ADR3-N's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[garlic vChordProd]

Love that this was primarily created using soundfonts. With that in mind, most of my critique is limited to mix balance and master (compression).

It's a bit hard to hear the kick and snare relative to other instruments in the mix. They, along with the bass, should be the loudest elements present for maximum intelligibility of the beat.

Bass may sound better with a generous helping of compression, perhaps clipping, and maybe even dropping down an octave. If you like basses that stand out, Goldeneye 64 and Waverace 64 have some slamming slap basses. Though I just discovered the WaveRace sf2 is 30 cents flat and 6 semitones transposed. LOL.

You did an excellent job of writing melodies throughout and despite the limitations of software and instrumentation, I was jamming. Great work!

ChordProduction responds:

Thanks for the evaluation. Glad you liked it. Will try to make some improvements in the future.
[Just checked "Goldeneye 64" soundfont bass. It sounds great. Thanks for the suggestion.]

[Anthony Ragus - Supercell (mamzr Remix)]

This is gonna be such a hard choice, I can already hear from your intro.

Lots of excellent sound design to be heard here, and as AR mentioned, great use of low-pass and flanger.

There are some instances of crispy static, such as at 54 seconds, that I feel could be toned down by a few dB.

I also feel the hihats could come down by about 1-2 dB and still serve their purpose. Panning them alternately left and right would also lend to the trippy cyclone effect you were going for. Sometimes I'll used timed ping-pong delays and auto-tremolos for this.

The same can be applied to any arpeggiated riff outside the bass.

But besides these minor critiques, VERY cool interpretation of the original track. I particularly enjoy your bass sound design and use of reverb.

Still could use an extra nudge on the master volume in post, using the Audacity method I mentioned; I'm not sure why logic is showing you that it's maxxed out, and the compression looks great, but the waveform is crunched 1.673 dB under max according to Audacity's amplify plug (which is how I check my max peak).

Freaking great work though!

IreadysuckS responds:

Thanks :) I agree with all of your comments, and I'll admit that I was too lazy to mix this beyond a listenable level so there's a lot of bits that could be improved. Tbh I'm a 'panning on hats' skeptic and tremolo on drum and other in your face elements lowk makes me nauseous lol, although I agree that it would be nice on the arps.

At least now I know that if I can just present the side effects of slamming a track through a clipper as 'intentional crispy static totally added for artistic reasons that was 100% a sample that I added and not at all by mistake'.

Maybe the volume issue is from logic's wav to mp3 converter?

[IreadysuckS - House in Chicago (Cover)]

You absolutely killed this. Sounds ready for a movie score, to be real.

At 1:19, I feel the trumpet is just a bit too loud relative to the accompaniment.

But hands down, probably the most tastefully done orchestral ballad I've ever heard.

Excellent ride cymbal at 2:27.

Did you perform that trumpet, or is it a fantastic solo trumpet lib? It's so lyrical, I struggle to distinguish.

Either way, amazing work!

anthonyragus responds:

I greatly appreciate your comments! From a traditional song perspective, I would justify the level due to the section being the first chorus, and the level of piano support.

Most instruments in sample libraries and sample modelings aren't truly realistic yet. This is some fresh homegrown trumpet, performed by yours truly!

Thank you for listening and feedback!

[NEON-SKIES - Fall (G2961 Remix)]

Amazing style here, seriously cooking.

The only thing I would recommend -- look up guitar double tracking; this sounds so much better than applying chorus to a single guitar source.

What it is, is panning 1 track 100% left, and a slightly different version (perhaps with a different guitar -- VST or otherwise) 100% right.

It's a technique that would take this track to the absolute next level, nice, big, wide, and in your face. Many guitar VSTs and libraries (such as Shreddage) offer 2 different guitar options, so that you can load the same midi and still get a proper doubletrack. This is what I use, then slightly alter velocity or articulation via keyswitches.

Still, amazing work. I would actually love to collaborate in this style some time.

But back to the remix, great glitching, adventurous production style, and surprisingly nice synth guitar lead. The only way it could get any better, is slight changes in gain staging and micro adjustments of compression/volume for drops, and the double tracking method I mentioned. Superb!

NEON-SKIES responds:

Yeah I'm cooked XD

[G2961 - Geometric Theory (Neon Skies Remix)]

First of all, grats on frontpage. Secondly, the cover is not bad :)

Thirdly, that first drop sound pretty wizzer.

I would probably back off the volume of your pianos outside the drops. They sound extremely OTTed and up in the mix to the degree that it's hard to hear the bass and kick outside of drops.

