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Gargoyle's Comments |
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Title: 6beat Filename: 6beat.mod |
Posted Wed 24th Apr 2002
Rated 6 / 10 |
| This is a four channel XM in MOD style, and I guess it has been a MOD before; the samples have that 80s MODs patina on them... :-) The song has blues pentatonics in the synth bass line and strong drums. The fills in the middle of the song have about everything of what we know from Amiga MODs, though this might not meet everybody's taste. 4 channels, almost no effects, old fashioned chord samples :-) ; the song is not a MOD landmark but could fit well into collections. | |
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Title: "Polar Wind" Filename: a-polar.it |
Posted Tue 2nd Apr 2002
Rated 10 / 10 |
| Well, howshallacallit? Eerie breakbeat? Melodic DnB? I don't know. There are a lot of weird yet fitting harmonies, an awesome percussion field and a drumloop layout like I've seldomly seen before. The feel keeps shifting from clean sounds to distorted sections and back, while the bass is simply cool. FX galore, yet none of them applied carelessly. By the middle the tune goes more towards club and dancefloor before the rhythm changes to a faster pace. A lot about sampling can be learnt from this track. All I can do is keep nodding. 32 channels, good volume handling, all sorts of samples from chippy to freaky to "full" sounding. Many different drum loops have been used, and boy they fit well. It's a kickass track. Very little could have been improved here. | |
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Title: sadness in my eyes Filename: sad_imy.mod |
Posted Wed 27th Mar 2002
Rated 6 / 10 |
| This piece is a nice and relaxing ambient tune, set around two alternating chords. Rhythm patterns as from an old electric yamaha piano and percussion blend in. There is a small melody part which is at some time set aside by more percussion before it comes back. I guess the tune is intended to loop, which is quite probable as it was apparently made for a diskmag (sample text). Except for the drum rolls/loops and percussion which are quite good for being 8bit, many samples sound a bit thin, they resemble the standard GM MIDI bank a bit. Maybe this was because of size reasons, but it is the main reason why I didn't rate this tune higher. The four channels have been used in quite a logic and efficient way. | |
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Title: Modern Overture Filename: overtur.mod |
Posted Thu 7th Mar 2002
Rated 7 / 10 |
| I am so damn sure that i heard this Mod before... it mainly contains all samples from the obligatory orch hit to the shakuhachi which i made my first mods with too. :-P The main melody is played relatively alone at first and becomes a hook for the chords, bass and percussion afterwards. (Try to hum the melody of Pachelbels Canon simultaneously and you will notice that this Mod basically uses the same chords.) There is a small part that sounds a bit like Yello's music. Compared to today's sound standards, it might not be competitive, but for the nostalgic ones among us it is a definite must for the collection. It stays in your ear. Channels look stuffed and crowded which is very typical for 4-channel Mods. Few effects have been used, the mod stays at 4/4 although the speed gets seemingly slower by the end. | |
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Title: Peaches At Beaches Filename: peachesa.xm |
Posted Sun 20th Jan 2002
Rated 8 / 10 |
| Very melodic, very balanced and a pleasure to listen. A few of the distorted guitar samples and maybe the trumpets near the end could have been better but the song as a whole is definitely worth downloading. Everything seems in place here. Best experienced on sunny days. The artist seems to be creating music primarily with real instruments, using trackers as an additional way to compose. This is why many features of a tracker software are being left out in this song, they aren't needed anyway. | |
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Title: MOD - 8th Wonder Filename: blasa_mod8thwonder.it |
Posted Sun 20th Jan 2002
Rated 7 / 10 |
| Blasa offers us a quite trippy, industrial yet philosophical view of MOD music. Mixed with a chippy distorted bass are all kinds of weird samples and sequences, contrasting each other. Thrilling, yet the warm beat flattens a lot of harshness again. Blasa's technique in this song is quite oldskool on purpose... few channels and a play with "original" MOD effects like arpeggio and retrigger. | |
