Step's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Monsieur Blacksky]

Excellent mixing man. This was one of the better metal auditions. The guitars sound positively menacing, and the drums have a lot of oomph in them. You used the compression very tastefully as well, since it wasn't too much to have the instruments compete and create a mess of sound, but was still there to give the instruments the power they need. Your riffs are solid, your playing is good...

...so why wasn't this accepted into the NGADM? I can't speak for the other judges, but personally if I were to criticise it, I'd mention what MetalRenard said. This needs better melodic content. There were other excellent metal artists like Braiton whose audition had great production value like your track had but at the same time had good composition. This has flawless production, but lacked in the composition department.

Apply your production skills to some strong melodic content and you'd have a winner in your hands.

PirateCrab responds:

Thanks a lot for the critique Step, it's muchly appreciated.

This song was written with vocals in mind which is why it lacks melodic content, I'm actually producing the vocals right now haha. Knew I should have chosen a different song!

You'll be seeing me next year fella don't you worry!

[~SW~ City of the Clouds]

Hi. Yeah I know I said I'd review this and I took ages to get around to it (but in my defence I was in Spain and I am certainly not analysing a track on laptop speakers or Apple earbuds thank you very much). Now that I'm back in Malta, I can finally review this, and let me just say from now that this is your best work. I greatly admire Birth of an Astral Nation for the whole size, ambition and creativity of it, but this is hands-down your most solid unified song. On top of that, I absolutely love it, and let me tell you exactly why.

This has EVERYTHING*. It's like my new smartphone. It can do everything save for make me my breakfast (but I'm sure there'll be an app for that in the future). This has parts that are slow, parts that are energetic and bursting with speed, parts that build up, parts die down, atmospheric parts, insane solos and even traditional instruments like the dizi and zither for God's sake. What's not to like?

This is such an ambitious project, just like a lot of your other works. There's a big diversity in sounds, effects and melodic content. This song is like a starry night sky. Look up at it and you've got a beautiful array of stars. Look closer and you start seeing more and more stars pop up here and there, and the more you look at it, the more stars come up and the more beautiful the sky becomes. Same thing here; if I listen closely to the song at any one point, I'll always pick up some new little detail which I didn't notice before. Yes, your song is a smartphone and now a night sky as well. DEAL WITH IT.

The insane amount of detail provides a very slight negative effect. It's very tough to add in so many instruments and soundscape layers playing together because that then diminishes the effect of each individual instrument, which makes this track fall in the same trap a lot of your other songs have. No sound truly stands out in the mix (except that open hat at 2:52 which ironically stands out too much. Turn that crap down, man). HAVING SAID THAT, this is very slight issue because 1.) It makes sense with the theme to have so many things playing together...

...and 2.) you've actually done a much better job on the mixing than you've ever done before on a track. This makes the problem of no sound standing out much less apparent because even if there isn't the clarity I want to hear in certain sounds, I can still feel the power and statement of certain instruments.

This issue is slowly dying away the more you make music, so I think after some time this issue will have disappeared for the most part and you'll be able to separate sounds more adeptly and suitably in a heavy and detailed mix instead of having them competing so much. In all fairness, your mixing skills right now are already great anyway. It's just that you use so many sounds that it ends up being a massive chore to control them all and mix them suitably, and you're already improving rapidly at that.

Now, I often start with composition when I review melody-heavy tracks like these but I wanted to get all that stuff out of the way first. The composition is stellar. I can't begin to express how much I love the leitmotif you've used here or how much I enjoyed the guitar solo towards the end without sounding like your number #1 fanboy or something. Not to mention that great rhythm guitar-like thing you use in the background during energetic parts like 1:20 which is coincidentally one of my favourite things in this track. Overall, you used just the right amount of quirkiness and just the right amount of excitement. This sounds very inspired and creative.

