MetalRenard's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[404]

This is a NGADM Quater-Final Review!
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Admittedly I'm not the first person you'd choose to comment on a jazz piece since I don't really enjoy the genre to begin with when it becomes so technical and discordant as it does at times in this piece.
With that in mind I thought it safer if I stuck to what I knew and focused on the production/recording and performance side of things.
Honestly the out-of place, kind of fake sounding instrument really did stick out for me at times and kind of ruined my immersion. If you didn't have something fitting in this case, I would simply have left it out or replaced it with something I -did- have. It would have completely solved the issue.
Having said that there are some fabulous performances in this and you also did a great job organising it all, bringing it all together and mixing it. I bet it wasn't easy mixing stuff from so many sources and with so many different acoustic footprints (here, read "room verb"). In the end it sounds quite convincing and I did enjoy parts despite my aversion to the style overall.

Cool stuff guys, good luck with that other project of yours!

9.1/10

camoshark responds:

Hey other Sam, thanks for chipping in!

"Admittedly I'm not the first person you'd choose to comment on a jazz piece since I don't really enjoy the genre to begin with when it becomes so technical and discordant as it does at times in this piece."

If I had wanted every to like the things I do, I would've went with something safe like rock or pop, so don't kill yourself over it! :P

"With that in mind I thought it safer if I stuck to what I knew and focused on the production/recording and performance side of things."

...Well shit, better duck behind cover then. :X

"Honestly the out-of place, kind of fake sounding instrument really did stick out for me at times and kind of ruined my immersion."

It goes without saying in this case, since the entire concept was to go for something organic and acoustic, and so replacing it with something cheap like this was bound to not really work.

"If you didn't have something fitting in this case, I would simply have left it out or replaced it with something I -did- have. It would have completely solved the issue."

We honestly debated a lot over this, and we almost did, but again, since the sax part was only meant to be played as a sax part, replacing it with a synth wouldn't ACTUALLY solved the issue, since it'd instead have sounded like a cheap synth.

That's my take on it, at least.

"Having said that there are some fabulous performances in this and you also did a great job organising it all, bringing it all together and mixing it."

Many thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed them nonetheless! ^^

" In the end it sounds quite convincing and I did enjoy parts despite my aversion to the style overall."

I'm glad you managed to find at least parts of it enjoyable, considering your aversion to the genre. I'm also glad it didn't affect your bias too much.

Thanks for the review!

-Sam

[redemption]

This is a NGADM Quarter-Finals Review!
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Automatic admission to the next round, lucky you! :)
It's a chill track for sure and the way the slower section really throws you off the beat with different sections coming in early or late making it feel like 3/4 mixed with 5/4 works well to lose the listener in the music. The sound effects of children playing at 3:00 really brought the piece home for me. Coupled with the title and that section I think I understand what you were aiming for emotionally in this.

I can see what you meant by the drums not quite being there yet - they're a bit distant and separate from the rest because of the reverb, but that's the only thing I can fault in this track. I love the sounds you used (special mention for Etherealwinds' lovely vocals too) and I really enjoyed the journey.
Fantastic and good luck in the next round!

9.5

johnfn responds:

It's funny how some people love the drums and some people don't. Eh... I'm a drum noob, but I'm getting better!!!

Thanks for the review! Though I don't really remember using a mix of 3/4 and 5/4 hehe. I think you think I'm smarter than I actually am ;-)

[There]

NGADM Quarter Final Review!
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Solid as always!!!
As usual, this song benefits from an impeccable mix, you're one of the most consistently good sounding producers I know. It helps that this song is catchy as hell and that I'm loving the retro/90s vibe. The vocals remind me (in all the best ways) of Savage Garden too, I'm assuming that's you singing, very impressive work.
I really enjoyed the composition - the level of work this competition has dragged out of you guys is insane and forced me to revise how I score tracks from 1/2s to decimal places. What can I say? Excellent work Garlagan. Best of luck in the final!
9.6/10

garlagan responds:

Wow cheers Sam!
Yep, that's me singing. And it reminds you of Savage Garden?! NICE.

[Reborn as Machine]

I really love this piece of music. The way the synth and guitar play of each other at times, it's kind of retro but in a really cool way. Oustanding guitar playing as always, too (yeah, I've listened to a bunch of your tracks).
Awesome! \o/

DanJohansen responds:

I am very inspired by retro video games and I love mixing up the synth and leads XD Glad you dig it dude, appreciate it! \m/

[WHATEVER]

Loving the track, you have a great sound, clean and precise. The drums sound great too. The riffs are also really cool.
You could maybe clean up the bass a bit, it's overpowering the rest. Other than that, awesome!

RobSoundtrack responds:

Thanks dude!

[The Concert]

This is a NGADM "Round of 16" Review!
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Awesome work, so realistic but with a retro feel to the sound.
The reason it got 9.5 instead of 10 is because you made the same mistake in this as you did in the previous round's submission. You don't have a good grasp of perspective in audio/mixing. The piano sounds like it's in a completely different room to the rest of the orchestra and to someone like myself it sounds so out of place that it's jarring. There are ways to make it work, but instead we have the piano sounding as if we're sitting close to the pianist in a small room and then everything else is being played on a stage somewhere else. For a start, when you're further away from the piano it wouldn't sound this wide. Also its sound would be projected into the same space as the strings and claps. Try listening with headphones if you can't tell what I mean. (Also the audience members are a bit rude to clap over the music, aren't they?)

