*NO* Persona 3 "Change of Seasons"

[prophetik music ⚖️]

No collaborating credits. Soundsources from Reload, like Trilian bass and Stylus RMX were used to keep the feel, but i tried to give it a funkier feel. New basslines, drums, guitars, and a remixes brass ensemble. I also brought back the French voices. I liked them, and was sad to see them go.

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Games & Sources

Persona 3 Fall semester theme, by Shoji Meguro. 
Original: 

Remaster: 

 

Edited April 1 by jnWake

[prophetik music ⚖️]

surprising how different the two versions are.

opens with similar backing elements and a male version of the voice part which is really loud compared to everything else. backing parts lack some verve as compared to the original through here. at 0:14 i expected something else to happen, but it's just another loop. bass comes in at 0:28 and doesn't sound particularly idiomatic. there's some extra keys being added in occasionally, but it doesn't sound like much because the voice part is so much louder than everything else.

there's an artifact at 0:57, and a guitar lead comes in. most of the backing elements are doing sustains in here - note how the original uses a lot of clever articulations to add style and power to the sound. i don't hear that here at all. additionally all the instruments are very densely populated in the low-mid range - lots of stuff between 200-400, and there is an overtone in the bass range that's heavy too (45hz is the fundamental, 90hz is the first overtone). this all combines to make it sound really dense through here. i like the guitar work, and i think there's a place where these elements come together feel vibrant and intense, but right now it sounds dull and repetitive since there's no uniqueness to each instance of the melodic riff and they're all the same.

there's some voiceover at 1:53 (and that hey hey panning vocal line is still going! it's so loud!), and more sustained trumpet. the lack of stops for breaths make it really obvious that it's not real. there's a fun guitar solo after this, and then the same thing that was happening back at 1:30ish gets layered back in for a few more repetitions. 3:19's a fadeout and it's done.

there's a lot of repetition in this. i don't think the bass playing the same thing stops during the entire track, the drums are the same for minutes at a time, and there's so much of the same riff used over and over. for example, look at the different drum patterns used by the original, and how constantly the instrument in front changes. the A and B sections have very different feels, and there's a lot of dynamics and space used by the original's instruments. i don't hear any of that here and that's to the remix's detriment. most of the instruments don't sound real, and they really should for this style. separately, nothing has room to breathe because of the very fundamental-centric EQing - it all sounds very dense. some more functional EQ will do wonders to allow everything to be audible without having to just crank up the volume.

this is a neat idea, but needs more work across the board. i think you definitely can do a guitar-driven arrangement of this kind of swingy electro-pop track, but it's going to take a lot more flexibility and execution in the backing parts to make it really pop.

 

 

NO

[Chimpazilla ⚖️]

0:00-0:28 is too repetitive, as proph said something else should have come in by 0:14.  This same vocal and piano pattern is still going strong until 0:56 and that's way too long.  Even with the bassline and drums added, the vocal and piano patterns go on way too long.

The mixing is out of balance.  The drums are comically quiet.  There are a ton of instruments playing during the dense portions of this arrangement, and everything is competing in frequency range, soundstage placement and volume.  The drum groove never drops out, once established.  Ditto the bassline.

At 2:08, the faux brass instrument has a slow attack, making it sound badly behind the beat.

The guitar solo is a nice addition!  The biggest problem here though is that the instrumental patterns never change, they are relentlessly playing the same patterns over and over, and often dogpiled one on top of the other so that it is a wall of sound.  I agree with proph that this is a neat idea, but needs a lot more work to be realized.  Writing variation has to be introduced, a drumless breakdown somewhere in the arrangement would be a welcome break from the intense action.  The instrument volumes need to be rebalanced and elements need to be EQd so that things aren't competing this badly.  I do like the concept, though!

NO

[jnWake ⚖️]

Begins with a similar instrumentation as the original with vocals and piano, but immediately sounds much darker. While the original focuses on a major 7th chord here you seem to be going for more of a minor sound. Two things jump at me right away, first is that this is a very quiet mix, on the intro it's averaging -16 LUFS and much later it only goes up to -14, not a dealbreaker but I'm used to things being louder. Second is that the percussion is very low, for a mix like this, that seems to be aiming for a groovy feel, you need that percussion to punch, not to be some quiet thing on the background. Anyway, for the first 20 seconds or so we basically have a repeat of the vocal pattern with some minor piano variatons. At 0:28 a bass line enters and the percussion becomes more alive with some extra hi-hat work. I really like that bass pattern, sounds super cool. New patterns repeat for a while, with some variations to the soundscape at times. At 0:57 a guitar comes in (there's a nasty pop sound right at the beginning of its part) doing the chorus melody. However, the bass/percussion don't change, so it doesn't feel like the track is moving to a different section that strongly. Eventually, more instruments join the mix and things start becoming quite crowded. Around 1:54 you drop a large portion of the instruments for the "french voice" section, but the backing is still the same. At 2:24 we get a guitar solo, cool! This lasts until around 3:20 where we basically return to the intro for the track's end.

On the arrangement side, there's some cool ideas (like the bass line) but this is extremely repetitive. Drum pattern and bass line basically don't change since the 0:28 mark and the piano line is also extremely similar for most of the track. The main variation is the addition of the chorus melody around 0:57 but even that melody gets repeated several times after its introduction.

On the production side there's room to improve. First, percussion should be more present, right now it's very quiet. Second, the mix gets very busy and, as pointed out by prophetik, there's a lot of stuff crammed around the same frequency range. I also think this would benefit from some careful EQ around the higher frequencies, the mix sounds extremely dark right now.

Overall, this in an interesting piece but I feel it needs more work. Backing elements are way too repetitive and the mix needs more clarity and punch.

NO

Edited April 1 by jnWake