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😮‍💨 Glad I didn’t do you any discomfort. 

 As for your approach. It depends on how old the gear might be or through witch system you wanted to play through. Every Soundsystem has its own idiosyncrasies. Vinyl gets scratchy and has system wise a pretty steep cut in highs and bass and warbles in speed and pitch by quite a margin. Cassette looses its dynamics and some bandwidth, though mostly highs and flutters in short bursts. So maybe it’s best to work out how you wanna break it.

Overall, some Distortion in the mix bus, that is added in parallel might give some grit while not overdoing it. Maybe also adding a bit of Tape simulation or Vibrato could add something.

As for the positioning. If you want to be an ultra-stickler, you could have multiple instances of the same reverb. All but different in the pre delay. Reason is, that the sound merges more with the room the further back it is to mic or listener. So the more far the sound the lower the pre delay. Also, some instruments loos some fidelity in highs and lows. So having some high- and low-shelves cutting by a bit might add some Depth grading. Also having those reverb instances globally as an effect bus and every track having a separat send adds some cohesion.

Like I’ve said before, maybe adding a stereo widener might hinder the mix more that helping. Most widener destroy the stereo field or cut the mid in the stereo. The best advice I can give, is less is more. Also, it might help to watch the mix in different terms. Maybe the sound stage can be formed like a real stage (positioning instruments like on the stage) or in LCR (fully panned left, center or right, it was mostly used in the 70s) or Mid/Side (mono and stereo difference). Especially Mid/Side can add a lot of depth (like cutting the bass at 200Hz for the side mix to have it in the mono sum and have a fat sound).

I can defenetly relate on the heavy reverb use. I needed to somewhat wean my use of it a bit and learn to cut it a bit more. General rule of thumb nowadays is to mix it like I want it, and like said earlier EQ it, and the cut it by 3db further. Reverb can be a b**** to mix. Generally if you notice it it is most likely to much. But it’s right if you cant tell if it is on or not. If you the just bypass it, it is like magic and you will miss it. It could be also a problem with some headphones. I had some Audio-Technica R70x that were great but sucked every reverb tail, so I drowned everything. Nowadays I use some HiFi-Man Sundara, they are planar driver headphones, that are higher resolution and can recreate those tails. Also transients are more true to life.  

I hope that might help somewhat. If necessary, I might need to add my Discord-account for some further nerdery ^^.  

Maybe my intentions got somewhat lost in translation. I kind of don't wanted to criticise your mix so heavily. I just felt like these were some points where I felt like it could be improved on, since it overall sounded pretty decend. That was my "try" on adding to it. Sorry if I overstepped here or gave a bad impression.

Kind of feel like difficulty B would be more fitting. Interesting approach by letting the instruments play reversed throughout the whole song. If I had a wish open, I would have loved something playing in the lower register. Maybe having your left hand on the piano an octave lower would have done the trick or doubling it with a bass. Nonetheless this was a cool entry.

Cool ambiance you've added, to the otherwise maybe more retro sounding songs. Also with the Amen brak lending them an cool drive. However I feel like chord wise they sonded something all over the place. Might be the style you've been going but was not quite my cup of tea.

Creative ideas with the over- and underworld and adding them together. Also having the underworld in a reversed sound. It would have been a bit more interesting if the different "themes" would have differed a bit more soundwise. Maybe like having underworld more synth heavy and Overworld unplugged. Nether the less, cool work!

I've got goosebumps while listening. Such an haunting noire atmosphere sprinkled with very cool sound design.

While the actual sounds are quite impressive, I feel like the reverb sticks to much like a blanket and diminishes the overall good mix. My advice would to be to add some more predelay and also EQ the Reverb directly. The good old Abbey Roads trick was to cut the Bus-reverb at 300 and 6k. So the reverb was never able to overshadow the original mix. Might be something woth to try. I kind of also feel like the use of stereo widener was used a bit heavy handedly. Eventhough it might sound contratuitive giving the mix a narower soundstage might benefit the mix and give it a realistic room with more puch with a more "in your face" character.

I might wanna add, that this is not a general critic of your work. I feel like it is one of the strongest entries I've seen. However I feel like there could be something added to its furthor glory.

Piano and chord progression somewhat reminded me of Mario Kart 64 Rainbow Road. Nice touche with the actual Announcements.

What a fat and well rounded bass. Crazy good sound design with the choir giving a haunting beauty. Progression was very natural.

Somehow the picture fitted very well with the song. Bongo cat is up to no good. Nice tempo change chordal voicing. Certainly impresses with its simplicity.

Can definitely relate to your story. This theme wasn't certainly my cup of tee and I almost threw the towl. Glad you've shared your work anyways.

I feel like the idea at itself has quite a pleasant spaceiousness that could be furthor added by just some additional atmospheric sounddesigne. Sometimes the simple things can be more impressive than trying to engeneer a new weel and I think your song is on the right path.

A very strong entrance for a first jamer. And then even with multiple songs! Felt like being right in the moment and venturing with the hero on his journey. Definitely "the thousand years war".

If I could advice: Your Woondwinds sometimes are having long lasting passages. Maybe think about letting room for breathing breats or edit them in for a more realisting feel.
Also your strings are quite heaby on using just Legato without any wurthor starting articulation. It might be sometimes more preferable to give them more articulation even if it is just for the start of the nex passage (might be sounding odd but singing the parts with la for legato and ta for articulated helped very much. Might be an approach).

