Azhthar's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Preach it, My Brotha]

Hmmm interesting... I have to say I like the main theme. It has a nice dark mood. I think some variations here and there would prevent it from getting to repitative after a while. When the drums start actually I have to regret I was completely surprised because they appear like they are not really in sync with the rest of the track... It´s nice that you are trying to be experimental with the percussion but in this case it just sounds as if something is wrong... Maybe check if you can quantisize this part? Later when the full beat starts it´s getting better. Also the drums in general (especially this "metal percussion thingy") are a bit loud in the mix washing out the rest of the instruments. The change towards middle is nice but if you would give the lead a bit more "punch" I think this would really suit this track. Anyway... Nice track with neat ideas which has some production flaws and could use a bit more variation at the beginning. Hope this was helpful since this isn´t really my genre...

SilverFoxJams responds:

Thanks a lot for the input. I greatly appreciate this. I'll be sure to do a better version of this sometime later.

I think I'm getting a BIT better with making my own beats now, in my current project, a very big one at that. I've played back several times and kept trying different placement things so I can get how I want it to sound like. It's tough though! Slowly but surely I'll get through it.

[The Concert]

Damn... if you really composed, programmed and mixed this within two days... Respect! Also: Nice piano performance! One theme you used (like in the horns at the end) actually reminded of something but I could not point my finger on it at the moment... Now I actually want to see the movie "Grand Piano" again, letting Elijah Wood playing this instead of the original music. The only thing which irritated me in this piece was the very close piano sound and it´s actually funny that I just read that Phonometrologist felt the same. It would suit this concert atmosphere if the piano sound would come from a bit more distance. Except, this is like meant to be from the perspective of the pianist (since the applause also appears from a bit more distance)... Anyway this doesn´t change anything about this great composition!

SoundChris responds:

Hey mate, thanks a lot for your kind words. Yeah - i had to compose it in that short time since i had a lot of unexpected problems this week. Nevertheless i am quite comfortable with the composition since i think the late romantical feel felt quite authentic. Its strange - the one theme also reminded me of something but i have no idea what it is. Somehow i was reminded of the italian belle canto style or arias. I really was thinking of creating a italian opera piece here since i am vocal trained in this field :D But my lov for the piano was too dominant to resist.

Hm i havent seen the movie the grand piano, but thanks a lot for mentioning it. I definitely will watch it! The close piano sound - yeah thats true. I had no oportunity to listen to the track on monitors anymore and on my headphones it seemed ok (but they are not really good). I will adjust that someday.

Thanks a lot for another very nice review of yours and beste Grüße in den Norden :D!

Machs gut und halt die Ohren steiff,
Chris

[The Mouse Went Up The Clock]

Nice that you went back to obscurity for this round! That piece is definitely highly imaginative and actually has a bit of that Burton/Elfman atmosphere. The most awesome part is the part with the creepy voice around 1:00... Afterwards the style changes a bit, which gives a nice contrast. Sometimes it appears a bit baroque to me and also reminds a bit of some 1960´s and 70´s italian giallo music. If you don´t know much Giallo or old italian horror film music, yet, you definitely will be able to find some awesome stuff there.
Can´t find much negative things here... Hope to hear more stuff like this in the next round! Good luck!

[Tranquillum]

Nice track which gives a happy feeling and has some kind of fantasy mood I would guess. Composition wise I have not much to criticise. It´s a beautiful melody and well arranged regarding the harmonies. The tambourine supports the fantasy mood by bringing some renessaince feeling. A thing which would improve this track a lot would be some velocity editing and humanizing of the instruments. Especially the quantisation of the piano sounds a bit mechanical. What actually irritated me was that the mixing of the track sounded a bit to much panned to the left for me but actually I had some troubles with my ears today so it could be my fault ;)
All in all: Keep on doing nice music like this one!

[Supercreep]

Awesome! Really appreciate the extra creepfactor in this track. Would definetely fit into a horror soundtrack.

ZLEAP responds:

I'm glad you enjoyed. I'm quite proud of how this turned out and 5 star reviews only help set that thought in stone.

Thanks.