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Title: New times Filename: a-nt.xm |
Posted Sun 20th Jan 2002
Rated 5 / 10 |
| Although this is more a groove than a song, it is still a tune you can listen to easily - I'd imagine it in the background of a "coming up next"-slideshow on TV or something. Except for the higher piano notes, nice acoustic samples have been used. The artist worked only one week on it and then released it - which is a shame because I guess this could have become a great song if he had made a whole song out of it. I would love to listen to it. Definitely not a beginner; use of few but well-applied effects and NNA. Volumes are just right. But there could have been made so much more of this groove, it seems the filesize is not quite justified this way. | |
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Title: Levitation Filename: levitati.xm |
Posted Tue 15th Jan 2002
Rated 8 / 10 |
| Levitation by Deep Throat is a tune that reminded me a bit of Skaven's songs. It is the type of samples used and the way the looped synthstrings are chopped into 8/8 which bring back this particular feel. Strongly supported by reverberating drums and a very interesting 80's pop percussion layout, the shifting and otherwise varying chord progressions and melodic use of the bass synth are the main things that characterize the composition. There is a division into different sections carried out by drum soli. What I miss in this track though is a strong lead. There is a part in the song which has a playful upper voice, but the track as a whole is missing some kind of finishing touch like a melody riding on the base groove. Anyway, this is a module that I will keep in my collection. First of all, the song is Mono. 10 channels were used, 19 samples total, of which about half are percussion and a good bit of synth strings. While the samples are so characteristic for the song, they are also the downside, as many of them sound a bit noisy as if recorded from older vinyl. Advanced tracking technique when it comes to the distribution of effects. | |
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Title: turquoise Filename: turquois.xm |
Posted Thu 8th Nov 2001
Rated 9 / 10 |
| Oh yes! reed strikes again. The song starts with a nicely sampled picked guitar, bass, percussion and electric guitar slides lift it up; at a point the piano sticks its nose into the whole thing and converts the tune to jazz, while strings keep shyly in the background. This is a tune that made me lift my eyebrows and move my head to the rhythm. The tune description in the sample text can only be called an understatement. Nothing to complain about here. Mostly 16bit samples, instrument function use, volumes just in place. | |
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Title: groovethang Filename: dman_groove.s3m |
Posted Thu 8th Nov 2001
Rated 2 / 10 |
| There could have been made more of this. "A cool loop. The key operative there being LOOP" is what the creator writes in his sample text. Actually, this piece only has two rhythmic themes, dominated by bass, the distorted quitar we already know from thousands of other mods and an annoying hihat crash. It seems the artist preferred cutting and pasting over the cut pattern command with which he could have avoided an overlapping of clipboard data and pattern length. This way many more patterns have been used than necessary. | |
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Title: Calm Filename: calm.s3m |
Posted Thu 8th Nov 2001
Rated 1 / 10 |
| I was not convinced by this one. This S3M has only 6 patterns, a few less than average quality samples, and there are no sound enhancing efforts at all. This song might have been in the game Eighth Enigma. Most simple tracking level. Besides a volume change on two occasions there is not much of technical stuff I could write about here. There were a lot better songs in 1996. | |
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Title: Carpet Burns Filename: agh_carpet.xm |
Posted Thu 8th Nov 2001
Rated 6 / 10 |
| Kind of dark-mooded 4/4 tune, a bit of spacey or underwater feel. If it were a bit harder I'd say it's going towards industrial music. Several kinds of beat sequences used, though a bit more variation would have been nice. :-P Alternate theme around the last third of the song. Some instrument options, including envelopes. Not many effects, good choice of samples. | |
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Title: PaperClip Filename: agh_pclip.xm |
