ADR3-N's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[No Empathy: intrumental]

Ah, that good old plingy piano patch -- I would swap to a different synth. It sounds alright with the 30 second section, but it sticks out a whole lot.

You've got a good bassline. I would probably not use those strings though -- there is an instrument called SQ8L which is free, which you can replace them with, and they may sound better.

There doesn't seem to be any percussion in this track, and I find it suffers for that. Writing wise, however, it's a nice little groove.

Can't wait to see what you do when you've got some good kit and software under your belt. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[Blast Off]

Like the first chords going on here.

Mixing wise it sounds like it's been soundgoodized. Over compressed. Try to mix your track well before you do that. Make sure reverbs have clean low end, cut it off about 250 hz, etc. Shorten any tails.

I do like that little dissonant diddy we end with. It goes well with the bassline.

I would bring out your percussion more -- by turning everything else down a little, and also, if you're going to use guitar synths, you can use a technique called double tracking with different amp and cab simulators for each track, then humanize the notes slightly differently, or even use different guitar patches, and it will sound more spacious/better.

You can also look up gated reverb for snares.

Enjoyed the piece. Keep em coming. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

BALDORF responds:

Thanks for the feed back!
You obviously know your stuff well, mixing/mastering is probably my biggest weakness. Much more about the arrangement.
Appreciate the advice!

[glass half empty]

Really interesting little piece.

Some mixing critique, your harmony acoustic guitar on those fingernailed chord stabs needs to come down a lot. They ring out a ton -- there's no way the listener can't hear them. Bring those vocals up some and cut down the reverb wet some. Bring up the lower bass strings on the guitar a bit. Take down your kick sound about .5 to 1 db. We're also not going to unhear that magically because it isn't very loud. It's the only sound in that range.

I would also not autotune the vocals so hard but that may be a spacy stylistic choice.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

Aweror responds:

awesome, the critique means a lot. thank you!!

[Cuprum]

Interesting, driving groove, reminds me of the old days here on NG.

Your drums are having a hard time coming through the mix. I would turn everything else down by anywhere between 1 and 1.5 dB or until you could hear them clearly when you turn your PC volume down to 20% or so.

1:15 section sounds ... very interesting. Very busy finger against the window texture -- although I'd probably turn that down just a tad.

at 1:45 whatever those chords are in the bottom, I would not have those notes so close together. They sound very chunky. Either simplify them or move them up an octave -- or invert them.

That said I hear the chords you want to make, and I like them a lot. As far as how the piece is going I might restructure it a little, perhaps to just a standard house template. But by the end of the song I'm starting to really appreciate those window slidey noises. I don't even know what's happening.

For Caustic, I'm actually really impressed.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[I Am, Are We?]

Very cool this was made with a bass. Makes me want to pick mine up.

Writing wise this is great, very unique sound. Lyrics are poignant. Vocal delivery is not bad.

Mix wise, I find some choices I don't necessarily agree with. For your verses, I would have a right and left vocal about 23-40%. On your choruses, the vocals are very, very clippy sounding. I don't know if they were recorded with red line levels, clipped, distorted, or compressed, or if they clipped on mix down. Sometimes that happens. That would be the first thing I would fix if you were to go back into mixing this track.

Secondly, it doesn't sound like your vocals have a lot of compression on them. I would turn those buddies into sausage casings and maybe use a transient shaper. Multiband compressors are good for this, and you can cut down on the frequencies below 250-300 hz to both save room in the mix and get a little more mileage out of the compression. right now it just sounds like you turned them way up.

I also would apply chorus or delay, to taste. Cutting reverb sends down and making sure the low end on reverb gets cut will usually improve the clarity.

For your choruses, your lead voice would probably do well centered, with those reverbed doubles pushed off to the side about the same amount as you've done your verses. I'm not sure if I'm left ear deaf, or if this song is just very heavy in the right channel with your vocals.

Very cool effects with the whammy btw.

Also, I find it VERY hard to hear your drums. That doesn't mean necessarily turn them up so much as it does turn everything else down. I would mix my tracks at about -6 dB of head room or at 20% or less volume on my PC. You'll find you tend to make better mixing decisions that way.

Anyway, fantastic job with this piece. It's like djent, but alt rock. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

SkankyMojo responds:

Thank you so much for the feedback. 🤓

[DeLoreans]

So punky it hurts. My only critiques are going to be mix related.

I would apply a little more compression and reverb deadening before processing (ERA-R is a good plugin for this) to your vocals. They could also probably come up by about .2 dB but compression might fix that.

