ReMix: Final Fantasy IV 'The Sky Was Never A Limit'

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goat goes orchestral? Apparently a symphonic sound, much like the sky, is not a limit for he-of-numerous-memorable-guitar-shredding ReMixes. Have no fear: he still works in a sweet electric lead, it's just now in a context that's a bit more sedate, romantic even, than his normal energized rock. The ReMixer writes:

"This was a valentine's day remix I did for "goatess" of the prelude theme from final fantasy 4. It's a bit different from my normal style."

Perhaps one day goat and goatess wil have a... kid. But I kid. Right - goat's stuff usually bypasses the panel and gets posted directly, but seeing as this was a different style for him, I figured he might want some feedback on the primarily orchestral portions of the arrangement. The first two minutes are entirely symphonic, with electric guitar entering afterwards, so a large portion of the mix relies on things working sans any fretted instruments whatsoever. While chris is an ace at putting together a shredding, rocking castlevania track, how does he handle something more delicate, with an entirely different sound palate? Pretty admirably, I'd say. Now, along with Mr. Baranowsky, I do think there's room for improvement, but the overall arrangement is effective if simple. The exposed harp intro covering the all-too-familiar prelude arpeggio, for example, could have used smoother dynamics and a bit more space, and the strings that enter afterwards are a bit thin, but things do build from there, and the solo strings at 1'30" are both compositionally interesting (the bass pattern changes to a moving up/down pattern) and dramatic. I do think having the french horn switch over to covering the arpeggio in this section wasn't necessary, and in general I might have exorcised the arpeggio a bit more from the overall arrangement and let the progression and melody hold their own. At 2'25" orchestral percussion builds, electric guitar and bass are subtly added in, and an acoustic kit comes in with a beat at 2'40" - I personally think this was a pretty graceful way to transition from the first section of the arrangement into the more rockish, swaying 3/4 feel of the next. Guitar really takes over at 4'32" with a nice repeating riff that quickly turns into soaring guitar-hero rock - picture slash out in the middle of the ocean (with no visible amp!) in the November Rain music video and you get the idea. Definitely my favorite part of the mix. The comparison to G'n'f'nR's NR is pretty relevant, since structurally the songs have aspects in common. I'm not too keen on reinvoking the solo harp for the ending, and again the processing on it seems incongruously clean compared to all other orchestral elements, but in general the last two minutes of the mix are the highlight. Yes, they're also the two minutes where chris is doing his "guitar thing" that he does so well, but I think it's made better here by the context the first half of the mix affords. It'd be very optimistic to expect a relatively initial stab at orchestral to succeed wildly on its own legs, but I think what goat's done is merged two styles, and while he may be better at one than the other, the fusion succeeds in taking his music new places - this doesn't sound like his other mixes, and overall it sounds pretty darn good, and I'd call that an accomplishment.

― djpretzel