Sonic CD - Metalic Madness (Good Future) Remix/Remake

[JetHawk95]

We'll Iv'e been playing Sonic CD latley and really love the good future track for Metallic Madness.

Decided to Remix/Remake it. Tried to keep the original feel to it but making it suitable for the new age of Sonic.

http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/448156

Feedback would be appreciated!

[Hybrid35]

I really like it man.

Never heard the oringal but I will soon.

[JetHawk95]

Thanks a lot

[luksamuk]

Lol just noticed that I was hearing this song for, like, one hour.

It's totally pretty beautiful, although I think you should enhance more the solo that appears between 0:16 and 0:21. Make it look more continuous.

[JetHawk95]

Thanks for the love

[JetHawk95]

Decided to do another 2 of these :')

Tidal Tempest Present (Remake/Remix)

http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/463262

Quartz Quadron Good Future (Remix/Remake)

http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/460748

[Falk]

I'm digging it. One thing I could suggest though, is to try to bring out the chords a little more. What set Sonic CD apart during its time was the really unconventional (back then) progression choices, and the full effect came from hearing all the chord tones vs tensions vs borrowed accidentals. It may be a little bit of a mix issue, but for example in TT-Present, hearing the dissonance of the melody vs the chord changes was what made the original outstanding. When the lead line is miles louder than everything else, that effect is somewhat muted.

I hope that makes some semblance of sense. D:

[JetHawk95]

I'll work on it :')

[Thefinalboss123]

1 word..........EPIC!!!!!!!! (and angelic)

[Ristar]

something I've noticed with your mixes is that there is very little bass, everything seems to be going on above the mids as well as the fact that everything feels completely drenched in reverb.

Tidal Tempest is a great example of this. I can barely hear the bass and the strings just feel WAY too loud whilst also feeling a million miles away due to all the reverb.

Reverb is there to add a sense of space, but the amount of reverb in these mixes make them sound empty.

What you really want to be doing is using a short or medium reverb with about 40-50ms of predelay and a slow-ish attack. That will give your mix a sense of space without washing it out.

[JetHawk95]

Thanks a lot man,

Only very recently have I got into mastering my work. These tracks were not mastered at all. I know now that these need the lower frequencies boosting or maybe some instruments like the hi-hats and strings need the low frequencies taken out completely to open a pocket for the lower frequencies to come through..

I should maybe touch these up a little.. My newer work is sounding a lot better now I understand how to mix down my work down properly.

I've learned slowly that less is more in a sense, Giving lots of reverb to an instrument may make it sound nice when played solo (Which is how i used to add reverb) but sounds bad when played along with the rest of the instruments, and this shows in this piece a lot.

I don't like to blow my own trumpet but I like to consider myself good at musical composition, Choosing the right instruments and arranging songs but I do need to concentrate more on finalizing my work and touching it up, Bringing out the lush sounds more.

Thanks again for the critique bro! (Y)

[Ristar]

no problem, glad to help.

a few tips that were helpful for me:

1. 90% of the time you shouldn't need to EQ instruments, especially sampled ones. The only kind of EQing you really need to do is high pass filtering certain instruments (such as an electric or acoustic guitar) to remove unwanted frequencies. I very rarely EQ my stuff unless I'm HP filtering guitars or a kick drum with shitloads of subsonic frequencies (a spectrum analyzer such as Voxengo's SPAN can reveal these).

Balance the dry mix first by zeroing all your faders and bringing up the level of each instrument one at a time in order of importance. This way you'll know which channels are interfering with which and THEN can begin thinking about EQ options.

A little rule I follow when EQing is to avoid boosting frequencies as they interfere with the phase response of an instrument and can also distort certain frequency bands which leaves a pretty crap sound. It's better to use a frequency cut and turn up the fader as the phase response will be changed around the frequencies you don't really want.

Also: if you're using more than 6dB of frequency gain, EQ ain't gonna help.

2. Add reverb and other effects only once you have all the instruments balanced in the mix. Solo the instrument and see how the reverb sounds with it; then reduce the send level to 0 and unsolo the instrument. Slowly bring the reverb up until it sounds right and dial it back about 1dB.

3. When mixing your work you should always use lossless commercial reference tracks. Export a wav of your work and compare it to a reference track. Import both tracks into a new session and do A/B comparisons so you can instantly switch between each track. Bring down the level of the mastered reference track so it matches the level of yours and then compare them.