ADR3-N's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[The Beach Looks Pretty Today]

This piece sounds like a lot of the same elements looped throughout. I've been there. You run out of ideas so you find a structure and copy and paste what you have that works. What's lacking to tie all of it together is transition sweeps and an overarching melody, like you added at 2:40.

I think for as homogenous as the piece is, you could actually make it shorter and not hurt it much. Your outro isn't bad.

For the drums, they have no problem standing out. I would actually recommend taking down the hihat somewhat. It's a bit loud for me, and probably finding different samples/drum kit.

I have recommendations for samplers and free instruments: Sforzando, musescore instruments (can be ripped out of musescore and used in sforzando, and they are noice), Salamander drum kit, MT power drum kit, Meowsynth, delay lama, KSHMR essentials kick, Diablo lite by cymatics, and a lot of other freebies you can find in my news posts.

There's also a great channel called Signals Music Studios if I remember correctly where you can study music theory, songwriting, and song structure. Highly recommend it. It's for guitar players but the material is E for everyone.

Beyond that, keep it up! You're making great progress.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[AlphezoPlay - Tesseract (Growls & Guitars)]

This is a fantastic idea hampered by lots and lots of reverb. It reminds me a lot of the Dragon's Dogma intro from forever ago.

Great shifts in style and transitions. Your growls are tasty bois. We're starting to get into clipping territory at 1:40 and sound as if we're in a tin can. Watch your overall loudness as you mix.

Chords are also fantastic.

I have a hard time hearing your percussion at all at 2:18. Your percussion and growls should be the loudest part of your track. However, I think there is too much reverb to differentiate much of anything by 2:45 except your guitar and the growls.

The low end fuzz I'm hearing is drowning all of that out -- what I hear at 00:23 seconds, is what it sounds like is creating all that mud, and it's VERY loud. Lots of sub frequencies and 250 hz. I hear it again fading toward 2:52.

I think there's reverb on your kick too that is not gated.

When I turn the volume up higher I hear a bit clearer but I shouldn't have to do that. Try mixing with the volume turned down to about half of what you are used to or even lower. Mix that way, then try again on higher volume.

All of these mix criticisms said, you've done a wonderful job on your composition, and I am particularly wowed by the timbre of your growls. Tasty, tasty, tasty. Rhythms are noice. Even the cheaper sounding synths have their place. It's just the mix that distracts from all these wonderful elements. I recommend saving this piece to revisit at a later date. Great work!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[Hotline Miami : SHOGANAI - Rolling Punches]

When this started I wondered if I'd have to change the genre from DnB to hiphop. This seems to be a slick fusion of both.

Your breaks are very nice and clean. I would bring up the bite on the snare, as it seems to be hiding in the mix, OR take the cymbals down a bit, reduce the volume of your lead by a small amount, and decrease reverb on all tracks. I hear just a bit of mud.

The kick is hard to hear. May need a little help with soft clipping (can be done in percussion processors like DIABLO or KSHMR Essentials, of which there are free versions) or you can adjust EQ/volume to taste

I'm not a massive fan of the bass. It's very soft and doesn't seem to grow or change a lot, either in rhythm or timbre. You may try if you'd like to keep the same overall sound a switch to MeowSynth bass, run it through a chorus and distortion/amp FX as you like, and LFO modulate various parameters like chorus and noise to make it do weird things. I discovered it by accident myself in my own work LUCY

Your structure is nice and cohesive, easy to follow, and everything fits together nicely, nothing obtrusive or distracting. Great work!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[Millnnium]

The beginning gives me the feeling of almost listening to it with my headphones off. May be a bit centered -- check that out.

The sub popping at 00:26 threw me off a bit.

Interesting low and hi pass play here. I think just a little less of that and the transitions will be perfect. Less dramatic slow passes.

I would probably not octave double very much on the end of your first drop. Some of the lower frequencies in the doubled melody are clashing a bit with the bass.

At 2:13-2:19 there is a small amount of clipping

I'm having a hard time picking out your kick and snare despite heavy sidechain. Make sure they are audible!

Your progression and arrangements are fun to parse through, and the track is interesting as a whole for it. It never really gets old. I would however check that you don't get too tinny like before 3:00 and around 3:08 for too long.

