prophetik music ⚖️ Posted February 25 Posted February 25 Some time last year Ronald Poe was noodling on a remix of The Chase, and that conversation made me think about how fun (read: ridiculous) it would be to mash up that song, which plays during the Luca Blight group boss battle fights, with Mad Luca, which plays during your 1:1 duel with Luca Blight, one of the main villains of Suikoden II. Luca Blight is the prince who slaughters a brigade of his own child soldiers, blaming it on a neighboring kingdom as an excuse to break a peace treaty. He only gets worse from there, personally slaughtering innocents by the hundreds and laughing about it. I wanted to arrange something that showcases his evil. Musically, I was inspired by artists like Sub Focus and Camo & Krooked. The Chase is a banger and felt like it lended itself to drum & bass, but Mad Luca is just absolute musical insanity. (Appropriately, given the character.) MIDI of The Chase existed, but as far as I could tell, nobody had attempted to transcribed Mad Luca before. I was in luck, however; I suggested it on 8BMT's patreon and he included it in a video on Odd Time Signatures, which meant he also made the transcription available to subscribers. (I'd recommend watching the videos, it's a really good breakdown of the source.) The cacophony of time signature changes made the idea of trying to do a really integrated mashup complicated, so I opted to use Mad Luca for the break, trying to show Luca Blight's descent into madness through the arrangement. Then I circled back to the B section of The Chase to bring it all home. It's not an entirely traditional arrangement because the break is more of a mental breakdown, but I think it provides the necessary whiplash to express just how bananas Luca Blight is. As always, thanks to the great community in #workshop on Discord for their reviews and critiques. Games & Sources Game: Suikoden II Composer: Miki Higashino 🔹 🔹 🔹 The Chase: 0:00 – 1:11, 2:28 – end, with some motifs sprinkled through the middle section 🔹 🔹 🔹 Mad Luca: 1:11 – 2:28
prophetik music ⚖️ Posted February 26 Author Posted February 26 The Chase sounds like something out of FFXII. Mad Luca just sounds like nonsense randomizer stuff. opens with some vox and heavy bass. dnb percs and bass woobles come in fairly quickly. there's some melody from The Chase here, and the feel is more filtered and restrained initially. 0:48 continues to be a rising build, and there's some fun filtering work in here. i admit i kept asking "where's the drop?!", and then when we hit it, it's the Mad Luca theme. that wasn't quite the payoff i wanted! the synth choice for the source content is pretty weak and so i felt it lost a lot of drive here. it noodled through the Luca theme, and we get something a bit more beat-driven to hang onto at 1:35. except not, because this continues to noodle all over. from an energy management perspective, this section goes on for way too long...but finally does get back to the The Chase at about 2:27 (i liked the Chase rising line in the background right before this). the mix trucks through The Chase's melodic material, and there's a lot of variety in the instrumentation and ways that it's being represented, which i like. there's a big drop at 3:24 (literally), and the beat drives alongside some vox for a short while before it's done. i think that the dnb sections of this are really well-handled. there's a lot of variety in what's playing, the feel is energetic and never quite delivers on the payoff, which is a neat concept. i think the Mad Luca section is at least twice as long as it should be from an overall song perspective - like, we get it, you can do weird time signatures in a style defined by 4x4, but you never asked if you should do weird time signatures in a style defined by 4x4. lastly i found the ending a little too disconnected from the main body of the work. i get the concept of using a different timbre as an outro/ending section, but think it should be closer to the bass falloff - like, having it playing by 3:30 i think would feel better (having the hats playing behind the bass falloff) to help string those together. i think the mix sounds really solid, and the automation on the drums throughout is impressive. i just don't get throwing away all the goodwill generated in the first minute plus to wander around in randomizer town for another minute plus. NO
jnWake ⚖️ Posted May 9 Posted May 9 (edited) I remember watching that 8BMT a while ago, that second source is indeed quite insane. "The Chase" is an absolute banger though. Anyway, this begins with a classic dnb pad sound quickly joined by the G#-A repeating notes from "The Chase" and a very standard electronic drumbeat. At 0:25, the first melody from "The Chase" plays with some pads and SFX. Around 0:47 we move to the next section from "The Chase", which focuses on a D chord, creating tension. I love the percussion work in here, adding some chaos. There's a quick build-up with a classic swelling sound as we move to the next section: "Mad Luca"! It's kind of a rough transition tbh, mostly because (I think) it begins on B and there's no harmonic preparation for the key