Something I would particularly commend you on is how you manage to combine a light, floating atmosphere with an energetic and fun atmosphere, even adding hints of deeper reflection in certain parts like the end. The sound effects and layers of drone ambience only assisted you in this feat. At the risk of sounding too much like an A.I.M. judge, this fits excellently with the art you chose in my opinion. Your story also fit so well that while I was trying to read it in sync with the music, I practically got goosebumps. It really works.

Notwithstanding the little mixing issue I mentioned above, the technicalities are pretty much nailed. Fitting intro and outro, superb transitions, great choice of sounds and choice of chords, and a very solid structure to boot.

There's nothing more I can say about this piece right now because I'm getting sleepy. I can tell you're proud of this and you should be. You worked hard on it and the result, without a shred of doubt, paid off. You get a 10/10 from me. Keep in mind the issues I've mentioned above and keep on improving please!

10/10
5/5
Download.
Favourited.

* except a cowbell.

SkyeWint responds:

FIRST THING. YOU ARE AMAZING AND HANDS-DOWN THE BEST REVIEWER I KNOW. PERIOD. This is not up for debate, you are not allowed to complain. So shush with the downplaying of yourself. I need to review a piece or two of yours (or like, 5) to repay you for all this great stuff.

Now, copy/pasting and responding to your points.

"this is your best work"
:D :D :D :D :D ME GUSTA. Definitely was my goal, though I hope to overcome that... like, 4-5 times during the NGADM.

"even traditional instruments like the dizi and zither"
Okay, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. But I must do this. It's an erhu, not a dizi. ;_;

"This has EVERYTHING* * except a cowbell."
...so is it like Omnisphere then? :D

"Yes, your song is a smartphone and now a night sky as well."
Okay, I can deal with it being a high-def picture of a night sky on a smartphone or a smartphone app depicting the night sky. Seriously though, I am highly complimented by you noticing this. I work incredibly hard to have tooooons of little details in my music which people can pick up on if they look deeper, and it's great to have someone comment on that in such an artistic way. ^_^ Also, of course... I always try to have things be diverse and 'different'.

"(except that open hat at 2:52 which ironically stands out too much. Turn that crap down, man)"
Yeah, people have mentioned that before. I guess I should probably change that at some point, lol.

"you've actually done a much better job on the mixing than you've ever done before on a track"
Thank you so much. x.x I hope that each individual instrument had a lot more space and was a lot clearer than they've been. I tried to give them each more room to breathe, and let the relevant instruments stand out a bit more when they're given their chance.

"It's very tough to add in so many instruments and soundscape layers playing together because that then diminishes the effect of each individual instrument"
You can say that again. :\ I like to add a lot of detail in my music as I said. Unfortunately, it can make mixing a complete nightmare. Still though...

"This issue is slowly dying away the more you make music, so I think after some time this issue will have disappeared for the most part and you'll be able to separate sounds more adeptly and suitably in a heavy and detailed mix instead of having them competing so much."
This be good. If I can seriously manage to do that then I want to be crowned the damn mixing king of the world (lol yeah right).

"I can't begin to express how much I love the leitmotif you've used here"
Will send if you want. c:

"the guitar solo towards the end"
Will also send if you want. C: It's this really cool and crazy synth I found lurking in the depths of Omnisphere, actually. No guitar related at all.

"without sounding like your number #1 fanboy or something"
:D PLEASE DO SO. I will give you a cookie the size of a car tire. Or possibly some pancakes, I know a place (went there this morning and they served 3 pancakes the size of hubcaps. I only managed to eat one and then was stuffed for the next 7 hours).

"Something I would particularly commend you on is how you manage to combine a light, floating atmosphere with an energetic and fun atmosphere, even adding hints of deeper reflection in certain parts like the end."
Atmospheres are actually something I also work heavily on. ...okay, so I try to work heavily on almost everything, but atmospheres are still an important thing I try to add into most of my music. :P They help so much in storytelling... which is apparently a good thing since my story came across well. :D So I think that's it, and I'll take my leave... oh wait.

