ReMix: Final Fantasy VII 'REAKTR.1'

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Newcomer Tweek rocks his sophomore submission, collab style:

"This remix was inspired and produced because of Zircon's FF7 remix competition. Out of all the tracks that were offered, I still can't put my finger on why I chose this one, but I'm certainly glad I did. I decided to change the song quite a bit from the original, with the most obvious change being the time signature. Converting the piece from 6/8 to 4/4 was no easy task. Throw in the fact that the song is full of melody lines that last no longer than a few measures and you find yourself with quite a difficult challenge. In spite of all that, I am exceptionally happy with how it turned out. Having sephfire join the project with me facilitated this mix being taken to the next level. His touch and expertise greatly added to the outcome of this mix. All in all, I can be, and am, very proud of this mix. Enjoy!"

Partner in crime Sephfire adds:

"The track was already about 80% done by the time I got involved. I rewrote the first minute (the Opening section) and then just played around with what Tweek had already layed out, adding some strings here, a stutter there, a synth line somewhere else, etc. As tight as the mix sounded already, I didn't have to do much. Tweek is growing at an alarming rate as a musician. I hope we get the opprotunity to collaborate again soon."

Mr. Floyd's FF7 love has been well documented, so it would seem that Brian chose the right compadre for this industrial/electronica/orchestral take on the Opening ~ Bombing Mission theme. Things start with Asian percussion and suspenseful, sustained pads+strings, with winds entering on melody as a little electro synth motif pops up here and there before becoming a full-fledged, consistent presence circa 0'54". Filtered drums percolate upwards like an inverted Cuisinart preparing a warm cup of joe, with string stabs leading into an edgier dropping of beat @ 1'34". The duo do a particularly good job of oscillating between full-on groove and more pensive, open patterns. Andy did feel like this was somewhat similar to Daniel's Speed Limit mix, and felt that more creativity could have been applied to help differentiate the instrumentation in particular, relative to this past effort. I'd tend to agree that one or two conspicuous, unique sonic elements would have helped the "oomph" factor for me - everything is clearly solid and transitional detail work is considerably beyond solid, but a lil sumtin' sumtin' to spice up the action would have bumped things up a notch. As it is, you can't really tell this is a collab, which is a double-edged sword: on the one hand, it definitely has a consistent and cohesive voice and never sounds pasted together or jarring, but on the other hand, there's nothing that shines through as representing the specifically impressive traits of either artist. That being said, both these bros are all about the quality, energetic arrangement, and FF7 stuff is notoriously difficult to flesh out and extract narrative development from; the OST as a whole tells a story, but individual pieces tend to weigh in more on the BGM side of things, as opposed to melodic overtures. That's my take, anyways. It's somewhat strange that a mix that's 80% Tweek and 20% Sephfire sounds a bit more like the latter, but Tweek's just getting started establishing himself, with an impressive Tetris Attack ReMix under his belt, and more on the way, so his "sound" per se is hard to pin down. Both this and that previous mix employ dramatic Asian percussion (very effectively, I might add), so if there's a common thread, that'd seem to be it. But there's no need to pigeonhole either ReMixer into having a specific sound, and they both definitely worked very organically and productively on this arrangement. The time signature alteration works quite well, there's effective use of dynamic shifts, and both the production and arrangement have that "big" sound of epic, impressive scope.

― djpretzel