change. Now, "Mad Luca" is a completely whack track so it feels a little odd to be calling out the key change but it makes the transition even more jarring than it should. In any case, from 1:11 we start covering "Mad Luca" territory and it's honestly almost impossible to accurately describe what's happening... I like how there's a lot of interplay between different synths during this section, and I also quite enjoy the percussion work here, switching from "nonsense" to having a regular beat for a few bars. We return to "The Chase" around 2:26 in a transition that's surprisingly natural. This riff works well on the dnb style. Then there's a reprise from the 0:25 melody and around 3:03 a reprise of 2:26 with more melodies (just like how it plays on the source). There's a fake-out ending at 3:25 and after that a 40 seconds or so section that honestly doesn't really add much IMO, just a beat and a reprise of the intro pad and voice clip. On arrangement I think this is great. The first minute is a nice build-up to lead into the "Mad Luca" section. I'll disagree with prophetik here, the length of the section doesn't bother me at all and I think the chaos of it, the constant changing of synths and never having a constant beat is a really cool effect. The transition back to "The Chase" is also great so that helps. Main nitpicks in terms of arrangement would be the transition to "Mad Luca" and the final section which, honestly, I'd cut. On production this is great, I have almost no nitpicks. IMO you absolutely nailed the dnb style and I dig the synth choices. If I were to nitpick anything, I think there's some SFX that get a bit wild on volume at times, but it's absolutely not a dealbreaker. Overall, I really like this! Arrangement is fun, production is great. Source treatment is generally conservative but the genre switch is transformative enough for this to fit OCR IMO. I'd love if the track ended at 3:25 instead of the additional ~40 seconds, but I won't reject the track for that! YES Edited May 9 by jnWake
Chimpazilla ⚖️ Posted May 9 Posted May 9 I like this tons right out of the gate! My ears are looking for even more intense neurobass though, some real dark growls, louder and prouder, And some more/louder percussion and breaks. What's here is cool but on the tame side. Lots of creativity here though! I really like how you've meshed the two themes together. I agree with jnWake here, I love the chaos of the arrangement, that took some skill to put together with Mad Luca in the middle but it feels really cohesive with the two source songs together, nice work on this arrangement. Mastering is loud. I think you could have trimmed some low-lows out of some of the elements and I'll bet that would give you more mastering headroom, and I'd love to hear the master go a little harder with some harmonic exciter/mild distortion, generally some more highs. I really just want MOAR GROWLS. But what's here is awesome, love it. Let's go. YES
pixelseph ⚖️ Posted May 10 Posted May 10 Heya Mel! I remember the Office Hours session with Ronald Poe when he was looking at smashing these two themes together and thinking it would be a big challenge for anyone to bring it together. The Chase doesn't feel nearly as unapproachable as Mad Luca, and taking the DnB approach with it feels meant to be here. I agree with Chimpa that moar growls and harmonic excitement would be lovely to have; what's here is a clear mixdown where the bass and kick drum are in harmony with the melodic elements. I don't feel the key change into Mad Luca @ 1:12 is all that jarring, though like Proph I would have preferred a different synth handling the serpentine melody initially - moar distortion, in other words. 😜 I also agree with Proph that the fake-out ending @ 3:29 makes the outro feel disconnected from the main body of the piece. To my ear, it sounds like it's introducing another new section rather than cueing the ending; the latter feels like the intent. If this one ends up not passing, I would have another look at that transition and see what can be done to make it feel more like a finale - move the vocal forward, start the beat back up sooner, etc. As it is, I think this is enough to pass the bar. Great job working in something as challenging as Mad Luca into this chaotic bit of fun! YES
Hemophiliac ⚖️ Posted May 15 Posted May 15 Sweet, high energy D&B! This is rad. Complete with utter madness in the middle, just how I like it! I have to say, book-ending the wild time changes and drum parts that Madness has with more "regular" dnb in the beginning and end worked very well to create a very interesting contrast. With regards to the Mad Luca section in the middle, I would've liked it better if the individual parts were clearer to the ear. They have a good energy but something about their sound design and mixing choices made them harder to follow the melodic lines here. Not a dealbreaker though. Aside from that the sources are both well represented throughout with clear and distinct sections for both. The production is not bad, the low end rocks and the kick is coming through nicely! Success from chaos! YES
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