"Keep in mind the issues I've mentioned above and keep on improving please!"
YES SIR!

.

(...but it's not in your favorites. ;_;)

[Biohome]

Certainly a well-deserved 2nd place! Hell, I thought you or InYourDreams had first place in the bag! This is a very chill, catchy, well-produced and enjoyable track with a great video-game vibe and a lot of diversity in moods. It's so good that it won my vote! Fantastic work with this.

I'm amazed that you managed to make this in just 3 days! As I said in that mini-review I gave you in the thread, this has such a clean and airy mix, and you managed to nail it in such a small amount of time. That is what I call talent. The production of this is off the charts. I can hear every instrument with crystal clarity, and this sounds great at high volumes (especially those bass-driven transitions like the one at 1:47).

The percussion is just great. I literally have no complaints with it. The beat is fitting, and the way you mixed those drums gives them a lot of oomph which, again, sounds excellent at high volumes, especially that kick which is probably the best kick in the contest, I swear. I sometimes have problems using kicks and sub-basses together because the sub-bass clashes with the frequencies of the kick and makes the whole thing sound like a bassy mess (which is tough to fix with EQing), but you execute it here seamlessly. Great drum samples too. Also, let me guess, the drums in the intro are from Stormdrum, right?

The composition is lovely. Everything is just so relaxed; it almost makes the biodome look like a beach resort paradise or something, ESPECIALLY when that guitar comes in later on! That guitar sounds amazing by the way; is it real or sampled? Funny how we both praise each other's guitars. Anyway, I digress. Apart from the stellar melodic content, you make brilliant use of grace notes, in the lead square synth, the guitar and the piano, which may be subtle but really heighten the melody.

My complaint in this section is that I would've liked to hear a little more melodies. I was disappointed to hear that the piano's melodies are practically the same or very similar to the melodies played by the lead synth. It was great hearing those melodies played with such an expressive touch by the piano, but still, I would've liked it if the piano veered off into some different melodic content.

When the guitar comes in playing some awesome new melodies, it sounds like a relief, but that relief is short-lived because a few bars afterwards, the main melody comes back in again. It sounds beautiful at the end, don't get me wrong, particularly when you bring it up an octave and get the guitar playing with it at one point, but you use that melody so much that it cheapens its final iteration. Also, this is just a little thing that I'd like to suggest. Maybe you could have a lush, uplifting pad play with the main melody at the end? Just to give it a bit more of a climactic feel.

By the way, words will not even begin to express how good the transitions in this track are. My favourite transition would, without a shred of doubt, be the transition at 1:47. Unlike TheDoor6, I absolutely love how "empty" the part at around 1:30 sounds, because it creates such a sweet contrast with the meaty, bassy transition at 1:47 that introduces the main melody. You approached that transition perfectly, and when the main melody finally comes in, it sounds beautiful. To a lesser extent, the transition at 3:05 was also great.

Finally, I'll quickly talk about the intro and outro, which, I felt, were sub-par compared to the rest of the track. The intro was nice and cinematic, with an interesting use of the rain sound effect, but to be honest it was a bit boring, and didn't give any indication that this track is something truly worth listening to. In fact, when I heard this for the first time during the voting period, only around 1 minute and a half into the track did I realise that this track could very easily win the round. Before that I wasn't quite impressed.

The ending is alright, but that final ending note could've been a bit more pronounced; you know, maybe you can add a crash cymbal and kick playing with it to give it a more definite ending than just a timid note on the lead synth that is filtered out. In addition to that, you could've added a bit more silence at the end. The ending on the whole felt a little rushed.

In conclusion, you've got an excellent track here. Highly impressive work; I consider this to be one of the best tracks in round 2 and I hope this review was helpful! Keep up the excellent work!

10/10
5/5

johnfn responds:

Holy crap man, what a review. I was thinking of doing a blow by blow response but it would just be me agreeing with every point you made. Ha! So instead I can make some high level comments.

