Step's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Stranded]

Hey, as promised here's that review :3. Pretty solid track overall, although upon analysis this has lots of room for improvement...

So, starting off with my favourite part of orchestral music; composition. I'm hearing some good ideas and potential here. I like your approach to the melodies and how you keep everything sounding so unified with a static chord progression, gradual progressions and the repetition of that pretty cool 0:39 motif at 2:02 and 2:41. Your composition is good and well-structured, and that's inarguably an important thing to have in this genre.

Unfortunately the bad news about the composition is that it's very repetitive and frankly it's quite bland. Most of the time you repeat the same eight notes in consecutive order. Even worse than that is that each note lasts for exactly the same amount of time. It just feels very linear. This is something you can fix with practice. Your melody is flowing but only because it does the same thing a lot of the time and there's not much diversity. The trick to strong composition is to make it diverse and non-linear but STILL flowing.

The number one solution; dynamics. I'm not hearing many dynamics here. And while I love your gradual introduction of different elements that you do in the intro... other than that there's nothing so dynamic about this, which is the main reason why this sounds so linear. I would've loved to hear crescendos, grace notes, diminuendos, tempo changes, etc... there's a whole range of articulations you can do here. For example I can imagine a gradual crescendo working wonderfully to build up to 2:09, and if you made the song die down more audibly rather than just remove elements from the track towards the end it would've sounded so much more intricate.

Your instrumentation is pretty typical but it works well! I like the fact that you used bells, they're pretty underrated (even I don't use them much haha) but if done right they can really add to a piece. And you added some pretty bassy instruments in there, which was a pleasant surprise. I'm talking about the guitar at 0:26 and the double bass (I might be wrong about the instrument names but whatever, I'm hearing bass and that's what matters! :P). These filled up the low end very nicely.

You've got a pretty pleasant mix but nothing out of the ordinary. Your instruments are unfortunately pretty low quality, but I suppose there's not much you can do about that. Still, they're not too shabby, and I bet that if you added those aforementioned dynamics to your instruments they would sound so much more realistic and intricate. You could have the most amazing samples in the world but without going the extra mile to make everything sound realistic and dynamic, your samples will end up sounding almost MIDI-like, so it's a good idea to make it a habit to add lots of dynamics. Volume automations work really well for me, I use them like crazy to do stuff like fade in instruments, highlight sections, etc...

The two things I liked the most about this would be the intro and the drums. Your intro is just fantastic man. Perhaps a more booming bell sound followed by the gradual fading in of the high strings would've worked a bit better but still, you managed to achieve that cinematic sound by throwing in new instruments gradually. Great idea to play that little melody on the piano at the beginning too. A subtle but very effective touch.

And the drums! In a way they're kinda low quality/unrealistic and a bit too snappy but they work so well regardless. Cool beat, and I love your drum fills, especially the one at 2:39. The drums aren't the best they could be, but pretty darn good nevertheless. They added a wonderful amount of intensity, and they were nicely varied with good rhythms too. Not much to complain about, percussion-wise.

So yeah, overall this is a nice little piece. There are quite a few aspects where it needs improving, others where it does really well in, but hey that's all what practice is for right? Good luck in your future works man, and thanks again for leaving a review on Ecosystem!
6/10
5/5

stunkel responds:

Honestly, I don't know where to begin DX, that was an amazing review though. I think that I can definitely improve upon what you said if I make an effort to change those things. But amazing review, I hope you enjoy my future stuff and give reviews if you choose to do so :D. Again, thanks

5/5 stars for the review :3

[Istishhad]

This is an NGADM Round 3 Review.

--

And for the third time in a row you deliver a creative and new-sounding track unlike anything I've ever heard before in my life. Darn it, man. This is what I call creative.

First thing that I feel I should commend you on would be how GOOD this sounds when you're probably using soundfonts for stuff like the sitar and strings. Everything sounds so polished and well-mixed, and there's literally no indication at all that you're using soundfonts (unless you listen really closely). Really fantastic work; I believe that making generally low-quality samples sound so good is the mark of a fantastic musician. Speaking of which, your mixing is really good. I think some of the snares were a bit too 'penetrating' in the mix, as in they stood out too much and were too snappy, but that's probably personal preference. Fantastic bass, by the way! I can definitely feel the bass in certain parts, and it added a lot to the experience.

