Liontamer Posted April 28 Share Posted April 28 (Aaron wanted two tiny spots of loud sibilance corrected.) ad.mixx's comments: This song was a fun one to work on. I had the idea while going through and listening to some old Touhou songs, and the source is actually from the same game I tried remixing a long time ago. That one got rejected, but I'm back at it again this time with singing involved. All I did production wise was the vocals, piano, koto, and one synth in the chorus. Chimpazilla came through with everything else and brought a beauty to the song that I never could have imagined when first working on it. She absolutely killed it with the drums and bass and added a bunch of details with chords, strings, synths, and transitions that really made this song sound 100%. The meaning behind the song is pretty simple in my opinion - it's a breakup song. Think of something like Tyler the Creator's "EARFQUAKE" and you pretty much get the gist of it. It hurts to break up - you feel like you lose a piece of yourself in a lot of ways, and I tried to capture that moment in time to the best of my ability, even though it was so long ago ("everything's getting so blurry"). The vocals and game actually have nothing to do with each other, like my past remixes here, but I felt super inspired by the doujin project "FELT" and how they write their vocal remixes (again, having nothing to do with the games themselves). I wanted to try to transform the song into something a little prettier much like they do, and I think Chimpazilla and I succeeded on that front. This one was incredibly difficult to sing because the melody is so much more complex than anything I've ever done, but I hope everything is up to par with OCR standards, and I hope the judges enjoy it. Chimpazilla's comments: Aaron said "all I did production-wise" but he isn't giving himself enough credit! This remix is his source choice, his concept, his arrangement 100%, his lyrics, his vocal performance and processing, in addition to his piano, koto, pads and fx. Aaron sent me an initial wip of this arrangement with his first sung verse, and I was hooked. It had such a haunting beauty already in wip #1. I added the bassline and drums, sweepy pads, a few plucks and details, a couple of transitions, and I mixed and mastered it. Aaron and I work very well together, with our ideas complimenting each other pretty seamlessly. This track came together rather quickly to about 90% completion and then went on hold for nearly a year due to LifeStuff™. Aaron reached out to me a few days ago with a completed vocal stem, and from there the track was finished and polished in two days. I had never heard this source tune before Aaron sent me his wip, and I was surprised how different his wip was from the source in vibe and energy. One thing I love about both the source and remix is the use of triplets throughout the arrangement. Aaron was able to maintain all those triplets in his vocal writing and it gives the piece a very nice flow I think. Aaron stayed very true to the source melody, but he added such amazing variations (such as the end of the chorus sections "and still I find I'm in love") as he crafted this arrangement, making it flow to express what he wanted to say. He even included the trucker's gearshift modulation in his arrangement! (and it is seamless!) I can appreciate how difficult this was to sing. As Aaron mentioned, the melody is quite complex, and it covers a wide range of octaves too. I think he did a terrific job! This is really an achingly sad song, but Aaron and I managed to put together a soundscape that is so lovely, and I feel like the beauty of the piece adds a hopeful feeling to counterbalance the intense pain in Aaron's words. It was a joy to work on this! Stuck In My Head lyrics: Who's to blame? It's all the same The battle's won, still it's a goddamn shame We oughta not, it's best we forgot Leave it all to rot, yet I'm still thinking what it could be I'm stuck in my head making all the wrong moves The wails from the dead say I'm breaking all the wrong rules Who's to blame? It's all the same Our hearts are charred from the unruly flame I'm so tired of this Guess I'm just not that strong So now I'm trapped with my thoughts and this same damn song I'm stuck in my head acting like a damn fool The tales from the dead say I'm being way to damn cruel I've wasted all of this life So that my hate could finally feed It's crazy for me to think That all of this ends without a bleed Enough with the nonsense, I'm stuck on the offense I'm trying so hard not to lose It needs to be confessed, my troubles were repressed And now I'm just left here confused I'm bruising my own skin to hold down the demon And still I find I'm in love I can't stop with the fury I'm so sorry Who's to blame? It's all the same The battles won still it's a goddamn shame I'm so tired of this Thinking I did no wrong So now I'm stuck here just writing the same damn song I'm stuck in my head making all the wrong moves The wails from the dead say I'm breaking all the wrong rules I've wasted all of this life So that my hate could finally feed It's crazy for me to think That all of this ends without a bleed Enough with the nonsense, I'm stuck on the offense I'm trying so hard not to lose It needs to be confessed, my troubles were repressed And now I'm just left here confused I'm bruising my own skin to hold down the demon And still I find I'm in love I can't stop with the fury I'm so sorry Everything's getting so blurry I'm so sorry Games & Sources Touhou 10: Mountain of Faith Stage 5 Theme: The Primal Scene of Japan the Girl