1. Wow you pay seriously attention when you listen to songs. I seriously need to work towards that. I am eventually going to review your song so that should be a good time to practice ;-)
2. This review is a really good motivation to work on those little details, cuz I know that somewhere out there Step (or someone like you) is listening to each of them. In almost every negative point of your review, when I had written that part of the song I had thought "yeah I should fix this but I'm lazy" (or whatever bad excuse).
3. I applied almost every bit of advice you gave on my next entry to NGMT. Sadly I kinda ran out of time to mix it properly because I only had two days to do it. But yeah a lot of your points were suuper helpful.
4. I also really like this review because we agree on almost everything. Intro? Yep, didn't like it (tossed it in to get closer to the theme). Quiet transition? I thought it was awesome too. Repetitive melody? Yeah I knew that was a bad idea. Ending? Yeah, it needed more. Production? Yeah, I really nailed this one. (Somehow - I often struggle with mixing.)

Thanks for the incredible review man. I will try my best to do you one in kind.

P.S.

1. Yup, it's stormdrum. Good catch :-)
2. The acoustic guitar is not live. I wish I had recording instruments!

[Sanctuary]

Yesss. This is such an improvement over your NGAPTAC submission. Wonderful atmosphere, very solid composition and spectacular use of instruments. Even though it's a whole new level from your NGAPTAC submission, for some reason I still instantly knew it was yours. You've got a knack for making stuff that sounds experimental, avant-garde and sometimes downright weird, and when you execute it well enough to make it enjoyable and sensible on the whole, like you did here, that's when you have me impressed.

This was one of my favourites from the contest for various reasons. If we had to judge solely based on atmosphere, I think I would've voted for yours. You manage to build a pretty incredible atmosphere with both unsettling elements like the industrial-esque percussion and voice, and more majestic elements like that harp and flute. Some instruments like the guitar are used both to convey a tense mood (1:14) AND a feeling of majesty and grandiose (2:49). Hearing the difference in mood from each section played by the same instrument was something I loved.

Like I said, you make great use of your instruments. You really give each instrument its due respect, which is the total opposite of how I work. I throw in as many instruments as I can into my work and together the instrumentation is a greater whole than the sum of its parts. On the other hand, you seem to give each instrument a lot more attention and care, and then make them somehow work together at the end. You don't use as many instruments but make great use of the instruments you ARE using, and by the end of the track each instrument has its own unique identity, which is a very interesting approach. Yes I have no idea what I'm talking about.

And the composition is great! I love the chords you use, the melodies you make and the rhythms you create to support them. You have some truly great ideas over here, for example stopping the drums at 3:03 and then bringing them back in with a little mini-buildup, which, coupled with that descending phrase on the harp, really highlighted the beautiful atmosphere you have going over there.

Now, my main problem with this is the one I mentioned in the thread. The eccentricity of this track is a double-edged sword. Going against the norm creates very interesting and unique listening experiences, which is certainly evident over here, but at the same time, take it too far and it starts making the track difficult to enjoy at times.

For instance, you've got that harp and flute combo playing beautiful melodies at the beginning, and then at 1:04, without any form of suitable gradual transition, the track suddenly becomes tense, which doesn't make much sense. You probably did it to depict both the majestic atmosphere and dangerous atmosphere of the biodome, but that transition makes it sound a little forced. In general, the track's metre is also hard to follow at certain points, which, again, is not necessarily a bad thing, but personally it made it harder for me to enjoy.

With regards to composition, I would've liked it if you latched on to a motif that plays occasionally, since the structure of this track is pretty much all over the place. Additionally, I think that the flute doesn't quite fit at 2:17.