Nicely syncope melodies that get quite groovy. Short but effective composition. But maybe a bit to showt, now I am aking for more of it! Well done!

Somewhat getting some VaporWave vibes. Very thick and wide atmosphere that you're building. Very dreamy and somehow uplifting. Nice!

Beautiful sonore Cor Anglais with a nice melody. Nice changeup of the piano pattern to keep it interesting. Lovingly made.

Pretty much appreciate the info. I'm a retired guitarist and might be interested to get back to it and should definitely look into the Neural DSP stuff. Thou I played a Strandberg I kind of Ignored all the Ampsimulations.

I might also look into the basses you've named. The fretless sounded pretty sweet and affordable and tonal versatile sound like the perfect combination :D

Can't argue with that, you're right. Oddly enoughth you are the first to point out. But I'm glad you liked it.

Arzette the Jewel of Faramore seems to be reminiscent of the old CD-i games. Interesting

Kind of surprising, that this is one of the first songs to have a Halloween-ish vibe, while the jam is in October. Very interesting approach and cool change up through the second half. Also work very well with your descruption. Nicely done!

Kinda reminds me of some Danny Elfman, though It might not have the strong brass marching of him. Really liked it. Great job also with the palindrome, it fitted your song very well.

Picture reminded me kind of on "Take on me" by Aha. Quite the journey you've taken us throughout this song. Might to look some of your used gear up. The Gojira Neural DSP might be something, as well as the Alex Lifeson LP. I need do commend your playing. Getting to hear a cleanly played Guitar is one thing, the other having also a fretless bass played so well. Great job!

Soundwise it kind of reminded me of some Icelandic music, that I liked. Your song has a very calm and gentle nature. I wished it was a bit longer to further sit here and dream.

Can't really say much that beautiful! It certainly was hart stopping your tune and try to write anything. Great sounddesigne. I just need to linger here a bit more and listen.

You might need to lookup your project settings. There seem to be nothing to listen to. Or add an additional link to a streaming site.

Loved the different Fuzz sounds of your Guitar throughout the listening. Felt like any moment Amon Amarth would come out and rock the place :D. The whistling and vocals gave it an interesting sound color. Defenetly wasn't expecting to find som Sludge/Doom on this jam. Well done!

Also, you might need to teach me how you've createt so much music in such a short timespan. There must be dark magic at hand. ^^

Kind of reminded me of some horror genre B-Movies, but not in a bad way. The change up to the reverse part felt pretty naturalm though like Jofes pointed out, it might be more akin to difficulty B than C. However, God job!

This is certainly not meant to be mean. But I feel like having just one song and working on that would have gotten you a better result. While most songs sound true to the GB/NES and its limitations, I feel most songs sound played save with just one melody repeting itselve and reversed. I kind of wished for something more. None the less you've nailed the challange with every song. So kudos to that.

Sureen, calm and gentle. That's what I would subscribe your song. Also never noticed the the change to the reversed part. So extra points on this for making it sound natural. Certainly well done!

A small journey it is indeed. Certainly nailed that drive of heading out, like listened so many times on the GameBoy. Well done. Also extra kudos to you for nailing difficulty C without just reversing the whole song in the middle. It felt pretty natural.

Quite the strong entrance for a firstcomer. I really appreciated the buildup and structure of your song. It was very dynamic and had nice changes of motives throughout the song. Well done!

Åh ja du har ret. Jeg er glad du like det. Så tusend tak.

Your critique is very much appriciated and the longer the better. As for your question: I'm originally a guitarist, but dibble dabble nowadays with a few other instruments and started playing the clarinet during lockdown. However, I wouldn't consider myself a woodwind player by any means.

I'm very much humbled by your kind words. So, thank you very much.

The whole OST of the remake is a Masterpiece in my books. So getting even the slightest association is like a knighthood to me. Thank you very much!

Very interesting roster of ideas. The palindromic nature fitted very well in all of your songs and felt pretty natural, which I can't say for most other songs that attempted this difficulty. "The Journey" was defenetly my favorite.

Definitely not what I was expecting after seeing those goats. But I'm glad I was proven wrong. Dreamy would be the best word to describe this song. Somehow I got reminded a bit to the old Rainbow Road song from Mario Cart 64. Great Work!

Very reminiscent of some older OSTs on the Atari systems or C64. Really digged it. Didn't know the programm you were using but it seems interesting. Nice work!

Sounds like the music to a run-and-Gun game I definitely need. Somewhat reminded me of Turrican. Very cool idea and executed well.

Cool vibes you got going on. I really digged the texture. It was like if Hyper Light Drifter had a coffee lounge to linger in.

This is one of the first songs on this jam where I truely believe the C difficulty is justified. The second half fitted nicely and was not jus added on to fit the definition. Really reminds me of some work from Akuma Kira. Very well done!

Very cool buildup. At first it kind of sounds felt like being lost an a blurry space that got more and more in focus. Really loved when the drums started with a cool drive. Also, great choice of sounds. can't complain with with the mix quallity at all. My only gipe might be the chosen difficulty since I can't happen to see were the whole songe is the same forwards as backwards. It feels more like A, but nicely done at that!

Can't really point my finger on what it reminds me to. But it was definitely something I was fond of. Very cool buildup and sound choice. Only complaint is, that I now need more of this :D. Thanks for sharing.