ADR3-N's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Four Sprouts Under Empty Sky]

Nice intro. I might suggest a lot less reverb on your piano and a bit less velocity on the chord stabs -- individual notes of it.

Nice intricate drum writing. I think I would like a bit less verb on the kick, more panning on the toms across left and right for fills. The snare if you can put it on another channel could use saturation and compression.

I feel the weakest element of your piece is DSK Guitars. If you can find Junk Guitar for sforzando (you will know from the Japanese site if you do) I think that'd be a better, more velocity sensitive guitar. DSK is sitting in the uncanny valley for me, almost guitar, but not.

Mix wise on that guitar, it sounds pretty dry. I would take it down in volume, do something with pingpong delay, space it out, reverb, etc.

Your vocals fit very nicely and I have no complaints. Arrangement wise, very nice pensive piece.

Overall, I enjoyed the listen. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[From the Past to the Future(bass)]

Interesting piece, with a lot of space and verb. I have no complaints about writing, instrumentation, or pacing. Transitions are very nicely done.

My sole gripe is how little center channel I hear. Most everything sounds as if it's been spreadilated, and the 20k and above in the mix is quite up there for each instrument, but especially your hats. Nothing melodic ever reaches those heights, so it's a little jarring to hear a hihat and reverb tails almost as loud as the melody.

There's a bit of boxiness to the overall sound. I recommend cutting 250 hz and below on all of your reverbs (to taste of course) and centering your bass at these frequencies. There are plugins to make this happen. I just forget their names.

The sine bass is somehow a bit loud and also nearly inaudible at the same time. I think that's just characteristic sine waves. I recommend pulse, saw, square, and ramp over sine -- sine waves take up a lot of room in the mix to be heard and are best as a sub bass underneath another bass, imo.

Other than that, really enjoyed the piece and think you did a wonderful job arranging. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC! (again)

[Dolph Infinity]

2 seconds in and I already know this is going to be a wild ass, tripping experience

Very interesting ideas throughout and feeling as if I'm trapped in a factory. That's also underwater.

I'd like to hear more of your kick and snare throughout -- less hi-hat volume. The detuned piano is ... detuned. I'm not sure what is happening, what is a drop, what is a verse. There is clipping or perceived clipping on louder sections. I'm not entirely sure what to make of it, just that it gives me anxiety in a kind of good way.

Some more differentiation between verses and drops in their density of instruments would help this track a lot. I also think you could stand do turn down reverb and delay wet signals. That would greatly help the clarity of the cacophony.

If it is indeed clipping I'm hearing, I recommend mixing at a quieter volume before anything hits the master channel and only then applying compression.

Nice work. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

dogsinmrimachines responds:

Hi ADR3-N, thanks for the detailed critique! I have a few minor follow-up points to it:

* Mixing at a quieter volume and then applying compression and gain definitely makes sense, my issue with this in the past is that it either doesn't prevent volume spikes or it does but then the whole thing is entirely too quiet. Maybe some kind of targeted compression would work here?

* Turning down the reverb and delay wet signals is highly tricky because of the way the instruments are built. There's always been a balance between getting the sound I want and making that sound crisp. Adding the noisier effects to the effect chain (or even the master) doesn't work because the effects are actually working with the feedback directly to give a richer sound. Is there a way of reducing reverb on an already-reverbed track? I mean I guess that would depend on the DAW but do you know any of the theory behind it if it's a real thing?

Your other comments are on point and are things I've worked on with newer releases. Overall though, a very helpful review!

[I wanna get fucked up wif U]

Sounds like gorillaz met I have no idea what no name band from the 90s. The writing is just fine. Bring up the vocals. Bring down the long sections of chords so that they don't overwhelm that initial line and any bass you have.

Beyond that, the mix is pretty clean and I like it. But I would throw the cheese synths in a lake.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[BASCUTI - PSYCHO]

The bit crush in the beginning is a bit extreme for me -- the high frequencies aren't painful but stick out very noticeably.

Writing in the intro is nice

I feel like we've gone from an intro into an intro by 46 seconds

and again at 57. I think wecould have gone straight into the drop at 1:10

Your bass sounds very nice. It reminds me of cyberpunks battle theme

However the entire track is mixed too loudly for me to enjoy. Whatever happened to the master, the levels were too loud going into it, so the track is at clipping values throughout the entire drop. This makes all elements of the track hard to differentiate from each other. The quality suffers as a result.

Beyond that, not bad at all! Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[Haunted Harpsichord]

Hmm. I think this would sound a lot better with more variety of instruments and quality of instruments, specifically if you are going to emulate real instruments, it's better to find libraries like Spitfire Labs

The writing is not bad, and neither is the phrasing.

I would appreciate in addition to the kick, snares, hihats, crash cymbals, and transition noises.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[SPURME - 5th Dimension FlowerBoyDeMii Remix]

The high frequencies in the beginning are pretty loud. I would also turn down your reverb on your pad.

Drop is SICK though. Think hihat could also come down

Reverb on everything could come down by 1/4 to 1/2 and the track would sound better under all that compression. It's getting wall of noise level compressed by 1:40. Notice 1:58 is the same loudness profile as the drop and that's not a good sign. You want at least a little break.

2:18 is nice barring the very high frequency. Turn that down somewhat. The rest is NOICE

2:38 sounds muddy but GREAT ideas.

Throughout the rest of the sections, much of my previous critique would be repeated so I'll leave it here. Watch so that you don't have screaming highs, as those are painful to listen to. Hihats, leads, anything screechy.

Beyond that, awesome work.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[ANGLE]

Ooh, 8 seconds in and already hard.

Percussion writing is nice, doesn't sound like the hihats are too loud which is nice. What is loud is your kick and reverse kick. When the crash and different transitions -- and triangles -- come in, the track as a whole is distorting. This is robbing your track of much craved low end. Luckily you have a mid heavy bass to help it cut.

Look at the waveform. It looks like a sausage casing. I would mix at a much quieter volume, make sure everything is audible, and go from there. The first thing you can do is reduce the reverb on all of your keys and strings, cut the low end off the reverb up to 300 hz to make room for your 808, and make sure they don't sit on top of each other all muddy. You can afford to turn down your kick by a little too probably if you reduce the overall volume. After the levels are good, apply your master/mastering compression/sausage fattener/internet mastering service.

Also, if you're looking for dirty ass 808s, I dropped a sample pack called Adreanaline in my newsposts. There's tons of other free instruments hanging out in there too if you care to see.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC! Really enjoyed your beat <3

[A new Chapter]

Great utilization of music theory in your chord modulations. Superbly and thoughtfully written. By 1:50 I'm waiting for a bit more to be said, wondering if we will see the incorporation of different instruments or lead lines. I think the ideas sold here would be best brought out into a full orchestra or a classic rock ballad. For a solo instrument piece, great work!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

GeminiGemini responds:

Thank you

[Dream]

I think a different bass besides that slap would better serve you for such a busy bass line with notes that close to each other. Or you could try something like Ample Sounds Bass lite and see what happens.

I'm not sure entirely what is happening with those scream samples fighting each other but I like it better when they are used as accents rather than a melody.

The piece itself is weird in an endearing way. I appreciate that about it.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!