Your composition is nice as well. Nothing out of this world but I still enjoyed your melodies, especially those presented by the sitar. And I love that little motif you introduce on the sitar at the very beginning. You even played it one last time at the end. I feel that this was a great way to end the song, as if the song went in a full circle. To add to that, you've got plenty of elements from different styles of music like the string at 2:28 (still loving the sound of those strings, hard to believe they're soundfonts!) and the lead synth that you used. Awesome percussion too; BIG improvement from the percussion of your Round 2 track haha. Interesting usage of the hip-hop snare and the fast-paced tabla beats (or whatever those are), despite being subtle, worked SO well. Additionally the jaw harp was pretty much the most awesome thing I've heard in a fair amount of months.

The biggest issue of this track, I feel, lies in the fact that it gets pretty boring to listen to. There are lots of lengthy buildups and patterns that just repeat themselves without throwing in anything substantial to remain interesting. That, and the song really stays at a pretty low intensity level. I have nothing against tracks that don't have super amazing climaxes or anything but in this case it actually made the track uninteresting. Everything is very laid-back and slow, and I desperately wanted a very powerful and fast-paced part to come in and liven the track up a bit, but it never came.

This is also unfortunate because your mix is very sparse and roomy. You don't really fill it up with that many sounds, and while this can be a good thing because minimalistic music can work very well, here it just makes the song a bit of a drag to listen to. I would've loved it if you threw in stuff like choirs and cellos and more auxiliary percussion like shakers, more layers of bongos, etc... Thinking about it, this would work very well for background music, but since it's pretty empty with slow progressions and a lack of intensity, it does get a bit boring to listen to.

But heck, despite all that, this is still a fantastic submission with a lot of effort put into it. Great production, composition, sounds, etc... I love it.

--

SCORE:
7.5/10

RetromanOMG responds:

Thanks for the review. It was really fun making something this different, but, unfortunately, it did get a little hard to keep working on. I ultimately wrapped it up as fast as I could and wound up not putting any of the things I wanted to in it. I suppose I'll go back and put in the changes I wanted it to have at a later date, though.

[Alpine]

This is an NGADM Round 3 Review.

--

Well this is... different. Jazz infused with a soft DnB-like beat and subtle ambient pads. I never knew that could work out so well. Nice work dude!

You've got good composition. I very much enjoyed listening to the piano's melodies and the basslines were awesome too. However, it's not really the melodies that struck me as much as the atmosphere and mood you created. Everything is incredibly chill and has that trademark laid-back jazz feel while still sounding entirely unique. The instruments modestly deliver a fantastically revitalising listening experience. And that soft drum beat kept things going wonderfully. It's fast-paced but at the same time really light and fits perfectly in the background.

Production is nice too. Tasteful use of reverb and I absolutely love the piano-playing. I don't know if that's you playing or if it's just a VST but whatever the case it sounds very very real. Beautiful grace notes and broken chords, and I love how the notes aren't a static volume but occasionally the notes are soft and other times they're pretty hard-hitting. It's a subtle touch that really added to the flow, I feel. Mix is crystal clear, I can't complain about that. I would've personally made the bass a bit bassier (or maybe I'm just feeling that way because the particular bassline you made goes to relatively high notes). Otherwise I think your mix is really really good.

Now unfortunately I'm struggling to actually mention much about the track because there isn't much TO mention. It's fantastic, and there are no glaringly obvious flaws anywhere (except that maybe the 0:54 cymbal roll being too loud but that's too minor for me to even care mentioning), but it's very underdeveloped, falling into the very same trap that your Round 2 submission fell into. Don't get me wrong, everything sounds nice. But it just feels like it doesn't go anywhere. This is quite a recurring flaw in NGADM submissions since the 2-week deadline is unforgiving and for some people (me for sure haha) it's too little to make a full track without cutting corners, but nevertheless I can't not let it affect your score. I would have loved to see this more fleshed out.

It even sounds kinda empty since the pads are so far off in the background, the drum beat is fairly repetitive and the piano, which takes the compositional spotlight for most of the track, doesn't have such captivating melodies anyway. The focus was clearly more on creating that amazing atmosphere because I'm not hearing much melody development at all. It almost sounds like improv and if it wasn't for your fantastic production skills and atmosphere/mood, I probably wouldn't have enjoyed this nearly as much.

So yeah that's my two cents on it. It needs to be more developed since it's pretty short and empty as it is. But nevertheless you have good composition/atmosphere, and fantastic production value. For a journey into a new genre such as this, I can't say I'm not impressed.

--

SCORE:
8/10

BlazingDragon responds:

Thanks for the awesome reviews. I really, really appreciate them!

What was strange about this piece was how naturally it came. It's a different genre than any of my other work, but it happened without much thought. I just sort of felt it and made it happen.

I played the piano part on a MIDI Controller using the miniGrand softsynth with Protools. The piece was made at the community college I go to, and the software there is way better than what I have at home.

The whole piece was essentially improvised. I found that pad and started laying down chords as they came to me. Then I improv'd a piano line over the top. Then bass, etc. I used the quantize tool to take make rhythms squeaky clean, so I can't claim to play piano that flawlessly. :p

You are absolutely right about the piece not going anywhere. I actually planned this to be 4 minutes and had the intended structure plotted out. There was to be a B section, bridge, rendition of the A section, and an outro. I wrote down exactly how many each of those measure would be and everything. I ran out of time though and had to stop where I was. I even wanted to lower that cymbal volume but didn't have time! Another class was entering the MIDI lab, so I had to immediately export the project and stop where I was. -_- I'm thinking of finishing this and using a gritty hammond organ in place of the pad during the B section.

I'm planning to branch out into more genres in the future (albeit with hints of my melodic piano style) and am glad this experiment worked out. Thanks again for the review! :)

[Symphony (GB)]

This is an NGADM Round 3 Review.

--

You know, in some aspects your track and Waterflame's are pretty similar! Both your tracks are upbeat, cleverly written and extremely fun to listen to, and both have a similar issue, but I'll get to that later. This is really darn awesome man. You're one of the best electro house producers on Newgrounds IMO.

May as well start with your production because it's absolutely incredible. Again, you brickwall the track like crazy but I'm not hearing any compression issues and everything is crystal clear... it doesn't seem like as much of a problem as it was in your Round 2 track to be honest. Everything is so clear and punchy. I honestly expect this kind of professional-tier production from mainstream artists. It's absolutely and undeniably brilliant. And your sounds are pretty darn awesome too. Each one was distinct from the rest and was mixed in really well. And this time the vocals actually sing something instead of shout random syllables, so that was a nice change. Not a fan of the heavy autotune but meh, that's just me.

Moreover your composition is just badass. It's not often you hear the blues scale in this kind of music, so I'll admit that was a pretty pleasant surprise! It sounds a bit unfitting I'll admit, but hey it's a step in a different direction from the usual mainstream stuff whose repetitive melodies don't venture outside the space of 3 semitones. I kinda like it and I'll admit that it's really catchy. This is just so fun to listen to. It's bouncy, upbeat, and it's got solid transitions. I quite like the transition at 2:00. It's incredibly abrupt, but damn it works so well.

However, the main issue that your track and Waterflame's both share is the fact that this is pretty monotonous, and while it didn't annoy me as much in Waterflame's track, it gets a bit obnoxious here. Once you think about it this only has one melody. That's it. No counter melodies or anything (except the vocal melody but in all honesty that isn't anything special). And other than that melody there are the parts at 1:00 and 3:00 that don't actually have a coherent melody I can follow.

I mean, they were produced so well, but they got very tiring to listen to (and the brickwalling didn't help). Your other tracks weren't as tiring because they had some more melodic variety to them but this just feels more monotonous than the others. I would suggest adding some more breaks, and maybe throwing in some different melodies, since you repeat the main melody many times to the point that it gets very predictable.

That's my only problem with the track. You lost one point because of it, but otherwise this is absolutely amazing. You're an incredible artist and I've added you to my favourite artists list because of it. Keep it up dude.

--

SCORE: 9/10

GrantBowtie responds:

Thanks so much step it was a good run and you were super helpful throughout the whole thing : )

[Omniwitch]

This is an NGADM Round 3 Review.

--

The same jazz rock metal crap huh? Well, I think crap is the last thing it is. As usual, you impress the hell out of me with your superior hold on composition, amazing mixing and skilful guitar playing. However, unfortunately, compared to your other submissions this isn't really on-par, and that reflects in the score I'm giving you this round.

Well, starting with the good news, your production is out of this world. I actually think that despite everything, this has the best production from all your competition submissions so far. I'm hearing similar mixing choices to those of your older submissions but this has a very clear mix with virtually no compression issues at all. And those drums! Fantastic; you managed to achieve a wonderfully good punch from your drums. Fantastic bass too. And on top of that you've got amazing guitar playing, and it makes me regret quitting guitar haha. In those aspects your song certainly excelled, in my opinion.

Your composition, in most aspects, is as usual very very good. I absolutely loved your chord choices and your wacky composition just makes everything sound so unique. You manage to achieve some pretty amazing atmospheres too, especially in the intro, at 2:22, and towards the end. And there are some really really cool parts like the piano solo that appears somewhere in the latter half of the track (which I absolutely adored) and the ride cymbal pattern at 5:26. I love how the song goes into a relaxed and chilled atmosphere at 3:44 too. And even though the guitar's the main instrument throughout, you throw in plenty of different sounds in there that really buff up the composition and atmosphere, such as the pad at 4:26.

However, this suffers the exact same problem as your Round 2 submission; it's probably even worse this time round. I'm hearing some compositional components that occur more than once throughout the track that help to tie the music together, like the melody at the beginning which you repeat again at the very end (or maybe I'm just imagining stuff) but unfortunately the song is just too chaotic. It's playing one thing one minute and another thing the next. The different sections in the music are very audibly different. It's like you've got absolutely incredible music skills but you're not using them to make something coherent and unified.

And it doesn't stop there. Some of your transitions were a little off and disrupted the flow. And some just didn't make any sense at all. Like at 5:26, you're playing that chilled ride cymbal pattern, and then bam at 5:31 some guitar shredding comes in. As much as I love the fact that this is so unpredictable and therefore it provides a really exciting and intense listening experience, it can get too unpredictable to the point that it isn't coherent at all and doesn't make sense. And the ending is bad... or rather lack thereof. It just ends like "right, I'm done here" and stops. Again, this doesn't make much sense to me.

Your amazing production and ridiculously good guitar playing and composition saved your score this round, because if you weren't so incredible at those you'd probably have gotten something like a 6.5 from me. You're a really really good musician but this song's a bit of a miss for me, compared to your other works.

--

SCORE:
8/10

Kor-Rune responds:

Agreed, this was super scattered brained, I'm not happy with it either. I keep trying to cram so many ideas in one track, and it can't be ten minutes or longer since I've only got the two weeks to make it. I just need to write shorter and more tied-together tracks, and not be so bound on being technical and goofy. My transitions are so abrasive and uncomfortable, I'll try and work on that. And the two week deadline kind of decided that outro.. XD I realize I can't do these things in two weeks. I gotta chill

Thank you for the fantastic review, I appreciate it! C:

[Nice to Meet You Here]

This is an NGADM Round 2 Review.

--

Sorry for the late review delivery! Your song was pretty much at the bottom of the list and I've got lots of stuff to do so it's been hard getting through all the reviews. The NGADM may be tough on you competitors but it's tough on us judges too! :P

So yeah. I'll start off stating the obvious. The melodies are fantastic, or at least the melodies in the first half of the song. They are honestly gorgeous. I love the melody at 0:20 to bits and the way you highlight it with that string passage at 0:39 is just genius. The perfect fifth interval is my favourite interval and I'm hearing lots of that over here so maybe that's why I like the composition here so much haha. But yeah, very good composition. Your sounds also sound pretty good with each other this time, unlike in Round 1 where the mix was basically a blob.

And you actually made an effort to humanise it this time. I'm hearing plenty of slight variations in timing mainly during the intro. Now that is what I'm talking about! I don't know if you did it on purpose or it was just a result of rushing to get this done (which would be ironic because it actually made the track sound better) but whatever the case I'm sure you hear the instant improvement, realism-wise. I swear that if I didn't know otherwise I'd almost think the harp at the beginning is recorded from an actual harp. Cool bird-chirping at the beginning too.

Now for what I dislike about this. As I'm sure you know, the first half of this track is the one that's actually worth listening to. You might've in fact noticed that all of the compliments I had for this track were confined to the first half. The second half really isn't that good as you know. The strings in the second half are just... bleh. Weird, and they have these super unnatural stops.

Some transitions were quite abrupt too, like the transition to the piano part. The piano part in itself was pretty ugly too since while, as usual, you had good melodies, the piano sound was unrealistic and odd-sounding. Don't get me wrong, your melodies towards the end were fine, but the strings are clearly very rushed. And, of course, your samples in general sound pretty bad. I certainly commend you on actually making them fit well with each other now and making them sound realistic, but unfortunately, apart from the harp and to an extent the birdsong, you don't really have such good sounds. You are one of the people on Newgrounds who, I believe, deserve my East/West samples more than I do haha.

Overall, this is actually an improvement over your Round 1 submission in certain aspects. You're a super talented composer and maybe if you had more time you would've really turned this into something amazing. I'm almost tempted to steal your melodies here :3. We should totally collab sometime. And I hope your health issues are gone now!

*is happy that he finally finished all the NGADM Round 2 reviews*

--

SCORE: 6.5/10

CheckeredZebra responds:

Heehee, thanks! Your review made me smile. The intro's "humanized" tempo changes were purposeful, but it made everything after it a bit hellish to record. I had to play the piano in such a way that it would get back on beat and AUGHRA ;=; it's such a pain.

And yeah, as you can tell, I use default for everything. I only own software; nothing else. No sound plug-ins or anything, as I can't figure out how to use them.
Getting in depth with how the whole "improving the sounds of the instruments" aspect of said software...well, I have no idea how to do that, and those free tutorials are above my head, haha. I'm going to try and wrangle some legit college level lessons on mixing, and see where I can go from there. Without such knowledge, I don't think fancy VSTs would help much. XD
(I can do some decent stuff with Sibelius' limited abilities, but it's because everything is up front and easy.)

As for collabing, that would be fun. However, upon file transfer, you'd be like "WTF is this person doing." Heheheh.

[We are now in orbit]

This is an NGADM Round 2 Review.

--

While I don't think this is nearly as good as your Round 1 submission, this is some really neat stuff! Nice work, I'm impressed.

You know, you've got a really awesome habit of taking really little melodic motifs and developing them brilliantly throughout your track. I've never seen it done as well as you do it. That small melodic phrase at the beginning was pretty much the main melody of the whole track but it never got repetitive despite its length because you develop it so well and use it sparingly and resourcefully. And you've got plenty of other really interesting melodic elements such as the alternate melodies on the harp and the part at 4:11. You effortlessly juggle different melodies around to create something fantastically coherent and structured.

Your atmosphere is great too. As BrokenDeck mentioned, there's a very obvious eeriness and space-like atmosphere to this track that makes it so fun to listen to and incredibly easy to visualise something when listening to the music. Transitions were as smooth as ice and I loved both your outro and intro. Your outro wasn't anything special but it still worked well and your intro is just incredible man. I adore that intro. And all those reversed sounds you added gave a lot to the atmosphere. Cool mixing too, nice and clear.

Unfortunately, the primary problem here lies in the fact that your drums are absolutely awful. Sorry to point it out so bluntly but your drum line doesn't work at all. I'm talking about the one at 2:18 mainly. It's repetitive, easily gets annoying and your samples don't sound that nice at all (except that clap thing which comes in at 2:17... that sounds pretty awesome).

The drums were pretty dry and bland overall. I didn't mind the 4-on-the-floor beats but to be honest it's not that hard to mess those up haha. Some of your sounds are also pretty bland and unfitting, such as the sound that comes in at around 0:25. It just doesn't fit with the atmosphere as well as it could've. I was looking for more echoing and reverbed sounds and lush pads to compliment a song like this and I'm really confused why you went for a different approach with more dry, raw-sounding synths.

I'm glad you made it into the competition this year because you're seriously proving to be a worthy competitor. A few issues here and there make me lower your score but none of these aren't fix-able with a bit of work and they're not big enough to really ruin the track. Keep it up dude.

--

SCORE:
8/10

RetromanOMG responds:

Thank you for your thoughts on this song. I understand that I could have made a better choice with the percussion, but I am glad that everything else worked from your perspective.

Well, back to work on Round 3, I guess.

[Descent (MSB)]

This is an NGADM Round 2 Review.

--

Dude, you're really aiming to impress for this competition. Every track of yours has pristine production, great sounds... it's all so well-made. It's hard finding anything wrong with them.

What I think I liked most about this track is the fact that despite having its generic elements in it, such as the very very typical beat, the transition from 1:33 - 1:48, some typical sounds like that house pad thing that first shows up in the background at 1:04, etc... you use them right and execute them very skilfully. You make them work really well like they're supposed to.

On top of that, despite all these clearly mainstream and generic elements, this still offers a fairly unique listening experience. Unlike most people who use these generic elements simply because they're uncreative and want to add something to their track which they know will sound decent, you actually do creative stuff with this track, and so it ends up sounding pretty unique!

You've also got great production, as is the case in both your Round 1 and your audition piece. There was one aspect of the production I didn't quite like but I'll mention that later on. Basically your production is brilliant. Everything is so clear and each sound is mixed very well. This is seriously a professional-quality mix, I swear. You put in tonnes of pretty small details here and there that make this track just ear-candy to listen to, such as all those occasional breaks and that little disco-like hit at 2:08/2:16. Great sounds too, and on a smaller note, you've got a good intro and outro too!

My primary issue with this track is most likely personal preference but anyway... There just seems to be too much over-compression man. This seems mastered to be thrown on the radio or something, rather than for actual listening, since it's brickwalled nastily. Sure, there are no audible clipping noises or compression issues (which is the mark of brilliant mastering skills) but despite that everything is so over-compressed and loud that I've got to turn my volume down just to hear this track at the right volume. More than that, it makes everything just blare out so much, especially the lead synths (which could be where BrokenDeck is coming from on the lead synth being too present). It just makes this pretty tiring to listen to after a while.

Overall, I'm very impressed with this. I docked half a point for the over-compression which was most likely intentional anyway, and even then it's probably just me. This is profession-quality music and I can't wait to hear what you cook up for Round 3!

--

SCORE:
9.5/10

GrantBowtie responds:

Wow thank you so much for such an in-depth review and it's so awesome that you liked it so much!

[-conclusion-]

This is an NGADM Round 2 Review.

--

You've got an awesome habit of making these really long and good songs with a tonne of energy in them. And 8 hours? Damn, something like this'd take me at least 20!

What I liked in this track would be that you've actually got some really good ideas here, both melodic and structural. You communicate them very very well with the fantastically skilful production one can expect from you as well, and the cool sounds you've used are just icing to the cake. You've just developed your own unique style so much that I seriously think one of the genres in the genre listings should be 'Waterflame'. I can't really throw this into any genre (except maybe Video Game) because you throw in many different elements, and best of all, these actually fit with each other.

Never have I heard orchestral elements fitting so well with such clear trance-like elements. Your orchestral sounds weren't out of this world in terms of realism but you've got good enough mixing for me to let that slide. The strings sounded great (although perhaps a bit too heavy in the lower mids which sounds quite clear at parts like 2:42) and I like your use of orchestral cymbals in particular. You used them like crazy but they didn't get annoying. Your flute could've sounded better if it was a bit brighter and breathier, though. By the way, I love your breakbeat.