At 3:20 the sub and low mid range seems to be a bit much. I want to hear the head of that bass. Distortion or saturation can help with that.

At 3:40 I would like to hear less reverb on that string synth and a bit quieter presentation.

Overall with some cleaning of reverbs and low end frequencies, I think this track is great. A good test for clarity is to play your track at a low volume, then a high volume, and see how that affects your mixing judgements.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[Tempest]

Great rain sample in the beginning and transition out of that.

Your composition is fantastic. I recommend doubletracking that guitar-like synth to the left and right; you may use two different instruments and slightly different amps to achieve a wider feel.

Your 808 is a bit loud in the sub range. Recommend turning down the sub so as not to drown out other elements of the track. In fact I might sub it out for a saturated saw instrument entirely. If you are partial to the sine, up the volume somewhat and turn down the very low frequencies manually with EQ. The rest of the track is simply not loud enough to support it.

The section at 2:20 is beautiful. Turn down rain very slightly. Possibly pan it around or add in other whooshy FX to taste. I trust your judgement.

We resume for a chorus at 3:12 with the same aforementioned issues, until 3:27 when we get into a nice synth line. UwU

I have a hard time picking out your kick drum. May process it with something like KSHMR Essentials Kick.

The next section through 4:20 blew my mind for a hit second, even with such minimal arrangement. I would not use the sub bass so high up and may switch to a more subtle instrument, or bring it down one octave.

The drum kit here is very slightly getting on my nerves, as it doesn't do your writing justice. For one, I would turn it up a notch. For two, the velocities on the hi-hats stand out as either not very sensitive or almost all the same. Shop for some free drum kits or samples and see what happens.

You may also benefit for writing each and every part of the drum kit to a different track and apply various FX and processing to them, again to your taste.

Solo at 5:30 is SLAPPING. Could use some delay, reverb, panning, chorus, etc to your tastes. It just sounds like it's laying on top of the track in the center. Particularly obvious when it's soloed. Beyond that though, it is so well played that I don't care too much. Just a little sensitive atmospheric touch would bring it from noice to epic.

The track itself is quiet and would benefit from a free internet master or your own hand at compression on the master channel -- OR just using the amplify effect in Audacity.

All in all, very nice cohesive piece, limited seemingly only what your software and mixing can at present do. Save this and other works of the same quality for a rainy day, when you can revisit them and bring your vision to life. It's fabulous.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

Aardvark04 responds:

Hey thank you so much for the review! I fully agree with all of your feedback and greatly appreciate how constructive it is.

[Daze]

Sounds like some nice transitions going here into our intro, with those combed frequencies. I'm nervous about overcompression/sausage fattening -- I think that's what's happening at 0:50 to your kick and the depth of your track. Try a lower input volume before touching the master channel. It's definitely soft clipping.

I can definitely hear the sub on your bass prior to the drop but it gets lost with the heavy compression later.

There isn't a whole lot to say about composition, as the track is fairly simple. It almost sounds like two of the same track with an A and B arrangement.

I would take down your stabs by a couple dB, and probably also those 8th notes up in the high register. It's very hard to hear your leads.

The strongest point of this track is your two intros and transitions into your drops. Beyond that compression is so hard that it's hard to pick out the textures. I do really enjoy the writing of your bass. It's light and and at the same time hits like a sledgehammer. Just wish I could hear its full character!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[Insert title here. Song made with computer]

Really interesting track with tons of smooth chords. It's hard for me to pick out the overall structure.

Listen to the reverb tail at the end of your track. There are a lot of overlapping frequencies. I think applying a gate or shortening the reverb tail would benefit the intelligibility of your song.

I really enjoy the stabs at 0:47. I think they're great, nice chords, very grooveable.

I can't really hear your cymbals well in the background. Your hihat is a bit loud relative to the rest of the track.

The transition at 0:36 I think should be longer and more obviously build into your next chorus -- this is what I was talking about with song structure. You have lots of great ideas here but I'm not entirely able to follow them beyond that lovely chorus.

I think a found-sound type snare with an overtone of a Bb5/A#5 would go nicely on beat 4 where you have that hihat hitting.

