Kazushige Nojima Sources: Hollow On That Day, Five Years Ago: Prelude: Dear to the Heart: Note: Hollow is the primary source, with small quotes from the other listed tracks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prophetik music Posted April 22 Share Posted April 22 dunno if i'd call this a mix of the two games officially. this is pretty clearly just FF7Rem. really interesting opening feel. accordion, guitar, and what sounds like the bouzouki to start. would have liked whatever plectral instrument playing the single tones here to be a touch louder. some melodic content in the accordion, and then the band sound comes in at 0:33. there's some really fun crunch in that first chord, very reminiscent of what makes the FF7 overworld theme so good. vocal line at 0:56 sound great, a bit of rawness alongside the nice backing elements. there's not much bass going on here - drums are pretty quiet too tbh - and there also doesn't appear to be much formant boost here, so it feels pretty mid-heavy with some pressure in the 200-300hz range. a bit of lift in the 3k range (this might require different EQing than the bigger parts later?) would allow you to turn down your vocal volume while still cutting through the mix, and in turn reduce some of that pressure on the fundamental. there's the lightest touch of autotune artifacting at 1:19 (your smiling face). i really like the instrumental refrain after this verse - it's a great contrast to the body of the verses. i also like the tremolo guitar accents in the second verse, again reminiscent of the original soundtrack (Life Without Parole is the vibe i get from that). there's a prechorus at about 2:17, and your alto tone is still really solid through here. it's obviously low so excellent job continuing to maintain quality. there's a touch of overlap at 2:47 and then we get The Chorus, which sounds freaking awesome. i see the same lift at the 3.8khz range (not sure it's on the vocal part for sure) that i saw before and i think that freq is a touch high, because the vocal parts are still very loud relative to everything else in order to speak here. harmony parts though are an excellent addition and sound good, and are balanced really well. i wouldn't have minded more attention to consonants in the vocal line to be able to understand the words a bit better. 3:20 is a guitar lead part and sounds superbly in-style - love the octaver and the tone of the lead. there's no transition to the prechorus and i wouldn't have minded a crash or something. this builds into the second chorus and again this is a high point. there's a ton of suspensions in the backing part which is a really neat sound. i could hear a lot more of the keys in this section too which was really nice. there's an outro on the instrumental refrain, and a great solo line from EK, and it's done. what a ride! this is a really fun rock ballad that overall sounds solid. there's some nits in production and execution that i would love to hear get updated, but overall this does a nice job fleshing out the original's fairly basic chord progression while adding a lot of verve and folky style to the structure. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted June 6 Share Posted June 6 I agree with proph, really solid rock ballad. The guitar performances are great, vocals are wonderful and the singing and tone are gorgeous. The vocal could stand to have just a tad more processing because it sounds a bit up-front, but wow what a vocal performance, and it cuts through really well. I also agree with proph that the overall mix lacks some lows. Regardless, I love this. Really nice work! YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted July 14 Author Share Posted July 14 Cool personalized cover with more graceful vocals from EK and more gritty rock from Erika. Fun textural changes throughout, plus the lil' cameos of other themes were a nice, subtle nod to the original game. The performances all felt very cohesive. The mixing was a little cramped for my tastes during the final big crescendo section, but it was nothing really dinging the track. Love it, this is strong! YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hemophiliac Posted July 16 Share Posted July 16 Absolutely love this, incredible performances. Hollow was one of my favorite parts of Remake and it fit in so well. Structurally very close to Hollow and feels very conservative because of that, but after multiple listens I started picking up the very subtle nods to the other tracks (Prelude and Dear to the Heart). That's just due to the nature of harp inside of a rock/metal tune that's more full and heavy. The countermelody writing is excellent, and fits in so subtle that it lets multiple listens have huge repeat value. I'll definitely be listening to this one again and again. Fantastic lock-in on the vocal harmony, almost too perfect. If you used pitch correction at all, I'd say you could probably even lighten it some to keep a little bit of rawness in there. Amazing! YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts