Liontamer Posted September 18 Share Posted September 18 RebeccaETripp Rebecca Tripp, Gabriel Tripp http://www.crystalechosound.com/ ID: 48262 Game(s): Shovel Knight Song Title: DJ Mole Mix Songs Remixed: The Underlying Problem This song was co-arranged between my brother and I! It's for the Shovel Knight album, Champions that's about to go live. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prophetik music Posted September 19 Share Posted September 19 little different style right off the bat! opens with a filtered bass synth and a very resonant lead. most of the synths are in the same range and it's dense. kick and snare come in at 0:16. there doesn't sound like there's any sidechaining so the kick sounds pretty weak. this opens up a bunch at 0:32 and you can hear some fun countermelodic elements, and a bitcrushing fill. it hits its stride at 0:49 finally and it's a nice groove, the kick just has no beef at all. i like some of the added flourishes to the melody line through here. there's a break at 1:20. this might have been a chance to change up the lead a little. there's a hard cut into a filtered beat and bass right after it - this was a little sudden and took a second to get the hang of what was going on. this transitions into a bridge section that's more transitional until some repeated material from 0:49. another transition with bitcrushing into the final chorus at 2:23. there's some bass-synth focused outro, and it's done. overall i think this is a really fun arrangement! you take an original with a lot of dynamic movement and manage to represent that well in this genre. there are a few technical issues that are a big deal - the kick having no guts throughout is a really big one. layering in some samples with more sub content, sidechaining the bass and backing pads so that the kick can speak through the mix a bit, and making sure you're not scooping the bass out of the EQs so high (looks like the peak's in the 75hz range, i'd expect it to be half that / an octave lower) would help a lot. separately i was getting pretty tired of the same synths by the end of the track. there's a lot of repeated elements in here (like how you reused the opening synth riffs several times) - by changing up your leads just like you would change up what instrument in the orchestra's carrying the melody, you add engagement and interest to your listener. you have several breaks at good times in the track, so maybe consider mixing up your leads in those transitional points. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liontamer Posted November 23 Author Share Posted November 23 Love this source, always glad for an excuse to listen to it! Right from the jump, I’m liking the genre transformation. During the chorus from :32-:46, the lead comes off very flat. The sound design and balance isn’t ideal, but it’s not awful. 1:20 would have been a great place to change the lead sound for more variety there. Dropoff at 1:36 that was super-barren but gradually built back up starting at 1:50; this needed something else to fill the texture out more without being too much. A bunch of cacophonous supporting writing from 2:00-2:08 and 2:24-2:32 that needs to be reworked; has no melodiousness to it plus the synth choices already feel old by this point, so, surprisingly, there's fatigue for me with this sound design even though a lot of time hasn't passed. At 2:08, the sound design and intensity are similar to around :56; it’s not really going anywhere new or dynamic. 2:32 messed around more with getting subtractive and varied with the presence of the melody. 3:04 revisited the style of the opening to bookend the piece, then did a little bit more original writing at 3:20 that wasn’t melodious and felt like a flat finish. I’m in the same camp as proph; there’s transformative ideas, but the track relatively too flat and repetitive in how it sounds despite effort given to varying some textures. Needs different leads, more filling (some gentle padding of SFX here or there), and smoothing out some non-melodious moments. The core of it is promising, so definitely worth revisiting to see what more could be done, provided the interest was there. You can have arrangements with a steady energy, but the dynamism has to come in other ways, and that’s not been pulled off here despite some tactics going in that direction. NO (resubmit) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chimpazilla Posted November 29 Share Posted November 29 Cool arrangement, lots of neat ideas here. But the production needs more work. Right off the bat, the bass that comes in is way too loud and dominating, it is pounding my ears at 90Hz. The synths playing melodies and countermelodies are all playing in roughly the same frequency range, and when the soundscape is full such as at 0:32, there is just too much playing at the same time and it is fatiguing to listen to. It feels like not much EQ has been done to allow each synth to breathe within the mix, and everything is stepping all over each other, in frequency and in writing. From 0:33-0:46 I hear a lead, an arp, a countermelody, and the upper end of a very busy bassline, all mushing together. The writing is all super busy and the synths do not have room to breathe. Listening all the way through, there are several sections that are overly busy like that. Despite several areas with very cool filtering and bitcrushing, the mix sounds repetitive because the timbre of the synths never changes all the way through, and sections of writing seem to be repeated wholesale. The synth that is used primarily as a lead is probably better used for a backing writing part; the patch is cool but it is nebulous and does not carry a lead melody well. A lot of the time, backing arps do not fit harmonically with the leads and countermelodies, and there are clashing notes here and there. I don't hear any sidechaining at all on this mix, so the kick barely comes through. Proper sidechaining of the instruments (bass at a minimum, but I sidechain everything in my mixes, in varying amounts) will let the kick punch through, it will add groove to the mix that isn't there now, it will help clean up the mixing, and give you much more clean mastering headroom. Unfortunately I concur with the guys that this mix is fatiguing overall. It is overwhelming due to the full-time busy writing and too many elements playing at the same time and in the same frequency range. This will need to be reworked. Keep in mind that contrast is key in a mix like this. If you have busy lead writing then the backing elements should be simpler at that point (blocked chords or simple supportive writing, not a busy countermelody and also an arp and busy bass writing). If you have a distorted element, then the other elements should be significantly less distorted (distorted lead plus clean backing elements or vice versa). I recommend soloing two or three elements at a time, that will help you decide which element is the lead in that section (and if so, is it cutting through properly?), and also if the elements are fitting together harmonically and rhythmically. If two elements are really competing, you can also use EQ to give lead elements priority (with a possible boost at its fundamental) and then notch backing elements at the frequency where the lead is primarily playing. You can also make sure some elements (typically leads) sit more centered (at least their fundamentals) and backing elements are wider or even use a Haas to completely stereo-ize the sound. The goal is to create a 3D soundstage where every element has its place to shine! Larry said "you can have arrangements with a steady energy, but the dynamism has to come in other ways." He is so right, that's a good way to put it. The dynamism will come with contrast, as I described above. NO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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