The track itself is short. Personally I could listen to your chorus for 3 minutes straight. Nice little club vibe, super relaxed. I think what hampers you from doing that is your transitions. They're a bit short, sometimes less than two measures. I could hear that beginning at 0:04 up to 4 times for atmospheric purposes.

With reverse crashes and so on, this point might become moot. You could signal transitions with whooshing crescendos and FX. If you lack those kinds of samples, check out Bedroom Producer's Blog. Tons of gems there.

Throughout I'm having a hard time hearing what I think is supposed to be an 808, and there seems to be residual noise from your stabs hanging out in that low middle piano register.

Other than that, I was having a rough day, and listening to this chilled me straight out. There's definitely something to be said for that.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

Aalasteir responds:

Thank you. I appreciate the feedback.

[Goam]

Oh this feels olskool. I dig it. Remembering when I didn't have anything but a sampler to work with.

I think that distorted bass can come down a dB or two.

Before I dive in, I want to say that I LOVE this kind of music. If you keep improving your mixing and sound design, I see a wonderful future for you as a very creative electronic music producer. This is raw and out of the box. I don't have a ton of tips for you, as the track is quite minimal, but having said this I will now listen again and do a more thorough pass.

I really enjoy the chopped guitar samples. On the same note, they give great atmosphere. I would recommend for lower octaves you have a separate track with low tuned guitar samples. I also recommend learning to double track with samples.

Doubletracking - two tracks, one panned 100% left, one panned 100% right, playing the same or very similar melodic content (and may include different FX like different amps and EQ) to give the illusion of a fuller sound. It's used in rock and metal for the rhythm guitar, where usually the guitarist will play the stuff twice and pan one take L and one R, with slightly different settings.

YOU on the other hand can just find two samples of guitar chops (if it's not the same note, you can change the pitch in the sampler) to make this illusion. I think it'd sound really cool here.

For your bass, I would not actually choose that note at 0:32, at least without writing a moving bass line. I'd pick the tonic (usually the bass note) of the guitar chords you're working with, just to keep it simple. Some other instrument can play that nice little dissonant note there.

I'd like if that section with the bass was repeated elsewhere like a chorus -- learning to write with a song structure will speed your development drastically as a producer btw, highly recommend.

I like your kick but I'm having a hard time hearing it over your bass. I think it would sound nice if sidechain was applied. I'm missing snares, hi-hats, and cymbals/transition FX.

Those spoopy melodies toward the end are SICK and really tie your piece together. Will be stuck in my head!

-----

This concludes the actual review portion

I don't know whether you're working with a PC or mobile app given the track complexity. However I have some recommendations for you for free synths and samples, which I will try to list here.

Free drums: Elsita soviet drum machine, MT Power Drum kit (super simple rock kit), Adreanaline sample pack (in my news posts), Bedroom Producer's blog has tons

Free FX: KSHMR Essentials Kick -- for processing percussion essentially all at once, DIABLO Lite by Cymatics, also for percussion

Free synths: MeowSynth can do crazy shit if you check my track LUCY. I'm sure you can figure out how to do more with it if you can make samplers sound this good. I also recommend Basic65 which is a commodore 64 synth

Free mastering: Soundcloud mastering, Bandlab, Music gateway

Hope you find something here to chew on. I'm excited to see what you come up with in the future.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

AVKid4 responds:

Oh wow, jesus man thank you so much! That's all incredibly helpful

[Liquid Lullaby]

I may have a bit of hearing loss, but it sounds like the left channel is a bit heavier than the right.

As a composition, this is wonderful, coherent, and pleasant to listen to! I may have some qualms with mix choice or instruments, particularly the bells, but other than that your talent and knowledge of music theory is clear to see. :)

I will dive now into nitpicking below.

First item of nitpicking -- overall volume. I think a free internet mastering service could be of great help here, or if you are not a fan, apply compression to your taste before you mix down your track. Audacity will also allow you to amplify an MP3 just under the point of damaging clipping, if you prefer no compression at all (and that's perfectly okay)

The piano is somewhat muffled in comparison to the ride bells coming in your intro. If you desire them to be that way, I would bring up the volume. I also think the leads through 1:06 are a bit loud. I would take them down by up to 1.3 dB. I hear an octave hiding underneath the lead around 36 seconds to 1:00 and on. Might be two octaves. You could either bring that out and pan it, or layer it in the same octave. I think it should sound better to bring it in on for a final chorus, where it is not hiding, as I can hear the lead cut off, and the accompaniment hold the same note for half a second longer.

