Hope you all enjoy! :D (Will be posting my individual works soon!) ♥

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OCRemix

The Man...The Myth...The Legend

We all know who this man is, I'd hope--especially if you're as much of an avid (*cough*...nerd...) fan of Square(Enix)-based RPGs as I am! I grew up on these games, remembering my very first to be Final Fantasy IV for the SNES way back when. . . I played them all up to about XII (kinda skipped X / X-2 and played XV), and I had so many memorable adventures, and met so many wonderful and loving friends on their critically-acclaimed MMORPG, Final Fantasy XIV. If you have played the games, you know. Their soundtracks are always so breathtaking, so diverse, and so emotionally-charged--most, if not all, penned by the mighty hand from this man's eclectic mind. He's got his own band, (The Black Mages), he's ingrained himself in many of our childhood memories for such fantastic music, AND...TODAY IS HIS BIRTHDAY!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, NOBUO UEMATSU!

And to celebrate his 64th birthday, the trailer dropped as well today for the album I am proudly a part of:

SeeDs of Pandora: "Inspired by Final Fantasy VIII"

Sixty-nine (yes, 69, haha!) tracks! Almost 5 HOURS worth of content, spanning a 4-disc set named after the Gardens/Areas in-game (Balamb, Trabia, Galbadia, and Lunatic Pandora), each with their own unique, thematic spin to the songs on the disc!

I am a newcomer, to both OverClocked Remix's community and to participating in album-projects as a whole (it's not only my first album to present my own work on, but also in doing collaboration pieces where I've done both arrangements with other remixers and incorporating live instruments!)--however, I'm exceedingly glad to see this project come alive and to fruition, and my hope is that others stick around to enjoy the fruits of labor and/or spread the word! FWIW: the three songs from the game I had done were: Premonition, Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec, and The Extreme (and yeah...I still cannot believe I managed 3 tracks to be featured here, all on separate discs!) I will post the mastered versions of those remixes directly on here when I get a hold of them / on the album's actual release date!

Currently, I am unsure if there will be physical copies of this to buy, but this will be digitally available (links are in the description/YT video above!) I believe the site this will be hosted on has a lot to give as well, from remixer/artist commentary, to some background history on Final Fantasy VIII, so check it out when the time comes! FF8 is certainly an underrated-gem (which some people refer to as the "black sheep") in the sphere of Final Fantasy games, but it truly deserved its mark and celebration in history here.

I am very excited in being a part of this opportunity! Please enjoy the trailer, lots of love and a shoutout to the artists and directors on the album, who made this possible, and to Nobuo Uematsu himself--for without him, none of this would be possible, and we wouldn't have these beautiful pieces to make such inspirational remixes from!

*As a note: OCRemix-hosted aside, please keep on the lookout and give this one a shot to support those who made the dream come true (album was in a state of limbo before the new directors took up the mantle to get it done), and support those who put in the graft n' grind to get those fresh 69-tracks on the (virtual) airwaves! If you'd rather skip this, that's OK too, I personally just wanted to put this out there for the sake of the artists on this, not simply to spread the word. IMO, they deserve the spotlight, especially since there's almost as many newcomers to the VGM-remixing scene as a whole on this as much as there are veterans of the field (ex: Audio Mocha, bLiNd, and Rebecca E Tripp, to name a few.) I understand that some might read this and instantly get soured because of it being OCR-related, but hopefully that, end-and-of-itself, won't turn the blind-eye to give this a spin and support fellow musicians regardless of who's got it on which website or under whose namesake. . . If this was done through Pixel Mixers, GameChops, or any other of the big VGMRC peeps, I'd do the same nonetheless.

