Commodore Remix

Hi All,

Just uploaded 2 remixes of OL3. One is pretty true to the original, (even got some real SID sounds in there).

The other.....

Well let's just say it's completely different from the 1st...

See what you think - As ever, ALL feedback is welcome, good, bad & ugly

Hey Peter, just grabbed the 2 version and .. well.. WOW!.

The first ( 21st mix ) is great!. Actually 'sounds' like the original, not the notes involved more the feel of the tune and that's pretty hard to pull off. You know what I mean, a Maniacs tune just 'sounds' like a Maniacs tune, Galway always 'sounds' like Galway. On the other hand, a remake of a Galway tune very rarely has that. Original author, make tune good!! hehe. Sounds good.. Thankyou

Orchestral version .. Staggeringly good.!!!

Been playing it through the stereo for a while now and it's beautifully written. Highs and lows, power and grace.. All an orchestral arrangement should be. Starts smooth, pulls you up in the middle of the tune, and leads you gently out to the end.. Nice.. Quality work my friend, quality work.. Oh, and got to say I Love the beginning, almost tender in its execution, wonderful.

Thanks Andy...

At the beginning, I thought the Orchestral remix would be the one I spent more time on.... but you're right, getting the feel of the
original SID tune takes time and effort. The opening bars of the loader, (Mart's original bit), are in 6:8 and it's a really weird time
signature to drum to. At least, to drum to without destroying the original accents.The orchestral remix, I really grafted at. It's true
what LMan wrote... You do sometimes take single comments on your work to heart.... On my 'Monty' remix I got the following comment:

"Amok shouts: Superbly arranged. But the instruments do not fully convince me. And the mix lacks a bit on the bass side imho. Great effort nonetheless."

...and he is right!! The strings lacked some dynamics and the mix could have had a little more 'arse-end' in it LOL. So, I really
worked at making the strings more realistic. Better samples helped and I have a confession to make... After totally screaming and
shouting about how good 'Reason' is, I've binned it!!

Until they release a 64 bit version maybe....

It crashed SOOOO! many times because I've got 16GB in my PC and, (I'm taking an educated guess here), at about the 24% RAM
usage point, it would load the next sample I wanted to use, cross the 32 bit boundary and die horribly, (even had BSOD a couple
of times). Anyways, I'm using Reaper64 and it is very good. NI Kontakt, (v5 also 64 bit), is the sample holder assigned to each
channel and it's 'Hello 16GB of usable RAM'. For anyone else who's tempted; just be careful mixing 32 bit VSTi's with 64 bit ones.

The '21st Century' remix came out of 'Reason' but the orchestral remix was done using Reaper64.

Hi Peter!

I was so stunned by the orchestral version I had to post this comment. Beautiful work! You sure know how to build drama with those skills and instruments. I'm a newcomer here and I've been listening to my favourite tune remixes, and thank god this one is one of them xD. Better check out more tunes as well, who knows what I'm missing. As I lack expertise, I'll skip any technical comments besides you sure have used great quality samples/instruments and that's why I'd love to know how I could get my hands on them. Did you use some kinda VST orchestral sample set thingy?

Thanks for the kind words Foxfield.....

If you read my previous comments in this forum, you'll get the gist of how much I struggled with 'Reason'. So, here and now in Feb 2012, I'm 100% using Reaper 64 as my
DAW, (Digital Audio Workstation). Unless anyone knows of another, it's the only 64 bit Sequencer, which means you can utilise more than 4gb of RAM, which is important
with high quality samples.

Ocean Loader 3 (Cinematic) was done using 'East West Quantum Leap Symphonic Orchestra'. It's way waaaaaay ahead of anything else i've heard for fidelity. To give you some
idea, the samples directory is around 14GB. I use Kontakt v5, (most important coz it's also 64 bit) and simply insert a VSTi on each track for the individual orchestra parts.

I panned the various parts to where they would normally sit in an orthodox orchestra seating so....

Violins 25% left
Violas centre
Cellos 25% right
Oboes 12% left .... and so on

The above values place your listening position about where the conductor stands. If you lower the values and narrow the stereo spread, your listening position moves further back
in the auditorium.