[Isaac's Noir]

Well done for your third track! But I have to admit after I just listened to your other to tracks that they were actually a bit better. You spent much more time on them, developing melodies than in this one here. The lead in this track is more like shifting arpeggiated chords. It would be nice to see some melody above them because otherwise the track gets repetitive very fast. The beat was nice though. When I remember the time I started doing music on my computer I always had problems to come up with a solid beat. For the production I would say similar things like the other reviewers: Listen to the track carefully and you will here that there are some points where the lead is just covered by the other instruments and it appears much more silent. Maybe MegaMettaurX is right and your volume levels are not proper (like to loud in general in the mixing producing some artifacts during the rendering). Play a bit with the mixing. First I would try to play a bit with the volumes of the different instruments, then maybe with giving them some own "direction" in the mix by panning them a bit to the left or right. Like xenxies suggested limiters and compressors are also something you should learn to use. They could already help to get rid of the volume problem in this track. The suggestion with the velocities is also a good one.
Keep up in doing some nice music! Looking forward to hear more from you (P.S. I really liked the Toybox Groove which definetely would be a nice game music track).

MirgilCando responds:

Thanks a lot for the review! The volume for the lead was completely intentional at sections. The problem is I lost a couple hours of progress due to an error on my part, so some of it was rushed trying to make up and get back where I was and maybe that's why this doesn't sound as good as my other tracks. All these songs I've released so far are mainly side-projects while I put a lot of effort into a main project, so if I have a left-over melody it'll probably make its way into a short song. I've also been trying to get more progress in on my main piece, so it might suffer here. I'm going to probably now go back and improve on all these songs now that I've got a good number of suggestions from people like you. So thanks a ton for the review and sitting down to listen, it means a lot.

[Tsukuyomi]

Nice track! Especially like the intro melody and the whacky creepyish atmosphere all along the track. The change to the piano part at 2mins something is really cool and indeed reminded me to the helloween soundtrack (a bit carpenterish I would say). To be honest I didn´t like the dubstep bass in some parts this track but I think this is just my taste so I won´t judge on it. The DnB beats on the hand are really cool. The piece is also well structured and is far away from being boring or repitative. I really enjoyed this track (I also like creepy tracks in general).

[(F) _Depth Perceptions_]

Uhhh that´s one nice ambience! Perfect as a scifi horror game/movie background. You did all that sound design by yourself I guess? Good job! Glad that I found this one. Void describes i perfecly and I really like ha minimalistic approach. Lot´s of nice filter work here. Feels a bit like things coming out and diving into the void again. This track is six minutes and it didn´t feel any long. I could just get back and listen to these spacy sounds for ages. Ambient sound design is heavily underrated at NG!

Fubaka responds:

Thank you for your kind words. This ship stays afloat due to reviews like this.

Also, this is officially the 100th review I've been given! Congrats!

[I wish I ...]

Nice and dreamy. The melody is a little melancholic and has also a slightly classic touch. It´s also nice to have the melody below the arpeggios. You did really a lot of work in the melodic progression. But there is also some stuff which might improve this track a lot. The first thing is that you could give the track much more dynamic by velocity editing. Since you played every note is played with the same velocity the track is lacking a bit of dynamic. The other thing is that the quantisation you used is very rough, which makes this track a little mechanic. You can this feel especially during the end of the track. Anyway nice composition with a few production flaws. Keep up the nice composing!

LexRodent responds:

Thanks for the good feedback man.
Dynamics are something I tend to neglect, I will give more attention to it.

[Argentinean Memories]

Damn that was nice! You play a quite nice Bandoneon there and this is not easy. I tried it with an old german concertina because I was confused of the many buttons which are even bisonoric, and the bandoneon has even more. So I stuck more to the english and anglo concertinas. Less buttons and smaller ;) Sound, composition, performance: Everything really nice here! This is definetely one of the best pieces of music I heard here on NG! You make a nice team indeed. Good luck! I don´t what pieces are in your group but if you don´t win this round I don´t know...

SoundChris responds:

Wow its awesome that a real bandoneon player likes the piece! I have to confess that this isnt a "real instrument" but a vsti. It was a lot of editing necessary to make it feeling natural and realistic and almost drove me crazy :D I also had no real bandoneon instrument but used an excelsior accordion here because it just felt better than the bandoneon i have. I always was very interested in accordion instruments - especially the russian button accordion - the bayan, because of its very sad character, its dark timbre and the bigger range.

We are really glad that you liked the piece! We had a lot of fun composing it and its nice that people also have fun while listening to it.

Thanks a lot for leaving your kind review with us. Best Wishes!