I understand that my points of criticism sound like they're trying to "standardise" or "dumb down" this track to make it more pleasant for a casual music listener, but what I really think is ideal for this track is that it nails a balance between sounding experimental/unique and sounding like a structured and well-thought-out piece of music. Right now, it's still very enjoyable, but leaning a bit too much on the experimental side, I feel. A track which, in my opinion, nails the balance, and has a pretty similar atmosphere to this track, is Shadow People by Buoy:
http://goo.gl/rspHj

Anyway, that's my opinion on this track. You've done an excellent job, and this track is bursting with great ideas and an amazing atmosphere. I very much enjoyed it, bravo!

9/10
5/5

alternativesolution responds:

I just... *blushes*

Thank you very much for your absolutely wonderful review! ^___^

I find your critique very informative. And I'm really glad you like it! Yes, considering my NGAP submission was done in just a few hours (not proud of that), I would hope that this one would sound more improved.

Though it varies from the different types of music I make, I tend to work on my transitions last, so that may be a telling point when it comes to how they've been affecting the stronger sections of my pieces. So, I will work hard on those!

Um.....all the detail.... T__T

I'm still smiling after reading this huge fence (it's not so much a wall..) of text, haha. :) I appreciate your thoughts on this piece more than you could know !

[IYD- New World (NGMT '13)]

What an excellent track. You should not be bummed at all that you got no votes. I honestly expected you or johnfn to win, and like I said in the thread, I only voted for johnfn over you because I thought that his track felt more detailed and like it had more thought put into it, whereas I feel that the deadline didn't work as well for you. But honestly, your production quality, composition, execution, and everything are so good that if it was only a bit longer and more developed/fleshed-out then I would've voted for it.

I'm going to start by saying that I love this kind of metal. Melodic, catchy metal which isn't just mindless shredding is just awesome, and here you execute it perfectly. Your guitar playing is nailed. I loved the rhythm guitar's riffs; maybe the chugging rhythm is a bit generic but honestly at this point it's impossible to find a fitting rhythm that hasn't been used many times before. It works well and fits neatly with the track.

The production value is through the roof. For three days, you've certainly managed to make a polished and tight mix. I remember listening to the tracks before voting and when I got to this track, I literally thought "crap, this guy knows what he's doing" when I heard 0:08. The guitar sounds GREAT, and your heavy use of compression works well over here since it really highlights the oomph of the guitar combined with those badass drums.

Speaking of which, the drums are stellar. I have yet to learn how to make such a clear and bassy kick, and that snare is amazing. The cymbal may have been a little underpowered (for some reason I swear I can hear it a bit better in the SoundCloud link but then again SoundCloud's playback is a bit compressed/weird at times). Otherwise, I have no complaints with the percussion, and I love that sci-fi-esque snare hit you played at times like 0:24 and 1:43 (or is that the same snare except with filters on it?).

The composition is lovely. Very catchy and "epic"-sounding. In a way it reminds me heavily of this (http://goo.gl/gdDni) for some reason. Like I mentioned in the review, my main gripe with the composition is that I think you use it to the point that it sounds pretty overused and milked. I would've liked some different melodic stuff played by the lead guitar, while still giving in some hints of that motif here and there, rather than starting every melody you've got with it (I'm talking about the first five notes of 0:25). Still, why should I be complaining? Composition is catchy, and well-made. I'm just nitpicking.

The instrumentation is sweet; one of my favourite things about this track. I always love when tracks blend metal with orchestral, or metal with electronic elements. Naturally, when you blend all three together you really win me over. The sci-fi stuff works well with the guitar and then you introduce strings which, while sounding premature and unexpected, sound great with everything else. Additionally, the sci-fi/techno elements tie the track to the biodome theme, even if that tie is not very strong.

Transitions are nice; nothing extraordinary, but they're good. 1:42 may have been a bit abrupt but otherwise, smooth transitions on the whole. Sweet intro as well. The same unfortunately can't be said for the ending though. After such good production and structure, all of a sudden you throw in some strings out of nowhere, and end the track like nothing happened. It makes it sound an awful lot like the deadline got the better of you, and as I said a few times now, the fact that this track has some underdeveloped ideas, not as much content and that weird ending is probably the main (or rather, only) reason I didn't vote for it.

