We had over 70 remix submissions. We did not expect that. A lot of them obviously spent a big chunk of time on it.
 
Yeah, don't slightly change a track on a remix people. You gotta flip it to be sick.
 
Different chord progression, tempo change if you feel it, original sounds, get crazy with it or just a new musical take.
 
That copy ish is not a remix. That is a new mix of the same mix.
 
lol
 
Lance

So we should all decided on a good head banging tune and remix it into an EDM track...

Jeff Evans
It is important to define what remix actually means. In one sense it means everyone just remixes the tracks or stems so everyone ends up with the same piece of music but mixed differently.
 
Or the real meaning of remix is a totally new piece of music is created out of the provided samples, tracks or stems etc..(as per Indaba Music remix comps) And the further away from the provided material the better. ie a total composition type of comp.
 

That is a good point, though I think I disagree about "real meaning". It's more that it means different things to different people.
 
Myself and a couple of DJs I know have done a whole heap of remixes under the name "Club Clique". And our thing is very much the total remake. To the point of even chopping lyrics around to change the conceptual thrust of the song, in a couple of cases. And new chord progressions, new instrumentation, the works.

Generally, we've been commissioned by people who knew that's what we were going to do. I think we've had about 20 released, and about five knocked back. But the ones that were knocked back were always on a "my god, what have you done to our song?" basis, and those people then went on to release more traditional remixes where it's the same record but with a bigger kick drum and a longer instrumental break. Which is cool, not knocking it at all.
 
But yeah, it depends who you're talking to. We had one act who'd made this electro 80s synth pop kinda thing, but with a brilliant soul-y lead vocal, and we re-worked it as a Chic-type disco thing, which we thought they'd love. And they were horrified.

Following from that, and more pertinent to the matter at hand -
 
Since this is a community thing, and not a commission, or even formal contest with a ranking, I think it would be interesting if we didn't define what we meant by "remix", and let everyone run with their own idea. I reckon we'd get all kinds of fascinating stuff out of that.

If it is not substantially different, that just defeats the purpose.
 
There is  a lot of lame commercially released remixes out there where they really did not hardly change anything. Who wants that instead of the original?
 
Not It. Boring and pretty much useless.
 
A real remix in the DJ world is a different version using at least some of the original stems, sometimes just vocals and sometimes just a sample sounding part of vocals, stuff like that, not another mix of the same stuff. That is just lame to do that. I have heard it multiple times. I am like, why did you even bother because you added or changed little to nothing. It's like washing a shirt again when it is already clean. lol
 
Lance

I disagree. I think there are really interesting things that can be done with only small changes.
 
There's a DJ called Danny Krivit who was around in the disco days and is still at it. And he used to do really simple edits, extending bits, shortening bits, not much else. But they're remarkable, to my ears. He's an absolute master at making dancefloor versions of songs, with really small and subtle alterations. That's an art in itself.

Since this Remix competition thread and Chic was just mentioned..
Chic singer has a remix comp of her latest track out.
Her voice completely blew me away...what power she's got, amazing I think.
Song: https://soundcloud.com/sy...-little-things-main-pf
Remixcomp: https://soundation.com/group/little-things-remix

Or to give a more modern example, there's Dimitri From Paris, who does a similar thing.
 
This doesn't contain a single sound or note that isn't on the original. But I think he's done something amazing with that material.
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaHp4i2mCdE
 

This is fast becoming the Chic thread.
 
We should have a Chic thread, actually. Those records sound like they're carved out of diamond. Amazing production.
 

Agree 100% John (think it was famous Bob Clearmountain mixing Chic).
totally don't want to say anything bad about the analog era productions, just thinking alone how they did is incredible..
But when listening back some old songs sometimes the mix or mastering isn't really that great as I thought (to modern standards) but probably the music/performance totally makes up for it.
One thing back then that helped I think, was that the engineers left plenty of headroom always....so the music really stayed alive and cut through.
At this point I think a lot of the 'analog sound' people look for is actually 'just leaving it alone' and having plenty headroom for the music. 70's + 80's music is just awesome and we don't know really why haha..