The way the samples are constructed is, as far as I know, unique at the moment. Firstly, you have the various parts of the orchestra... 18 violins / 10 cellos / 9 basses /
4 clarinets / and so on. Then, if we take '18 violins' as an example, only the true range of the violin is sampled and every single note is sampled at 5 different 'bowing' levels.
This captures the different tonal qualities of differing bow strengths rather than just turning the volume down. In addition to this, (and this is where it gets really cool), you then
have different iterations of each note or varying samples of the way a violinist bows the instrument, i.e. 'on hard and push through' 'soft attack swelling slowly' 'steady legato'.....

So, for a single note of a single instrument you can choose from 1note x 5 vol levels x 3 to 10 iterations depending on the instrument(s). 1 x 5 x 10 = up to 50 samples per note
to choose from. Once you start to think about this level of detail applied to every section of the orchestra.... well, mindblowing really. EWQL stuff isn't cheap but it's VERY good
and if you want a bit of everything, their 'Collossus' package is really good.

Hope this illuminates a little.

If you want a little sneaky peeky of something I'm working on with 'Symphonic Orchestra' for submission later this year......



(apologies for not sticking this in the WIP section. It was just relevant to this post)

Hmm hehe Okay now this has me giggling like a child..My first thoughts oddly? "Last of the Summer Wine "!!!!!!! hehe.. Jesus man I'm sorry..

Okay okay I'm settled.. just One word.. Awesome! Has that comforting Sunday afternoon Highway to heaven/little house/feel . Looking forward to the final release.

Oh NO! I can hear it too now..... Ha Ha. and I used to watch that in my teen years.

You do realise that this could have deeper implications. all of the theme tunes from my dubious childhood and teenage television viewing could be manifesting themselves in my remixes.

It would give away secrets about uncool programmes that I must have watched over and over in order for them to lodge in my subconscious and therefore... I must have liked them.

Oh my word! What might appear next? Richard & Judy? Dad's Army?

Sh*t NOOOO!

Most of my remixes featured test-card music in one way or another

Right!!! You've started something now Andy!!

The mischief maker in me is loose....

I swear, every note of the melody is correct......



Maybe Reyn is a secret 'Summer Wine' fan HA HA

Sweet Mother of all things Holy and right in this world ... What.... Have....you.....Done....!!!! hehe

Okay, really Peter, as bad as this sounds, forget the original post and just finish this one!! heheh.. actually damn you.. finish them both..Flimbo just fits a little too nicely here as you said hehe.. but really pal.. Sweet!!! That's properly made me chuckle .. Thank you!

You've still got to finish it though.

Bloody wonderful mate! Plain and simple.!!

As for the mischief maker being let loose, that's got me thinking. Maybe a plan for future remixes.. 80's TV themed Sid tunes.. SidTV?? heheh Pot Black, That's Life, gawd the lists goes on.. HmmmmmmmMMmmmmmm. But as for liking the dodgy Tunes, with only 4 channels back in the day and Saturday/Sunday night being a REAL Family TV night It's hard not to love them all.. I mean come on.. Saturday was always Wrestling/darts ( snooker on 2 ) , pools results, news, generation game, that's life then over to ITV a bit later for Tales of the unexpected and all the errr 'classics' inbetween.. hehe..

poke16384 wrote:Right!!! You've started something now Andy!!

The mischief maker in me is loose....

I swear, every note of the melody is correct......



Maybe Reyn is a secret 'Summer Wine' fan HA HA

Thanks for the details of how you work this stuff. That orchestral EWQL stuff really has come close to getting the obvious simulated sound hidden. I've skipped these things for years and stuck with simple emulating synthesizers since the sampled ones didn't feel authentic enough (Tho I always assume dynamics and panning etc. should be handled at least semi-automatically with these software cause I'm lazy). Guess a lot has happened in a few years now when PCs have become more powerful. That plugin must eat serious processing power and RAM, but I'll definitely check it out as well as other software you mentioned. Maybe I can update some of my tools with your tips.

I'd suggest you remix a tune from batman the movie. The carnival scene would be perfect to be remade using EWQL. Or maybe I'll get my own hands to it if I ever be able to pay for that EWQL and learn it's secrets.