Saw Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prophetik music Posted April 29 Share Posted April 29 wild original, really fun ride. opens with an organ-like arp and some really fun electro vocals. the build into 0:41 is great, i was ready for a bop and it's a half-time groove. there's a great track outline here in this opening section - the intro verse and refrain flow well into the second verse and refrain. i think there really could have been a nice break there though as there's a lot of words in the opening sections. there's some fun modulations around the 'wasted all of this life' section, and the one right after as well. there's another verse/refrain package and a repeat of the earlier 'wasted all of this life' section, and a final verse to finish it. the track feels like it goes by pretty quick! i think that's a byproduct of how wordy most of the lines are, and there not being an instrumental section throughout. that said, there's a lot of really fun ideas in this. as expected there's a lot of musical complexity in the original, and the way you adapted this into a vocal track is seriously impressive. i also think that ad.mixx's approach with the intentionally heavy autotuned vocals really works so well - there's a codependence between the pad-heavy backing elements, the restrained drums and bass elements, and the vocal parts, i can't imagine they'd work so well together if this was clean vocals. the master's so clean too, as expected - it sounds fantastic. really fun track. excellent work. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted June 10 Author Share Posted June 10 Whoa, I'm lovin' it! Aaron's layered vocals sound awesome, and I love how comfortably the lyrics fit with the melody, something that can be easily taken for granted until you hear someone perform vocals too rigidly in time with a source melody. The instrumentation was lush, and the textures built up nicely in the first minute. Man, y'all even made a key change sound seamless and non-disappointing (hey, I can be a key change hater). The end at 3:34 wound down too quickly, so I dunno if it could be touched up to let things resonate and breathe, otherwise, this was perfect. Y'all should seriously consider doing a Touhou EP and selling it at Comiket; this would go over extremely well there, this is so cool! :-) YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emunator Posted June 11 Share Posted June 11 The production here is actually nuts. Kris is consistently dropping professional-quality productions across so many genres, it's stunning. That production skill is wielded perfectly here to support Aaron's incredible writing, giving it a strong foundation without stealing the spotlight. It's exactly what a good pop production should do! This is my first time listening to the source material after hearing several iterations of this track during development, and I was shocked at how different it was. Honestly, there should have been so many pitfalls along the way where this could have fallen apart, conceptually - adapting an upbeat instrumental track with a very complex melody into a downtempo breakup ballad is not an easy task, especially when you introduce original lyrics. There's a million possible points of possible failure where things could have gotten awkward or overextended, but you managed to dodge them all. There's a bullet hell analogy to be drawn here that someone who is better with words than I am can run with if they want! I don't think it's out of line to say that this is the most successful and polished collab I've heard between the two of you. I'd also like to hear the outro fade extend just a little bit longer, but no biggie either way. That's all I've got, great work to both of you! YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted June 11 Share Posted June 11 I sent the votes so far to Aaron today, and he told me he made some EQ automated cuts to my mastered wav, to remove two spots of loud sibilance, and he said he sent that to Larry. He should have just pinged me! I don't bite! (hard, anyway!) So we talked about it, I made the changes and re-rendered the wav. For those who have voted, this should not affect anything, as it is just 1/4 of a second of total revision. But he was right, those S's were too loud. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hemophiliac Posted July 27 Share Posted July 27 This is great, the vocals are given all the spotlight. Meanwhile, the supporting structure around it them are very present without over-taking the vocals. Aside from the strong vocal performance, the subtle background stuff are the highlights for me. The opening background organ, the mallet-like synth at 0:41, and the piano counterpoint at the end of the track are all so perfect and well fitting. As if they were always meant to be the way they are. Sometimes I hear arrangements that feel like major improvements on their sources, this is an example of such. It goes so many more places then the original by changing leads around and adding vocals and original lyrics. People might not be familiar with the source, but boy is this will stand alone just as a good track by itself. The only thing that threw me for a brief moment was the early key change at 1:12. It didn't seem like you had said everything in that first key before departing. Modulation to the new key wasn't jarring, I just wasn't expecting that sort of color change so early. In the end, any change to prevent stagnation is a good thing and I think that it works. Very strong work from the both of you Kris and Aaron. YES Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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