Posted Thu 8th Nov 2001
Rated 5 / 10 |
| Paperclip has a simple intro consisting of a base melody which is accompanied by chorus and synth piano afterwards. besides a bit of transposition, the whole concept does not vary much throughout the tune. I think this module would fit best into a demo or game loading sequence. Samples are nice, they fit together quite well. Minimalistic use of commands, 21 channels used. Advanced use of instrument options. | |
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Title: Aquatic Jive Filename: aquajive.s3m |
Posted Thu 8th Nov 2001
Rated 2 / 10 |
| This tune consists of a very distorted guitar, a bass, drum kit. Simple and unspectacular melody. A few effects and volume column commands used, but not much apart from that worth mentioning. Definitely not one of the best tunes by Arcturus. | |
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Title: on top of the world Filename: on_top_of_the_world.mod |
Posted Thu 27th Sep 2001
Rated 8 / 10 |
| Very melodic, a nice and easygoing tempo, and a great selection of possibilities to play with chords and harmonies. Great use of effects, great mix of different rhythms and styles. Especially the jazzy-ish part in the middle was a nice climax. This is a song which I suggest every chiptune lover to download. | |
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Title: I FEEL OK Filename: ok.mod |
Posted Thu 27th Sep 2001
Rated 1 / 10 |
| A 40 second, 7 patterns tune. Speeding beat and dull melody. Moo. See above. A waste of webspace. | |
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Download:
Title: oh_yeah Filename: OHYEAH.MOD |
Posted Thu 27th Sep 2001
Rated 8 / 10 |
| LOOOOOOOL!! Remember that cool tune "Oh Yeah" from the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off? Well this is a great 4-channel mod version which is definitely worth listening to. A few of the samples have been taken directly from the song, but the song is well arranged anyway. Give it a try. the artist manages to create a great illusion that this is actually the original song. Only when it becomes obvious the some elements of the original tune are missing, the difference can be noticed. Great economy of the 4 channels. | |
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Title: Smash hidden track remix Filename: ofspring.s3m |
Posted Thu 27th Sep 2001
Rated 1 / 10 |
| This is a rather bad tracked version of a tune by The Offspring. the first few seconds sound promising, then a harsh saxo annoyingly bitches for attention. The rest of the tune is not really worth mentioning, as it only represents a cover of a track which was intended as an epilogue in the first place. The best part of it is actually a set of two loops. 3 samples total. Need I say more? | |
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Title: Fogscape 5:00 AM Filename: gem-fog5.it |
Posted Sun 28th Jan 2001
Rated 8 / 10 |
| A very interesting tune. Synthstrings, organ and a bass form the pattern base, piano chords and rolls are used to brighten up the sound scape. Keys are resolved in thirds before a new key kicks in. This might sound a bit strange at first, but when you listen to it twice, you can see that the whole scenery fits: Imagine running through a thick fog layer, disoriented and hasty - and resting after a while in a creepy environment: a different beat, slap bass, and itchy notes form the middle part of the song, before the main theme with additional elements takes over again. Worth to keep! For about the first two minutes it keeps the same beat. A bit more variation there would not have hurt the song here. Samples are good, the artist plays a lot with volume, and a bit with panning in the middle part. | |
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Title: I'm Only Kidding Filename: onlykidg.mod |
Posted Wed 20th Dec 2000
Rated 1 / 10 |
| This song's name is "I'm Only kidding", right? It also says there that "This is only a FIRST attempt". Whoah... melodies with basedrums. A chord going wild with a trumpet. *barf* sssssssssigh... no review here. This is one of the mods I'd like to personally delete from the archive. | |
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Title: Olivia Filename: olivia.mod |
Posted Wed 20th Dec 2000
Rated 1 / 10 |
| A quote from this song's text in the sample list: "made ya waste a dl if you are listening to this mod" . And another one: "this mod sucks" . The artist himself put that text as a description of this piece, I just wonder why he released it then. He would have had every reason in the world not to release it - the mod is made of five different patterns, eight bad samples, no structure at all. Oh well this won't become three lines of text here... sigh... flush it. | |