That said, this song has some issues scattering about that really lower your score. For starters, despite being original and going for a trance/orchestral hybrid like this (which I admit you did very well) you've got some compositional ideas that are very unoriginal. I'm saying this mainly because you use an incredibly overused chord progression which makes all of the trance melodies you have sound cheesy and like I've heard them before.

On top of that... this sounds kinda rushed. I'm not saying that because you said it only took eight hours but I honestly think it sounds rushed. The mix here just doesn't seem as polished as it was in your Round 1 submission. I mean it's still better than average, but in a lot of parts it sounds pretty unclear (especially when the orchestral samples are playing). The woodwind especially is underpowered and drowned out. Also, the ending is very abrupt and unfitting. It was a good approach but executed poorly.

Overall, this is a very energetic and enjoyable track. It feels pretty rushed and not as polished and intricate as your Round 1 submission but nevertheless it's a considerably badass piece of work!

--

SCORE:
8/10

Waterflame responds:

Thank you for all the kind words and the constructive criticim! this really helps me get a prespective over the song, and i see the errors bright as day. i feel im learning so fast this year :D and ill definatly take this advice seriously. thank you for the great review!

[Child of the Trough NGADM]

This is an NGADM Round 2 Review. When I wrote this review it was before you added vocals so I'm judging this on the old version.

--

Before I start I'll say that mixing and melody-wise I think you managed to trump your Round 1 submission. You're a fantastic composer man, you write great melodies like it's nothing haha. Sounds great.

You've got a tonne of wacky composition here man and it all sounds incredible. I'm hearing many different influences, such as jazz throughout various parts of the track, funk at 2:01, lounge music at 2:39, blues at 3:29, metal at 4:33, etc... This makes for an incredibly diverse experience that never ever becomes in the slightest bit monotonous or uninteresting. Every time I hear this track I hear a new song section I wasn't paying attention to as much in previous listens. It's long but keeps the interest maintained the whole time. Fantastic work.

On top of that, this track has plenty of amazing production value and feels extremely sophisticated both production and composition-wise. First off, your guitar playing is amazing and everything is perfectly on time and pitch. On top of that, you've got loads of amazing harmonies and everything fits wonderfully with each other. Everything is crystal clear in the mix and you make good use of the entire frequency spectrum. I absolutely adore some of the melodies like the melodies at 2:18 and 3:29.

Unfortunately, I find this track a disappointment from your Round 1 track for one primary reason; this lacks a direction. As much as I enjoyed the diversity, there are no recurring motifs or themes. The song just switches from one song section to another without any distinguishable form of approach. I mean one second it's playing one style, the next it turns into a totally different and seemingly unrelated section. And none of the sections really have anything to do with each other.

The transitions are on the whole good, don't get me wrong. A lot of your transitions are extremely commendable since you switch from one genre to another in an almost entirely natural way. That's not my problem though. The track just doesn't feel united. Chemicals had similar changes in style but it felt more united because it wasn't to the extent that this is, and that track also had vocals that really helped bring the whole track together, while this is lacking vocals. I'm not saying the fact that it's lacking vocals is a problem, I'm saying that maybe vocals will help tie everything together. That, and some recurring motifs.

Anyway, that's about it. Fantastic work, you're a seriously incredibly musician. If this track had more of a direction and felt more unified then I would've probably given this full marks!

--

SCORE:
9/10

Kor-Rune responds:

Thank you for your review! I DEFINITELY agree with how scatter-brained and random this track was! I was frustrated writing it because I know multiple genres can share a similar theme. A band like Haken is one I take a lot of influence from, and they can dance around metal, jazz, rock, and polka like nothing, all while keeping similar themes. They also like to go off the wall, but they keep their integrity about the heart of the song. As Skye said, it's more of a technical display.

The vocals on it right now suck, so I'll probably do more later. But for now, it's about the next track for NGADM, fuck. XD