Now that I've explored that fully I can move on to the good stuff. ^_^
Like I said, it's really realistic sounding, almost like an old film-score feel to it at the beginning. The instruments weave in and out of each other very well and the piece flows too.
The piano part is expertly crafted and I enjoyed the piece overall a lot. The mixing is good, the piece has a lot of depth and warmth.

Congrats on making it to the quarter finals! 9.5/10

SoundChris responds:

Thanks a lot MetalRenard for your kindness. I was trying to combine a lateromantic wagneresque orchestration style with a chopinesque / sometimes rachmaninov style piano. Yeah the thing with the room accoustics is true. I also knew that when i heared it. Unfortunately i had a lot of trouble in the 2 weeks where i wrote this and in the end i was not able to listen to the track on monitors anymore before the deadline since it was already very late here. Also the orchestration - which had been written completely could not be uploaded anymore. I had to write half of the track on the deadline day and then had to face some extremely annoying DAW problems ... i could not use the playback function anymore but had to freeze, export, listen, unfreeze and so on ... In the end also the last part of the piece had an already composed and finished instrumentation and orchestration (the french horns were not alone - i composed the orchestra like it was in the beginning of the piece) but could not upload it anymore. It was 7 minutes before the deadline. Exporting: 4 minutes, upload 5-7 minutes --> disqualified. So i decided to upload the "unfinished" version. I am very glad you enjoyed the piano and especially that you found the orchestra had a warm sound because thats always what i want to create. Thanks a lot for your detailed review!

[On The Glass Edge]

This is a NGADM "Round of 16" Review!
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This is on a whole new level from your other pieces, and those were already fantastic. This just blew me away. Your guitar playing is outstanding, honestly I could never play this. You know how much I like this already but I have to say it again. Bloody hell. Brilliant. Haha
I was torn between giving you 10/10 and 9.5/10 and gave you 9.5/10 because I pussied out and didn't want people to think I'm super biased about metal... Sorry. They wouldn't be wrong. ^_^"

Seriously though, nothing I can see wrong with this. Marvellous. You fixed any mixing issues I picked up on in previous pieces too, including making the lead sound fit so well in the mix.

What more can I say? Sold!

PirateCrab responds:

Dammit I was hoping for a 10 ;)

But honestly thanks bro! Your constructive criticism last round helped immensely, took it all on board and completely upped my game! Now my production is down, I guess that leaves it all to composition! Here goes!

Again, thanks dude! Means a lot :)

[A Girl's Champion]

This is a NGADM "Round of 16" Review!
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I can see the difference between this and something you'd usually make. It doesn't have lots of the subtle details you usually throw in that make it polished and realistic. It's a shame because I think it's a good piece. I had to remove half a point because it's short - also a consequence of not having time to finish. To add to that, the fade-out ending is disappointing too.
I was sorry to hear you weren't able to finish, Bosa, I know you're a very capable composer and orchestrator.

What you did do well, though, is making lush, beautiful melodies right from the start. The whole thing flows overwhelmingly well, weaving a heart-warming image of peace at the beginning to something more powerful as the music progresses. I love how you weave the different instruments together at the start, you're such a pro. I'm envious of people who can do that, I'm a much more straight-forward kind of composer and those details and techniques elude me.

Please send me a PM when this is done (I mean it), I want to hear the final version (and to download a copy!). If you upload it as a separate piece I'll review that one too.

Bosa responds:

I will do it.

[Can Your Cow Do This?]

This is a NGADM "Round of 16" Review!
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It looks like I scored you the lowest out of all the judges. That's always a bit awkward when you have to leave a detailed review too. Well, here goes.
I guess some of it is personal bias, I find lots of the sounds in dubstep quite jarring and unless you mix it really well they come off quite harsh. Your mix is good, indeed. The drums are full, the backing synths are awesome and I love the lead sound, so awesome.

Sadly during the signature dubby bits (if that's a thing) I feel like you underestimated the power of a pure synth to blow out ear drums since their perceived volume is so much higher than a complex sound. What I mean by this is that an electric guitar won't sound as loud as a sine wave because its sound is full of harmonics and the distortioin throws those all over the place too whereas a pure sine wave or something similar seems so much louder.

tldr: What I'm trying to say is that I had to turn your song right down to listen to it, not because it was loud but because the differences from moment to moment in perceived volume made my ears hurt.

What I did like is the variation from section to section. I also think you're really good at making melodies and backings that fit really well together. That backing wouldn't have been complete without that melodie and vice versa. Complete synergie between the two.

Congrats on making it this far in the competition, it's been really tough and you did admirably. Keep it up!

introstalge responds:

Not awkward at all. I was actually hoping you'd be allocated to Group D so I could see in which areas I need to improve! Thanks for picking apart the positives and negatives, it has been very encouraging to read as well as informative. I will try to work my mixing even more for my future tracks. Thank you for the detailed review and also for being a judge for this year's NGADM :)

[Adel's Theme (Menu)]

The issue with the looping is because of the large amount of reverb in this. Otherwise I think you did a marvellous job buddy.
The simple solution for the reverb is to reduce the decay a bit, it will tidy it up but still sound roomy.

Step responds:

I thought it'd be the reverb on the piano... I tried wrapping the remainder of the track during export so that the reverb tail at the end continues at the start, but that ended up still leaving a click at the start of the track, for some reason. Maybe it's because the waveform of the reverb tail didn't start at 0 amplitude so it produced a clicking sound? Like, instead of the reverb tail in the intro starting like this: http://puu.sh/bnUDi.png it started like this: http://puu.sh/bnUEB.png producing the clicking sound... I'm a dumbass when it comes to this stuff so I wouldn't know for sure.

Super glad you like it though, I really value your feedback! Thanks man.