The piece itself has great choices in instrumentation and arrangement. No complaints there. It manages to sound both classic, somehow Christmasy, and belonging to a cheery videogame/anime shopping scene at the same time. However it is quite mid heavy and low-mid heavy on the mix, leading to a boxy sound. I want to hear some more of that 8k-18k!

I think close to the outro, the high bass clashes somewhat with the rest of the arrangement 1:45

You could bring that bass down there, or bring it down one octave. One thing I notice, the bass seems to have some formant shifting going on, as well as a delay, and sounds very, very soft on the attack -- is that a frequency comb or bit crush that I'm hearing? I think those would sound much nicer without any delay or reverb of any kind, to just let your bass unapologetically be itself. You want as little noise muddying those low frequencies as possible, or each time you hop to another note, you're going to get clashing frequencies.

All the considerations I mentioned above would bring the bottom end more to the forefront and vary the timbre more. You may also try bringing the sub down in volume. I notice that also is quite loud relative to the "head" of the bass, and it makes the rest of the track sound out of balance. To get more presence out of a bass you can experiment with distortion/amps.

Your percussion could use a bit of a facelift with some light transient shaping -- kick/snare. The cymbals would benefit from playing with width. You may also play with humanization on those velocities a bit more and thin out the lower mid range on what seems to be functioning as a ride cymbal at 1:28. It's quite loud relative to the bells you have going on. Personally I would take it down and crescendo all the way through 1:59, maybe with slow motion panning around, because motion is everything.

The bells on this section, while adding Christmas spirit, are muddying into each other, making individual rhythms on the same key hard to hear. Playing with accents, reducing reverb and reverb length, and decluttering the piano roll of multiple notes can help with that. You may also take the harmony you want and move it to a separate instance of the instrument with slightly different panning. I use this trick frequently.

I think your crashes could actually use long reverb tails and the occasional reverse crash leading up to them for transitions. I'm super fond of that and think it would work wonders for the big transitions in your piece to make them more dramatic.

As I listen more and more, I start to focus on your kick. I'm not sure if you designed it yourself -- have you considered tuning your kick to the tonic of your track, and tuning the sub? You can accomplish the first with a simple guitar tuner plugin and the pitch wheel of your sampler, if used. Following that, KSHMR Essentials Kick would be a nice quick fix to choose a sub note, fix transients, widen, etc, to your liking. It seems boxy in the 250 hz range to me.

The snare by itself does not sound bad but seems to be having issues cutting through. A little more processing would probably do the trick, focusing on transient shaping, saturation, bit crush, width, clipping... You may also think to tune your snare accordingly.

Overall, it's a great listen, a very whimsical, fun piece to sift through. I really enjoyed it.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

314leafcutterant responds:

Thank you for this very in depth review. I'll try to implement some of your ideas in my future work. Do you think I'll make it past the tryouts?

[MAKE ME]

First of all, the album cover is fire.

Second of all, I was not expecting a sausage case file to sound anything but offensive. It's hard to really hear the bass on smaller speakers, but it's audible on my headphones. That may be the industrial elements -- it's very much an acquired taste.

I love the chords used and the leads aren't half bad. I would take down the initial spreaded pitch bending instruments down a dB or two. Occasionally they sound to me like a malfunctioning ambulance siren. I think more sparing use of these would give the composition more variety.

Considering it's a genre fusion that I tend not to listen to, and my first thought was Grips, it is certain to be enjoyed by someone out there. I would recommend more taming of your low frequencies prior to applying distortion, and emphasizing high mids. Make sure everything cuts through before dirtying it up, essentially. I'm also a fan of using distortion and saturation on every single track in the mix. There are tips and tricks to making things layer nicely. With an 808 and a kick running along similar frequencies, you'll want to do that or subtle sidechaining to achieve a "clean" chaos.

But this will certainly be an earworm of mine for a while. Even if it isn't my favorite, it's very catchy. I can only imagine someone who really enjoys the genres. They'll be overjoyed.

Also, thanks so much for listing your plugins in the descrip. I found another distortion I didn't have!