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Title: OldSmoke Filename: oldsmoke.mod |
Posted Wed 20th Dec 2000
Rated 5 / 10 |
| This one left me thinking. It doesn't sound good at first. But the more I listened, the more I became aware that this track was made by a skilled person. The annoying drumtrack is being accompanied by a mix of harmonica, xylo, piano and marimba. It all develops more and more into Al Yankovic polka, if you know what I mean... :-S Friends of funny mods will like this. Some random noises seem to be placed on purpose to appear in a place that doesn't fit for them. Hell, beat me. Many things have been tried out here, bluesy piano fills as well as harmony changes. Few but well-used effects. Best in Mono. I guess you have to hear this a few times to like it. I will keep it for a while - see if I still like it next week. :) | |
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Title: Oldschool Girl Filename: old_girl.xm |
Posted Wed 20th Dec 2000
Rated 7 / 10 |
| Got a slow modem? Need nice music below 100kb size? Here you go. This is a good old demo music track with a bass line on two octaves, three lead instruments on a disco trip. A song to keep. Might be a bit repetitive when heard several times in a row, but that is not a reason to leave it. Advanced use of instruments and effects, mainly slides and fades. Samples are perfectly in tunes, and the only one that disturbs a bit is the open hihat. | |
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Title: Chronosphere II Filename: ohnoooo.mod |
Posted Wed 20th Dec 2000
Rated 2 / 10 |
| An old-fashioned sounding mod. I said "sounding", but not good. Some basic structure, but it seems that after one minute the artist didnt have any more ideas, got bored and decided to leave it in a quite unfinished state. There is a wind sample I have heard in at least three dozen mods. The drums go like "dom-chadodom-tss" on repeat. Nothing that will be remembered. Not at all. | |
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Download:
Title: OMG-ANGL.XM Filename: OMG-ANGL.XM |
Posted Sat 7th Oct 2000
Rated 6 / 10 |
| Not the best thing I've listened to, but worth keeping. Balanced spectrum of bass and lead tones. Volume is just ok, I guess. The song comes with some nice pattern dissolves every now and then. Clean 8-bit samples and extensive use of volume column effects. Good voice samples. | |
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Download:
Title: oooooooooooooooohh! Filename: ooooohh.mod |
Posted Sat 7th Oct 2000
Rated 1 / 10 |
| Downloaded, heard, deleted. That's what I did with this mod. Random speech samples, some horny woman and a bit of beat with some boingy sounds. It is this kind of mods that make people look down on the mod scene. Thumbs down. This tune simple sucks, ok? Sorry, but it is next to impossible to write about the techniques of a song if there simply is no song at all. I got a four year old cousin who could track better stuff, but at least he wouldn't release it. | |
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Title: Fire On The Sea Filename: orch2.xm |
Posted Mon 11th Sep 2000
Rated 7 / 10 |
| A rather dramatic tune... reminds me of a peaceful voyage on a ship when suddenly a fire starts and spreads on the boat. The tune has some nice harmonic parts and a sudden change towards a faster and more aggressive pace. What I was missing was enough bass to undeline the tune. Also, the tune does not keep its structure: around the middle it does not keep the listener too interested, and the seagull cries are repeated too many times. There are too many orch-hits as well - there should have been some more variation, perhaps different samples here. Nonetheless, the rest of the drum part has been carried out very well. The song has both 8 and 16-bit samples. Very good use of instrument options (panning/volume). A spectrum of effects has been applied, not too much, not too little. Strings and chorus form quite a nice couple. | |
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Title: InterstellarOvrdrive Filename: ovrdrive.mod |
Posted Mon 11th Sep 2000
Rated 2 / 10 |
