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*NO* Balloon Kid 'Hot Air'


Liontamer
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Hi, my name is Philip Robinson. My ReMixer name is (or will be, if this gets accepted) Daftman. I'm sending you guys a remix of the first level music from "Balloon Kid" for the original GameBoy. (I have no idea if the song has a proper name. You could probably just call it the main theme.) The composer's name is Hiro Tanaka (which with a name like that, I can't help but think of Hsu and Chan, but I digress). I do not have a website or a OCR userID. My email address is philipr15@gmail.com. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the soundtrack anywhere on the internet; however, you can download the music files (GBS) from www.zophar.net/gbs (it also has a link to download a GBS player if you need one). The song in question is the third one.

About the mix itself: I'm using GarageBand 3. I decided to do the remix because my younger brother arranged the song for the piano and then tried to make a GarageBand arrangement. It sounded pretty bad so I decided to give it a try. I'm rather pleased with the result. It's not a terribly complex remix (or at least until near the end) but it's very catchy; it's a very happy song. Anyway, here it is. I shall await the verdict with agitated anticipation.

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The source is a decent variation from the Balloon Fight original, but I definitely prefer the FIGHT! Still, let's see what we've got...

http://www.zophar.net/gbs/ballkid.zip - Track 3

The vibes (or whatever) opening things up are way too rigidly sequenced, as well as those initial piano plunks. Just doesn't sound smooth or natural at all. Once the piano chords come in at :20, the tone is at least a bit better. What's that light percussive dealie playing along with the bass? Annoying little thing, but no big deal. Yeah, this mallet percussion sequencing is way too tight. Plus it sounds too bright and empty in the soundscape, IMO. The robotic sequencing drags pretty quickly.

1:34 reduxes the the main verse only with extra notes. Not bad, but this needs more substantive variation. Mallet percussion was still annoying me with it's syrupy roboticness. :lol:

The textures are pretty empty; sounds like you're relying on the reverb/delay effects you have in place to fill everything out, but it's not completely effective. Unfortunately can't put my finger on what this could use to fill out the soundfield and get things sounding more cohesive. This is a decent foundation, but lacks a lot of polish and could use more arrangement development beyond minorly spicing up a rehash of the first section.

NO

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  • 5 weeks later...

That's the bass sample Larry. YOU GET THE :roll:!!!

Larryhate aside, he is correct; things sound far too mechanical here. One of the advantages the piano had over other keyboard instruments when it was developed was that it was capable of producing a dynamic range of sounds, from soft to loud.

I'm sure you already know that. So apply it! Every piano note in your piece plays at the exact same velocity. Adjusting velocities is one of the fundamentals of good sequencing. Don't ignore it!

Arrangement isn't too bad though.

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pretty simplistic and very rigid. funny thing about me even owning an imac, is that i've maybe used OSX 10-15 times in the past year that i've owned this thing. garageband is a fun program, and the loops are terribly addicting to play around with, as are the software instruments, but it takes some work to get a good, full, rich sound. especially the strings. that's probably the main thing i DONT like about GB. the other stuff is pretty cool--the synth leads and textures are pretty cool. (in garageband, that is).

at any rate, the track is way too sparse and there's lots and lots of empty space, for lack of a better way to describe it.

otherwise, it is a happy lil' diddy. it just needs some more work and some TLC.

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