Honestly though, I regret not voting for it. This track is fantastic and based on this track alone I consider you one of the most talented metal artists that I've heard here on Newgrounds. Eventually I'll check out some of your other stuff to see if it's on par with this, and if so you're going straight to my favourite artists list. Keep it up!

10/10
5/5
Download.

InYourDreams responds:

Wow,.. that's a lot to read xD...

Yeah... I only had one day time to write and come up with something for this round. I admit I did't work as much on this song as I would normaly do. Lucky for me I got super inspired that day :D... the rest is practice, I think.

Allmost everything I used for writing and mixing this songs were freeware plugins. My drum sounds are actually an awefull sounding drums- VSTi. But I used some boosts and EQs Compressors and stuff to highlight the Kick. The snare needed only a little boost of air and a lot of reverb (and love... xD...). I wanted an organic acoustic sounding drums, but at the same time modern and somewhat robotic. The simple beat made it easier to create those feelings.

This Metal-Electro-blend is becoming something like my style latetly... I love it! :D... I'm glad you liked my song. Check out my latest 3 or 4 songs... before that I was still developing my sound and my playing and mixing skills.

Thanx for the awesome review, Step! and see you next round :P

[FD - Dreams]

NGAP 10TH ANNIVERSARY CONTEST REVIEW

--

This is such an incredible track compared to the original that it's actually hilarious. Even on its own, this is one hell of an incredible track.

The atmosphere is nailed. The intro is just spine-chilling, and when the vocals come in, it truly becomes an extremely dark and captivating experience. This track has the ability to encapsulate the listener in its grasp and keep him/her under the spell until the very end, and then leave him/her thinking about it even after the track is finished. And halfway through it turns into a metal track with excellent guitar-playing! That was entirely unexpected, even if hints of it were thrown in at 2:14 (which were wonderfully subtle, great job). The vocals overall added a disturbing element to the track and the voice acting is just excellent. I don't know where you got those vocals from or if you made them yourself though.

It is incredibly hard to find anything to point out that I didn't like. This is just fantastic. I can only mention miniscule little faults that are probably personal preference. The ending, for me, felt a bit too uneventful for an ending. Perhaps add some echo/reverb to the vocals, especially for the last word, so it rings a bit more before the track ends. Also, I'm not a huge fan of the mixing in the metal part. The cymbals sound a bit thin and the rest of the drums sound a bit flat. These are all slight nuisances that don't really deduct from your score that much.

I consider this one of the best submissions in the contest. Truly well done!

--

SCORE: 9.5/10

ForgottenDawn responds:

Thank you so much, this is an incredible review. :)
Yes, I did perform the vocals myself as I couldn't get any voice actors to read those lines and so I had to stick with my fat performance. People liked it, I'm pretty content too. Also I agree with the minuscule flaws, I'll definitely be careful next time.
Thanks again
//FD

[Violin Fight (Arr.)]

NGAP 10TH ANNIVERSARY CONTEST REVIEW

--

45 minutes! Now that's what I call speed-writing. After 45 minutes I still wouldn't be done choosing my instruments haha.

You're a talented composer and it shows over here. This often reminds me strongly of the Guild Wars 2 soundtrack for some reason, but that aside the composition is lovely. Great change of chords at 1:20 for example. I like that you still made creative interpretations of the original, like throwing in that beautiful harp and woodwind intro, and slowing everything down to a more emotional pace as well. The sounds are also awesome, but I'm pretty sure you use East/West right? That explains it. The brass in particular works very well. I like that you extended the original in quite a few different ways. You added a lot more instruments which weren't necessarily strings, and made this feel more like a song and less like a cool little menu thing.