| I know, I know... it is VERY hard to make a hard rock tune with a tracker... but this one is definitely not good. A bass and a (differently tuned) distorted guitar form some kind of base pattern and are backed up by a lead string on a prohibitively high pitch. This is supposed to be a remix of the Pink Floyd tune. Nah. Not much to write about. Samples are not good at all, which is basically the main reason why this tune cannot be enjoyed. Also, much could have been been improved on the tracking style (I won't go into this further... nearly everything which could have made this file to a song is missing), but what's the use if the samples are so bad? This is a MOD from 1993, and I already wrote in another review that there were much much better 4-channel MODs around then. | |
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Download:
Title: overrain.xm Filename: overrain.xm |
Posted Mon 21st Aug 2000
Rated 1 / 10 |
| There was this old childrens song "Somewhere over the rainbow". Then Marusha made a quite interesting mix a few years ago. Since then, there have been dozens of remixes of this song, different approaches of varying quality. This particular version is more on the crappy side. This mix does not even care about time or harmony. The accompanying (?) bass blobs seems to have their very own idea of how to play the song - like if a 3 year-old was going wild on a xylophone. Perfection is reached by the base drums ... UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK ... yeah, great. Around the middle is a barely recognizable La cucaracha solo, before the whole mess starts again. This song is insulting the programmers of FastTracker II. I won't write much more about this, only that this section would be left empty if I weren't required to write something about the tracking technique used in this song. Argh. "Well there r sum ultrakewl 10 chanlz wif almost no FX and doubled-up chanlz too." Way to go!! | |
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Title: Overload X25 Filename: overlx25.mod |
Posted Fri 18th Aug 2000
Rated 1 / 10 |
| Boring. No, no... brain-damaging fits better. The ar-(cough)-tist has loaded about every sample he could find and made tracks of it at random and underlined it with a techno base drum. It sounds bad. It sucks BIG TIME. Total junk. See below. You simply cannot make a melody by using ONE chord sample. It is also not a good idea to try to track a melody with orch hits. It is an even worse idea to make a melody with a voice sample. It doesn't make a difference if you do any of the above at the same time or alternating. The only thing that really impresses me is how the artist could listen to this song himself to make it last over six minutes. | |
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Download:
Title: overload Filename: overload.mod |
Posted Fri 18th Aug 2000
Rated 7 / 10 |
| Hey, I *LIKE* this! This song seems has about the same feel as many old Lizardking tunes. It starts with a fast pop part, goes on with a slow airy interlude and changes to another, very moody melodic softpop and 70's jazzy ending. 4 channel MOD par excellence with all sorts of samples and fx, a tune out of the best days of MOD. This song is really worth checking out. | |
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Download:
Title: overflow Filename: overflow.mod |
Posted Fri 18th Aug 2000
Rated 2 / 10 |
| A rave, not too good. This song was made in 1993, and there have been much better MODs of this type around that time. The basedrum is annoying, and although the artists has put some effort in the tracking of the synth samples, it all sums up to a load of volume changes. Reminds me of distorted chopper or bumblebee sounds. Some playing-around with a sinewave raising up to frequencies that should not be reached in a MOD. Not much to say about the tech... the best thing still is the changing assignment of the tracks on the left and right channels of the MOD, but there is a too chaotic structure in the song - therefore I don't even find it danceable. | |
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Download:
Title: OverDrive.(c) Arena98 Filename: mb_ovdrv.s3m |
Posted Fri 18th Aug 2000
Rated 7 / 10 |
| Solid 98er Trance. Well-arranged samples, the song is a bit on the goa-ish side. Not bad at all. :) A four and a half minutes track with aggressive bass distortion and a melodic part in the middle (although the change between the first and middle part is a bit abrupt). 16 channels, clean patterns and good effects use. Sample volumes could have been adjusted a bit better, but the track as a whole is quite nice. | |
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Title: Aller, Onyva! DJ Dafuki Filename: onyva.s3m |