Your 2:30 little bridge sounds great. Then that spacious sound dies out when the chorus comes back in. That tells me either you yeeted those synths down, or compression is killing your sound. Make sure your synths come through the chaos by shaving off low end on guitars, vocals, and indeed the synths themselves. The magic number seems to be around 250 hz.

Your kick sounds really boxy, like it has a ton of 60 hz. I might sub it out for an airier kick or turn it down some, and play with the EQ some to get a cleaner sound. As is, it's a little muddy.

Also, I felt robbed we cut out at 2:53. Let that note ring out, dammit! :P

Otherwise, pretty banging track. Can't wait to see what you come up with next! Thanks for coming out to NGUAC

AjSkull responds:

Thanks for the feedback! The ending actually cuts out fast because it leads into another song.

[Abstrack - Together]

Nice soft, subtle intro. I'd have appreciated just a little bit less ghosting on those snares just to let that happen at some point later in the song.

Otherwise I have very few points of critique other than not liking a super deep sidechain so early on in the song -- before we ever hear a drop. Also, your transitions are very sibilant. That's fine on my monitors, but it might be really airy on a pair of commercial headphones, which tend to have a bellcurve sound.

I'm not a huge fan of such long reverb tails on your snare. It's creating a real high washing sound.

I would also turn down your lead and harmony synths down about a dB. They're so much louder than your bass and percussion that I'm having a hard time getting into the groove. 1:50 is an example of just how much louder they are, as well as 2:02. That's really out there compared to your bass and percussion, and it doesn't ever seem to come on.

The tempo of this song could probably stand to be just a little faster. 5 to 10 bpm

The slowing down outro was a nice touch. I would have liked to hear a I chord on the end, just ringing out for a second or so.

Good work!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

Abstrack responds:

Thanks for the feedback! I might revisit this song later with these issues in mind.

[Green Grape Goes Groovin']

Interesting name. Fade at 50 sec was unexpected.

I know what Massive preset you have past there ;) My favorite personally

I'm not really able to determine what is going on here structurally. You have three or so grooves that don't really seem to interact with one another a whole lot.

I would actually turn down your other synths minus the bass. They're covering up your drums.

Also would have liked an outro, maybe just that Massive slapback synth on the end.

This amused me, and nothing about it is particularly bad at all. In fact, it's got a pretty solid groove. I just found it hard to get excited without an overarching lead or clear structure. That would be where I'd wanna go next. You might check out some nice channels on YT like Holistic Songwriting or Signals Music Studios. And don't worry, the more you write, the more interesting pieces of music will come to you, so keep going!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

Tapestoppa responds:

No Problem and thanks!!

[The Power Company]

Interesting soundscape going on here. The super high 15-20khz here is killing me though on those arpeggiating instruments. Watch for that.

Definitely a lot of interesting textures. Gorgeous chords at the 50 sec or so mark. I'd have liked that to continue briefly. But I'm definitely not complaining.

As for speech, it definitely sounds quite human, but I don't know what the hell is going on. If it's not "I'll be back" I am severely disappointed! T_T

Probably the weakest aspect of this piece, if any, is structure. It more ends sounding a noise scape, I mean, no obvious verse, chorus, etc, to keep my reptile brain processing this strange input as super srs music stuff. Drums also had a hard time peeking through the mix. I would turn down a lot of your synths before applying compression so they come to the forefront.

But I enjoyed nonetheless. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

[Warm Waves]

That third chord you've got, I have mixed feelings about. It resolves nicely into chord 4. I'm not sure about resolving INTO it though. We have 1, 2, 3??, and 4. Repetition legitimizes though. It's becoming more normal as I go on. Actually, it sounds a lot better in the piano. I think I might just be reacting to the instrument choice.

There are a lot of interesting choices going on here musically, some of which I feel are hampered by obviously synthesized real instruments. Uncanny valley.

Now, I really like the subtlety of 2:04 or so.

I'm not completely in love with the chord progression so I'm not really able to get as much into the big groove sections as I'd like, but I will say your lead writing is wonderful.

Any other complaints I have would be reserved for a lot of muddy reverb covering up your drums. I would pare down your reverb wet signals in both volume and tail length/feedback/size. I feel for a 4 to the 4 dance banger, we're lacking a three quarter note, rest, three quarter note, rest bassline slam for your drops. That could give this piece the edge it needs. Without that I feel like the drums might actually be clashing a bit with where the track naturally wants to go with the instrumentation. I.e. drums might be too busy, or bassline might be. I can't decide.

I would take down your accompaniment on the big sections -- the chords, down a dB or two. They're quite loud in comparison to those piano runs you have in the background. That's also distracting me somewhat and covering up the drums.

Beyond that, great work, a nice bold, swagging piece. I enjoyed the listen. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!