That said, I can tell that this is written in a small amount of time. I've always thought you've struggled a bit with mixing, and over here it's all the more apparent. The staccato strings have way too many mids and there's a lot of frequency clashing going on here. Apart from that, some transitions feel rushed. With a bit more tweaking, the transition at 0:46 would be good, but right now it sounds abrupt. 1:20 feels like a rushed transition too, and the harp/violin part at the end feels like it came out of nowhere.

Unfortunately, on the whole this feels unfinished. If only you started earlier, because if you realise your full potential I think you would've done very well in the contest.

--

SCORE: 7/10

samulis responds:

Yeah, I really need to teach myself all the fancy mixing things people do. Finale doesn't offer EQ... all that would need to be done to the rendered file or perhaps I could find a good VST EQ plugin (I know there are millions out there... if you have one you recommend, let me know!).

I really honestly don't have the tools to do a full mix like most digital composers do aside from pan, volume, reverb, and some basic envelope work, all inclusive in the PLAY VST. Finale recently brought in VST effect support, but I really have never bought any effects or learned formally the best practices to using them, so that's something I need to work on for the future. :)

When I go back to this, I plan on adding some percussion (I normally do them last and left them out on this due to the time), some more content before the ending plus a better ending, and clean up the transitions as a whole.

I actually was busy out of my mind for the weeks leading up to the deadline with schoolwork, so it was a last minute "maybe I should give this a shot..." sort of thing. I don't know how I managed to even make it a piece of music tbh. Thank you for the critique, I'll try to stop entering these things at the last minute. :P

[SD and L (cover)]

NGAP 10TH ANNIVERSARY CONTEST REVIEW

--

You're the one of the two competitors to cover two tracks, and unlike the other one I feel like you actually had a decent transition here.

Let me start by saying that the guitar at the beginning sounds fantastically atmospheric and works extremely well as an intro. Even if you say you have a bad microphone, it sounded just fine. Tasteful use of reverb on it too! You then transition to the other track with a fairly smooth transition (even if it's a bit crossfade-ish), and some really unique-sounding ideas. This all sounds interesting and creative. Both covers also feel like improvements from the originals too.

Unfortunately, like other people have said, I feel like this didn't go anywhere. The second part especially doesn't feel very structured. The guitar intro was lovely but when it transitioned to something else, there was nothing that indicated that the guitar intro's place is in this track, since it turned into something else entirely. The other submission covering two tracks also felt disjointed and I feel that this was an issue that I should have addressed earlier, since using more than one track to cover in your submission doesn't mean you can make it sound like two different covers entirely.

You present great, creative and intriguing ideas, but work more on making this one cohesive listening experience, since it feels somewhat directionless.

--

SCORE: 6.5/10

alternativesolution responds:

Oh, that's good to hear! I finally was able to filter out much of the background noise (I got a new mic now, yes!) after tweaking around, but to me I couldn't tell if I had done the job right or not. So I'm glad it's not terrible sounding.

I had a hard time transitioning the two covers, and at first wanted to add in some guitar to the second piece as well, but it sounded too busy... so I ended up leaving it how it was. Ah, the life of a procrastinator. I picked my songs 3 days before the deadline and did all the work on the final day, most of it after 6pm >.<
But it is good to know I did well with the creative aspects, because I was certainly happy with the second cover, myself. Just...not how quickly it ended. (time constraint) I wanted to extend it much further, actually. If I had allowed myself more time from the start, I would've seen to the now-clear transitioning issues.

"You present great, creative and intriguing ideas, but work more on making this one cohesive listening experience, since it feels somewhat directionless."

This is especially helpful. Cohesiveness is very important, and I will keep that in mind the next time I think it's okay to procrastinate.

I appreciate your input, and thank you for your review!

[Motivated Wonders[NGAP10]]

NGAP 10TH ANNIVERSARY CONTEST REVIEW

--

You're the first to put melodies from more than one song in your track. Interesting!