On drops, the sidechain is enough that your perc is cutting through fine, but watch that your percs are clearly audible through sections.

Key-change was nice.

This takes me back to the old days of GD tracks. Driving, high energy, nice recession music :)

Overall, pretty nice, clean, and very much a style still in demand. Great work!

NEON-SKIES responds:

G2961 did way better...I know it's over for me :(
I'm still proud of myself!

[A+B : Can't Do Shit]

I thought this deserved a review, because it's pure vibes. It gets stuck in your head if you aren't careful, even if I have minor gripes about pitching up distorted guitar samples and how it sounds as a metal producer.

One tip for that -- you notice how when you rolled off the high end, the pitched powerchords laid better in the mix? Let me explain why that happens in two words -- nyquist frequencies.

They are a problem I encounter a lot when making sample instruments from less than ideal sources.

If you must pitch upward, not downward, and your sample has a lot of fizz to it, like an amped guitar, rolling off those highs with a slight notch right before your shelf will work wonders to keep those samples sounding pretty!

Anonymous-Frog responds:

I made this in late 2023 and struggled to fix it for a whole year after that (mainly reverb).

[AMATEUR - StixDevs [REMIX]]

Super downtempo remix -- so atmospherically and dynamically opposed to the original that it can hardly be recognized but for the vocal sample, which has been reduced to an almost percussive/aleatoric effect.

I would say this is a cross between downtempo, trap, and dubstep.

It's interesting to hear some of these samples I made back in 2020 in a different context as well.

The "paulstretch" approach to the adlibs and vocals also is quite unique and very tastefully done. I would not have even realized the vocals had been used for pads and other textures, had you not mentioned it.

I have only one minor critique -- I wish the snare were just a bit brighter, and the supersaws just a hair darker. Downtempo trap does love its bright, verby snares, and shelving the saws with a gentle roll off around 12k or so would lend to the melancholic atmosphere.

KI1 responds:

When it comes to remixes, lately I've been enjoying seeing how much I can change while still basing enough of it off the original. Much different to the old way I used to remix - just remake the original with my own instruments and not a lot else.

Paulstretch blew my mind when I first saw it applied to a Justin Bieber song in 2010. Luckily FL has a few different ways of getting the same sound, so I like to sneak it in when I can. Even the most unlikely sounds can turn out pretty nice.

Critique well received; I did struggle with the snare for a while - I've never made music in a genre where the snare is such a focus. 12k roll off for the saws is a good idea, I think I may have over boosted the higher end in compression AND post-EQ 🤔

[Frank Lake]

This is pretty insane! The fact that the entire track, ambient textures, and all of that warbling is just glorified guitar samples.

Even though this isn't my particular genre of choice, I find studying it from a sonic perspective to be interesting.

2:44 is surreal. The tape stop effects you're doing... in audacity. Sometimes I find myself thinking, what sorcery is this?!

JimmyTheCaterpillar responds:

audacity has the tools to make an acoustic sound like anything!!!!! i am such a believer. a lot of how i get the ball rolling is just pasting two copies of the same clip on top of one another and then tweaking them individually, cutting and stripping as i go -- letting things play off each other and kinda grow from the rest of the larger recording. i think the way i make this stuff is like how a snake eats itself.

it's good to see you! thank you so much for taking the time to listen to my work :) i'm trying to push hard with it this summer.

[Who do you think you are?]

Shocked that this has virtually no listens or comments. The vocal performance, writing, and vocoder are absolutely standout. 1:25 is also an excellent verse, particularly the sound design elements. I'm not well versed in genres, but the melodic, harmonic, and rhymic structure are pure groove.

I think the compression on the master may be blowing out the sub, and the snare could use a bit more crisp, but this is otherwise top notch.

Excellent work

Southwest-Statistic responds:

Thanks!

[-Gentle Eyes-]

What bass synth is this? You're right, it does sound like Acceptance (for those reading my comment, a track I did many, many years ago)

I never did achieve the level with dubstep I was going for, but I still screw around with basses like this from time to time.

Loving the bitcrush as well.

The rest of my review could probably be summed up by TaintedLogic's comment. Minus, I didn't think the wubs at 1:58 were grating. I actually think the strings were too loud xD

But I hate synth strings because I spent too long listening to orchestral and cinematic with their realistic strings lol

The transition into 3:35 was cool af also

Creeperforce24 responds:

Thanks! I used groove machine synth here lol. I actually use the vst quite a lot in my tracks