ADR3-N's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Around The World]

Neat piece! I love 7/4 time. However I would like a bit more volume overall. Even big sections are not loud enough to hear as clearly as I'd like over say, room noise with my headphones on. Writing wise, this is a treat. It is not mixed dirty, as many pieces in this genre are. Although it took me a bit to perceive the pitch of the low strings and that they were not drums. This may represent a need to mix differently for those upper frequencies. I'm speaking specifically for the right channel. Although it does sound like you've used brush percussion as well.

[(NGUAC '23 Final Round) The Final Act]

The concept of this song is fantastic, as is a lot of the writing. What could be better is mix. The kick and snare are cutting through well enough, but it sounds like volume of bass and other elements are all over the place. Bass is too loud. Synths sound centered and not loud enough. Reverb wet is too high and too long, with not enough low cut to maintain balance.

I also am not a major fan of the glock at 4:50 ish

The transitions make this piece well worth listening to, and the melodies presented are interesting. I think it is more than a sum of its parts, but quite a lot could be done to clean it up!

[Remembering Our Journey]

Piano pieces are not my specialty despite a background in classical music. What I can say about this piece is that it is fairly wonderfully mixed and has excellent technical transitions. Lovely work! My only bone of contention is the chord at 3:00 exactly.

Everratic responds:

Thanks for the review! I'm glad you enjoyed it :) That suspended chord sounds wonderful to my ears, especially when it's resolved, but I understand.

[4th Entity]

For 8 hours, this is a grand slam. I couldn't do something like this in 8 hours, no way.

At 46 the mix is muddy, as is to be expected with such a time restraint, but I encourage you to revisit this for certain.

1:06 the snare is actually a bit too loud, and the kick is a bit too distorted. I may drop the pitch on the kick or tune it differently. Same with snare. Could even change it out for one that's in the same or complementary key.

In terms of melody and driving beat, this is a smash!

The only thing holding it back is as mentioned, not a lot of time lead to mixing issues, such as the leads being somewhat too quiet. Perhaps this will improve by backing off on compression and adjusting levels somewhat? It's sounding almost like I have something between my ears and my monitor headphones, like a big fuzzy earmuff.

Either way, really enjoyed it!

entropicvoxels responds:

thanks a lot! i'm definitely trying to improve on my mixing and mastering, sometimes i overcompress my songs and a lot of elements end up sounding quieter than they should.

[nguac final submission]

Looking at this track, I think already that it needs mastering compression, but that it doesn't sound like it's mixed too badly at all.

Intro sounds like it wants to be dubstep but is chilling out where it is. That's perfectly fine. For trance, it does have that progressive feel to it which I appreciate.

Overall, I think mixing is done tastefully, though I don't like the choice of what sounds like a nexus keys piano at 1:23. That sound is quite common and can stick out to anyone who listens to EDM as cliche, very chorused, etc. I think you would do better with a piano that sounded drier, sustain, and apply a pingpong delay.

This brings me to hihats -- these seem to sit in relatively the same space, centered. A lot of other elements do as well, minus the bass -- I would actually isolate up to about 200 hz on the bass to dead center.

Beyond that, I enjoyed your melodies and the slow, dreadful drive of this piece. Sounded like a villain about to execute his plot.

[Gazing Ball]

Never heard of this composition software but praise your chord progression and approach to milling those keys through the chords. I would caution to use less reverb but genuinely surprised a mix in audacity sounds this good. If you do this well with it I would recommend trying Reaper, which is much more capable of suiting your needs. Also surprised to hear Wavetable sound this good.

I think the bass could be more centered than it is. It's washing out and causing a low hum wide in each channel. I would also change out your percussion instruments or apply some sort of filtering FX such as sample rate change to soften them to fit the rest of your composition. They feel flat in comparison to the spacious keys, choir, and tubes. Great closing chord, very satisfying.

Ellietonin responds:

Thanks! Aria is a relatively archaic midi editor that I dug up from the reaches of the past. At the time, the closest thing I could find to a tutorial was a video in a language I didn't speak that briefly mentioned it. This being said, it's very intuitive and a great peice of software. I'll probably always use it.

Audacity is actually a lot better than people give it credit for, and that's good, because to be honest, it's the only DAW that doesn't break my brain. I do have a bass-to-center plugin, but I forgor to use it this time.

Percussion is a bit difficult for me because I do everything through either the wavetable or soundfonts, and there isn't much selection on my device as far as that goes. This being said, the wavetable kit is actually pretty good in the right contexts, and I use a lot of sampled breaks which tend to add a lot of flavor as well.

[shopping at the mall]

This one is really cute. The mix is indeed a bit off as you suggest. Hard to hear the kick. Bass is nicely up. Chords on the side need to come up about .4 dB at least and potentially be double tracked or spread out otherwise in the stereo space. Beyond that you've got such gorgeous writing on the leads I hesitate to score much lower than this. I especially enjoy what sounds to be like meow synth and would like that to be just a bit ... wetter! Otherwise I feel like cutting my critique here. FinaLee has a lot of great points!

[Superior Magnetic]

Gorgeous vibe at 53 secs, and great solo. I think the clarity of mix could be improved significantly however, less reverb, a centered bass, or double track two basses out to the sides, who cares. This one is already a wild step into the unknown. Great atmospheric work and chords. Sounds very much like FF13-2 to me, which I dearly loved.

Cresince responds:

I'm gonna have to look at those basses, they are centered on panning but i think stacking them gave an off center effect I will have to explore. Thank you for your mixing pointers as always! Now I have an FF OST to check out as well :P

[Une nuit proche des étoiles]

This is not a genre I typically enjoy, however, I praise your tactful mixing and arrangement. The piano sounds lush and atmospheric. Only a bit more sonic blending and contrast between intro and mid sections, and this would shine gloriously.

2:40 strings show as hybrid cinematic it sounds like. I think the choir past that point sticks out a bit as synthy and laying over top the rest of the mix. Needs to be spread a bit more. The rest of your elements sound gorgeous. Only need a bit more balancing, less reverb, and more attention paid there. The final chord choice is a confusing one for me. Could be resolved to major 1 chord with heavy 3rd

BAOWZ-Tobass responds:

Thanks for your comment. The final chord choice is on purpose 😈 I felt like it would have sounded to conventionnal with a major triad, so i changed it. And yea, the choir is kinda mid. First i wanted a solo soprano girl voice. It does exists in vst but it's not free...

[The Octagon - NGUAC 2023]

Fantastic writing for solos and driving rhythms. I find the mix is a bit off balance though. It's pretty high mid heavy to my ears. At points the bass is sucked out from under, perhaps by overcompression. Percussion such as kick and snare are not cutting through properly. Shakers and hats are cutting through overly. It is causing transitions to be not quite as impactful as I'd like. Still a rocking tune!

amishpimp responds:

Thanks for the feedback! Mixing the rhythm section has always been pretty hard for me so I will work on this more in the future!