Anyways...enjoy! I usually don't do big announcements or much on my NG blog...sooooo...I figured, why the hell not? XD

♥ Love you all. Peace, have a good day, and I look forward to many more years of churning out hot bangers with you fab folks. ♥

(Album is Due to be Released - Late Spring 2023 [~ End of April])

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* UP FOR MUSIC COLLABORATIONS! PLEASE PM ME IF INTERESTED! *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Heya, guys & gals. :)

I am kinda throwing this one out there...see what catches on, but for a while now, I've been very interested in collaborating with other musicians, producers, mixing enthusiasts, etc, to try and strengthen not only my craft, but to outreach amongst fellows here. I don't really have many friends or followers, but it would be fantastic to try and network around, and make some! ^_^ If people are worried, because I am kinda an unknown variable in that department (even though I have been in a few contests on the music-front), I have been collabing a bit outside of Newgrounds, mainly in conjunction with OCRemix (OverClocked Remix) albums, to some really great successes (and I hope to share what we've cooked up after the LPs' release!)

*What's my reasoning behind scouting for some collab opportunities?*

Besides networking, making friends, and just having fun, I think it'll go a long way towards strengthening my craft and cred. Over the course of this year's competitions I've been in, all of them I fell out in the last rounds of, and after asking for feedback / critique, a lot of the 'issues' seem to stem from problems in mixing (even though I do and have been really focused on getting that down, but it's still apparently problematic...) and my compositions seem to be too minimalistic, without not enough variation--or if it does, that variation is strongly supported by the soundscape rather than the melodic or harmonic bars. I don't have a whole lot of music theory under my belt, so...I'm unsure how to improve. I'm not looking for a tutor or some kind of apprentenceship-style thing (or anything that rigid/serious in nature), but I think learning from those who have the experience and know-how might go a long way. . .

*What am I interested in collabing?*

Anything and everything! :) Currently, been trying to wrap my head around just coming up with better compositions, mixing, and throwing lyrics/singing into songs, but I don't really have a genre I dislike. I think my least favourite music genre(s) are Country/Bluegrass, but I've pretty much dabbled into most stuff; Pop, 80s, 90s, synthwave, funk, e-jazz, lo-fi, hip-hop, R&B, DnB, trap, electro-swing...I'm willing to put in the effort in just doing anything that remotely sounds cool. :3 This also goes for if someone is making a game or animatic/animation, and wants to collab on the music for them. Or their artwork! Anything goes, but this is primarily a shout-out to other musicians... :D It also doesn't (necessarily) have to be restricted to only Newground submissions. I'm happy to help / do work with outside sources, like Pixel Mixers, for example, or people's solo projects.

*TL;DR*

So yeah...please, feel free to take a look at some of my work here on Newgrounds, or PM me! I super look forward to anybody/anyone feeling up for some collabing! Let's grow our skills together and make something groovy, I hope. :)

Hooray for first blog posts!--but let's keep it simple:

My question to people who put their works in the audio portal and get scouted / placed on the front page...how do review scores and comments work for you all? I ask because I've been looking at my own analytics and it's been...bothersome, to say the least. What seems to do 'well' in the eyes of the user-base (for me, at least) is techno, EDM, and anything sort of hip-hop that I do. Anything beyond those genres get middling results at best, and I am unsure if it's just "I'm not good enough" or "they're just bad." And most reviews are silent, and come with the caveat of no comments, so I don't know whether or not those two points are even valid or true.

I just noticed this especially recently with my AIM 2022 song... I'm past bewildered at the flip-floppy results between songs I post, and more just intrigued at this stage...

So I open the floor now to guys here in the audio portal: is it just me or is this just how NG do? AND how do you guys deal with it and get more exposure? I mostly post on NG to get feedback and improve my craft. I don't care for or am bothered about clout chasing, and I am aware of the phenomenon called "review bombing" (some people spoke to me in private about that last year during NGADM and the NGUAC.) I mean, getting followers I guess comes with time, patience and just throwing your work out there (and reviewing others' art and songs), but yeah.

Realistically, I'm just curious at this stage and wanted to have a discussion, haha (and probably just waft in the copium of this process and how to deal with it). ♡ Have a great day to those who read this uh...semi-rant...? XD And a hello to those who reply!

It's my first post here, so uh...be gentle. XP