Few things before I start my long and boring commentary that nobody reads. First of all:
1. Thanks SO MUCH to Karco! This would be SO MUCH WORSE without his help! Check him out! (karco.newgrounds.com).
2. Thanks to Endlessnumber, for doing the preliminary helping out which really MAKES THE TRACK! Thanks :), check him out (endlessnumber.newgrounds .com).
3. This track is a REMIX of an old track of mine: http://www.newgrounds.com /audio/listen/1347073.
4. This track is for the "Trancegiving" Contest on the audio forum: http://www.newgrounds.com /bbs/topic/987703
5. This track will be featured on my "Sounds of Science EP," which will not be on Newgrounds, but will be available later on, if you ask nicely :P
Now, into the commentary...
The original version was an experiment of mine into melodic work and Trance in general. I was a total noob, and I was messing around and got this cool progression. I ripped the synth off another track of mine that was in progress (http://www.newgrounds.co m/audio/listen/107836, but in a much earlier form), and used it to make this cool gated chord thing! Then I added this cool synth and it was a wrap. I would revisit it for a number of "remasters," none of which could make the track better. Why? Because the elements themselves sucked.
So, at 1 AM on Sunday morning, I decided to change that. I had just gotten home from a Bar Mitzvah party, it was a blast, I danced to "One More Time" by Daft Punk, and the bass I had felt was my inspiration. So, I found the project file and I saved some basic synths/melodies that I wanted to keep. I deleted the arrangement, and deleted basically everything else.
I took that, and added more elements that I thought would work well. This is before I arranged it. I added a cool string synth, a cool bass, a cool lead, etc. So now, I had a bunch of patterns and no real line up.
From there, the next morning (or should I say later that morning), I simply started ad-libbing the arrangement, doing what I thought would sound good. I had a buildup with the original, then... what? I decided to add some breakbeats, since I was still feeling strong from Zdarkness, the tune I submitted before this. I took that break, layered it, and put it into the tune. More on that later. Anyway, I had this breakdown, then another build up then it was over. 11:13... 11:13?! FUCK, THAT'S LONG! More on that next.
So I had this preliminary mix. Fresh out of my ears. I hear what I hear, and I can't judge it objectively. To get a nice set of new ears, I sent it over to Endlessnumber. I took his suggestions and put them in a text file. They included speeding it up a few bpm (which I did), changing the bleep synth (which I did), frequency-splitting the bass and only sidechaining the sub portion to avoid muddyness (which I did), and adding all kinds of music theory related things, like 6ths, more suspensions, and appoggiaturias (which I didn't do).
And I thought it was over... I had nothing in my suggestions file. Boy was I wrong. Later that day, I sent it to Karco, but he didn't send a response until earlier today. LOTS of stuff wrong, including buildup issues, percussion issues with the crash and hihats, and all kinds of other stuff. Wow, he even did it TWICE, which is simply amazing in my opinion, and I can't thank him enough.
One odd point which he didn't really focus on, but mentioned in passing was the breakbeat. It was weird. It wasn't a "this is wrong, fix it," like many of his other things, it was a "this sounds odd, out of place," which was an interesting comment coming from him. So, I took that breakbeat from Zdarkness and replaced it with what you hear now. However, I haven't been able to consult with him over the new break, but I followed his directions in making it "synthesized," since he said that the original didn't fit because it wasn't completely synthesized, while the rest of the song was.
Anyway, that's my lame-ass story. No stats because I'm too fucking lazy (and out of space), just know that it's mostly 3xOsc, and that I worked damn hard on it. Most importantly, ENJOY! :D