Posted Fri 18th Aug 2000
Rated 1 / 10 |
| Rather simplistic 4/4 rave arranged around three tones in an irritating bass. Very repetitive, and at some parts more than slightly out of tune. The title should have been something like "Aiieeee, je m'en vais!" 8 bit samples, most probably much older than the song itself. FIFTY-FIVE SAMPLES LOADED, INCLUDING VOCALS, BUT ONLY TWELVE USED. Not a very convincing style in my opinion. | |
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Title: Run Over The Sea Filename: otsea.xm |
Posted Thu 13th Jul 2000
Rated 9 / 10 |
| Wow! This one sounds really nice! Sleepy background chorus, echoing drums and a low bass beat make an interesting combination. Something for the club's chillout corner. At 4:30 the overall sound gets brighter, but it lacks a leading theme - the concept of this song is impression, not complexity. Some parts remind me a bit of Odyssey 2001. To some this piece might sound a bit repetitive, but when you listen to it half asleep it is really relaxing. Don't underestimate it. Very careful use of volume slides and panning, professional NNA handling. Good selection of samples. The mix of the drums is impressive. | |
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Download:
Title: The Orion Connection Filename: orion.xm |
Posted Wed 12th Jul 2000
Rated 9 / 10 |
| Great tune. I am listening to this while surfing the web. Spacey. If there were any vocals, it would be perfect. Melody is not the most important thing, though some theme patterns are recognizable. The artist plays a bit with changing between major and minor scales. The guitar sample sucked a bit from the impression, but the buzzing sounds in the bass range and the drum track along with all background fx are great. A wonderful mix! Advanced use of volume column options. Excellently balanced panning. A song to learn from. | |
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Download:
Title: Overnight Filename: overnigh.xm |
Posted Wed 12th Jul 2000
Rated 4 / 10 |
| Well... I didn't like this song too much. Though its chord structure is slighty more complex than of a standard techno tune, it is a) too short and b) nonetheless too repetitive. The drums and hihats are so low that they don't add anything to the substance. I really think there could have been made much more of this song. If Pete'd remix it now (this version is from 1995) with better samples and a more advanced tracking technique it would certainly be better. | |
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Download:
Title: OrBiTaL DeLuSiOnS II Filename: ORB2.MOD |
Posted Wed 12th Jul 2000
Rated 6 / 10 |
| A bit doskpop-ish, a bit of an announcement tune... lots of drums and chords. A little over-effected for my taste, but definitely among the better MODs made back then. This is an old one... released in 1993, Orbital Delusions II is an example of an 8CHN mod, though only six channels have been used. Nearly the whole repertoire of effects has been used. Where commands didn't suffice, volume changes did the rest. It is a convincing example of how good limited resources can be employed to tickle power out of a MOD - maybe a bit too much. | |
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Download:
Title: Crystal Eternity Filename: luna1.xm |
Posted Tue 20th Jun 2000
Rated 10 / 10 |
| Once again CoS shares a musical prophecy with us. A slow and relaxing melody, a subtle background beat and a structure that builds up, getting more and more powerful. WHOOSH! This song is like an ocean - impressively *big*, smooth and breathtaking. An electric organ is the basis for all sorts of classical and synth instrument parts woven around about six to eight chord units. It has been quite some time since I last heard a tune balanced that well. Especially the (two) loud parts have been armed to the teeth with perfect strings and thundering drums, not to forget the voice choirs and the clarinet that takes over a drifting melody... only the ending is a bit abrupt. This is a perfect ten. Those who don't like this kind of music (I do!) will be convinced of this score when taking a look at the songfiles' data. Almost no effects commands were used; in fact, they are not needed and would be out of place. The most dominantly used "effect" is carried out as consequent volume changes. Many samples are 8-bit, but seldomly have I heard a song that uses them as efficiently as this one. Panning and volume are well balanced, all samples have optimal parameters. | |
Title: funkacider
Filename: funkacid.xm
Rated 10 / 10