I suppose I'll have to treat this as two different covers. The Motivated Suspicions cover was my favourite from the two. You still managed to retain the great chords from the original and you've got some great ideas in there too. The original is MIDI so it's nice to hear it with a beefier and thicker arrangement, rather than with crappy MIDI instruments. The other cover was not as impressive, I felt, but you still made some decent interpretation of the original in some parts.

That said, I expected a lot more from you and this was a bit of a disappointment. A lot of the samples you used just don't that good at all and this isn't mixed well. The slap bass in particular sounds bad. The sax is the only instrument in the Motivated Suspicions track which I was happy with. The second cover is also lacking in good sounds (and this can be heard all too clearly at 4:54 especially), and you didn't even vary the genre and structure that much either,. And of course, a big issue with this track is that it's just two covers squashed together. when I said I allowed composition from more than one track, I was still expecting one unified experience, since you essentially did the same thing as posting two submissions to the contest, except they're just put together in one audio file here. No good transition, nothing to join the two together. You didn't even use the same instrument set.

I love some of the ideas you have here, but I'm a big fan of some of your other works and this doesn't begin to compare I'm afraid.

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SCORE: 6/10

Nimble responds:

I can agree with you with just about everything you've said here; mixing ain't my strong suit, there are a couple sounds that are below quality, and the transition didn't go very well. I wanted the transition to be sudden, e-brake style(the kind you sometimes see in film scores and musicals), but I guess it was just a bit too much of a fast change to be effective. I will argue the instrument set point though. there is a english horn improvisational solo in the Motivated Suspicions part and right after the solo section the harp and flute/eng are used along with the electric piano in the "B" section, and the harp plays along with e.pno for the rest of the Motivated Suspicions part. Also, the brass section is the same throughout both sections. I'm just being technical at this point, though.

In all, I do feel like if I had just left out the second half it would've been a lot better, due to the lack of transition and no general structural changes. To be honest, Time was one thing I was spending alot of on this contest, because for two weeks I was brainstorming and sending PMs out to artists asking for a MIDI or chords to work with. Of course then a few unexpected things happened, ended up working for about 9 hours in one sitting on this single submission, then turning it in just about an hour before the deadline. I feel terrible to have disappointed you, and will make it a personal goal to learn and fix ANY of my future mistakes and will try my best to reach a higher standard with each submission that i write in the future. I thank you for your time in reviewing this piece.

[Sea of Grass (Jazz)]

NGAP 10TH ANNIVERSARY CONTEST REVIEW

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Wow, that's exactly what I needed. Some mellow jazz. Thank you.

The composition here is just beautiful. I haven't given points to that many people for the composition because, needless to say, it's generally someone else's since this is a cover competition. However, I have to mention that you entirely changed the chords of the original and it just sounds amazing in this setting (0:43 gave me goosebumps!). The song you chose is far from jazz but it works so well in jazz that it's making me wonder why TroisNyxEtienne didn't make it jazz in the first place haha. The instruments other than the guitar play some fantastic supporting melodies. The piano especially sounds great at the end where it really shifts the pace into a more uplifting style.

My complaint here is that unfortunately this sounds somewhat disjointed. Instead of being one cohesive song, this often just pauses one section and starts another, like at 0:21 and 0:57. I really appreciate you turning the original into this rubato jazz thing, but that doesn't mean you make it sound like it's not a full, structured song. Some transitions just didn't work. This is my only complaint, and it may be more than just a minor issue but it sure as hell didn't detract from the incredible composition.

All in all, fantastic work. I'm highly impressed.

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SCORE: 9/10

SilverPoyozo responds:

Yes exactly, when I first heard her original version the harmony just screamed 'jazzy' to me.

Well, that happened due to the lack of time and especially my lack of skill with beats, I planned on making the transition smoother with some drums.Plus, I intended for the song to be a bit longer, so the first section would make more sense...but still I'm glad you enjoyed it.
Thanks for the review.