*NO* Little Samson 'Lair of Kikira'

[Liontamer]

Hello!

My second attempte now, I'm positive this is better and from an unremixed game. Thank the PRC for this

The ReMix: (tagged)

or (in case of emergency, untagged)

Contact Info

• Your ReMixer name : Another Soundscape
  
• Your real name : Mattias Häggström Gerdt
  
• Your email address : anothersoundscape@gmail.com
  
• Your website : www.anothersoundscape.tk

ReMix Info

• Name of game(s) ReMixed : Little Samson
  
• Name of individual song(s) ReMixed : Kikira's Theme (as seen in PRC85)
  
• Additional information about game:
  Released by Taito, developed by Takeru, Released June 26, 1992 Japan, October 22, 1992 (U.S.) March 18, 1993 (Europe), System: NES, Composer: Kazuhide Sasuga
  
• Link to the original soundtrack: http://www.zophar.net/nsf/lsamson.zip OR if it's still hosted
  
• Your own comments about the mix:
  Realizing you have to learn the program you're working with I started to dive deeper into the world of Reason. Here's the fruits of my labor.
  This is an industrial mix of Kikira's Theme made entirely in Reason 3.0 for PRC85, using a lot of original samples and obscure ReFills (distorted toysynths, old junk and such).
  This remix was done mainly to ridicule the cuteness in the Little Samson game. After listening to the original track over 20 times to get inspiration I was so sick of the sugary sweetness of the theme so I decided to make a really dark and somewhat heavy mix.
  Like, what if Kikira the Dragon was one of those big, evil, man-eating dragons you've heard so much about instead?
  All vocals and lyrics are done by Kholdstare, all credit for them goes out to him, the only thing I did was process them.
  The original lyrics in order of appearence:
  Let the roar of the dragon sound
  Why did you come here?
  What did you seek to obtain?
  Get out now!
  Let the roar of the dragon sound,
  Your corpse falls to the ground
  And that's pretty much it. Enjoy and I hope you like it.

-------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.zophar.net/nsf/lsamson.zip - Track 3

Heh. Definitely an interesting original. I prefer track 4 myself, as it was one that I heard Shadow play around with years ago.

Intro already seemed kind of lossy, but that just may be how you produced it. Vocals kicked in at :23, but the music sounded way too murky and ended up de-emphasizing the source melody. Some drums kicked in at :59, but the tone didn't quite fit the track, IMO; unfortunately, I can't suggest what I'd change there.

Transitions back into the theme at 1:23, but the soundfield is still pretty murky; could be personal taste issues, so nothing that kills the track in terms of evaluating it. The beat pattern that started at 1:23 becomes too droning and repetitive, even staying that same when 2:11 changes the rest of the texture. Gotta vary things up at some point.

Rather bleh on that guitar synth at 2:11, though it's not trying to function as a real guitar. So it's not all bad, just rather generic-sounding. There's just not much power behind it though, and it struggles to cut through the rest of the music. 2:47-2:59 was pretty cluttered. Genuinely interesting and creative ending.

Pretty interesting interpretation, but the execution is really rough. Having monophonic/singular leads from 1:23-2:36 (less so until 3:00) tended to make the track feel very empty. Flesh out the melodic portion, either by layering the melody more substantially and/or adding some countermelodic writing. Work on varying up the drumwork, and separating the parts more substantially through EQing. Decent base, Mattias, but it would need a ton of TLC to be made passable.

NO

[The Orichalcon]

Blande percussion straight away. I have no problem with the way you've programmed the percussion (except that it sounds a bit robotic perhaps) but you need to make the sounds less dull/flat. Beef them up, give them flashy effects, make them interesting.

The bass-synth stuff sounds robotic in a not very good way. The mix could be much smoother with the flow. The melody is good from 1:30-ish and on. But you could easily thicken that area up to go with the crunchy bass-beats you have plunking in the background.

Things move up to a better level towards the end of the mix, it starts sounding like Bjorn Lynne circa Worms 2 when those soft spoken vocals kick in.

I'd recommend working on the soundscape for the mix, you have the right idea as you go in, but you need to make sure the whole mix maintains the same level of sound. That is, the intro has to sound as professional as the last minute or so. Get your instruments more fluent, and your beats more interesting and maybe you'll have a nice dark groove mix here.

NO

[Malcos]

I enjoyed the intro actually. For me the main issue is one of interest. This mix has solid foundations, and the vocals and effects at the end were good. The actual meat of the track is too empty; I agree with Liontamer that the leads were out there on their own, and with perhaps more parts and more fills on the drum section, this could have been a more engaging arrangement.

NO (please resub)