ADR3-N's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Daffodils]

It's a bit hard for me to make out the percussion with the compression and reverb so high, as well as the arpeggios supporting the main melody so loud relative to the drums and bass.

I'm not able to pick out a main melody really. Instead it seems to be a lot of, granted quite pleasant, chords. I do like the way your bass sounds and your writing of short pulses on 1 and 3.

Strong points, chords and bass writing. Weak points, structure -- I can't tell one section from another either by sight on the waveform or by listening through. It doesn't seem to develop much if at all. There is a LOT of reverb on each instrument. If you want to do this I would suggest cleaning your lower frequencies up and shortening the tails. Alternatively you can do a nice ping pong reverb on a lower setting and achieve the same effect -- increased perception of space.

I'm not sure what the high pitched percussion heard throughout is but occasionally it is off beat. I believe it is bit crushed. Sounds like a clave or something. It hurts my ears a little and I think I would like to hear more clarity on it. As crushed as it is, it's peaking I think somewhere around 8k if I'm not mistaken. It has been some time since I looked at frequencies by number. May even be 5khz.

The piece itself is not very short but I feel there isn't a lot for me to differentiate so I suppose my biggest recommendation is to study song structure -- there are plenty of online resources for this -- and use what knowledge you gain to take great ideas like this and parse them out into full compositions.

Also, there is a cut off at 2:20. Did you mean to do that?

Anyway, please don't take what I said too harshly. All in all, I enjoyed your work, and I think you have vast potential, if you just break through this wall of disorganization. Many of my own projects, truth be told, are at this stage, where I have a wonderful idea I have no idea what to do with. What you have here I would have probably relegated to an outro, as it's so full, and pulled other elements from it to make choruses, then written an intro based on your outro, some verses and bridges and called it a day. Making music is hard. So frustrating, not knowing what to add or take away. I feel that when I listen to this piece, great elements, and confusion.

But anyway, keep doing what you do, and don't let anyone stop you, least of all me. Happy to see whatever you come up with next!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

CassArtzz responds:

thank you for your critique, the cut off was and issue with ableton, i think my main issue is my mixing and how my mixing isn’t on point for the type of music i was going for on this, i mainly do rock and metal, but i wanted to try something new out. if you have any other criticism feel free to pm me :) - cass

[new day]

I have some nitpicking for the vocal processing. The FX is quite interesting to listen to, and melodies catchy. What distracts me is the sibilant consonants of T, S, poppy P, fricative F, and your breath noises. You will achieve better results cutting off breaths by hand, manually ducking t, s, p, f, and others.

Lyrics are very relaxing.

Vocal mix at times is MUCH louder than accompaniment and at parts rides roughshod over it. I think this can be corrected to some extent by bringing up bass, snares, hihats just veeeeery slightly by 0.2 dB or less, decreasing reverb on accompanying instruments and other wet FX. The pads are suffering quite badly from inaudibility of the lower register.

2:07 is the worst example.

At 2:36, the levels are starting to come into balance!

At 2:58 the vocals are about 0.2 to 0.5 dB too loud. I think a more judicious compression or hand leveling may help.

Your solo at 3:33 is very nicely played but could benefit from snare and accompanying vocals coming up somewhat.

Your vocoded vocals at the end are gorgeous. Much enjoyed.

I actually think after hearing your outro that a lot of the mud and unintelligibility of the track is due to compression picking up reverb and other wet effects and giving the impression of a wall of sound. Check out 2:02 with those pads getting lost in a wall of reverb.

Your vocals sound like they're spread out almost completely evenly in both channels, leading it to sound as if there's a weak center. This works for your vocoded vocals but makes the entire track sound very flat for your lead. Recommend a bit less chorus and perhaps a very light pingpong delay.

Instrumental wise, beyond the leveling, I'm very fond of your arrangement and have nothing bad to say. Transitions are done well. The only thing I would harp on even a little is just making sure if you must use a ton of reverb, you shorten those tails, take care to mind that reverb tails from previous chords don't clash with the next chords, or simply use them for effect with a big cut off like your end. Modulation, modulation, modulation, or you'll get mud.

Beyond that, great piece. I'm suffering from depression myself, so I'm here with you. Keep doing what you do!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

cad-mium responds:

thank you so much for the detailed feedback! this was my first real go at vocal mixing so i'll take a lot of this into consideration in the future

[An Amazing Adventure]

Pretty simple structure to the song. Nothing offensive in the sound design. Everything is clearly audible. I would recommend some changes to leveling.

Kick and snare should be proportionally the loudest things in your song. Whether this is accomplished through PERCEIVED loudness, opposed to actual loudness, is up to your taste -- i.e. sidechaining versus raising the levels, or adding distortion or saturation and transient shaping to your percussion to help them stand out. Your snare for your drop is a little hard to hear relative to the rest of the elements because it doesn't have a very pronounced mid to high frequency profile. Otherwise the leveling.

Your structure is good, but your transitions leave some to be desired. I think what you're lacking are crashes, transition FX - risers and downers, percussion fills, melodic fills and solos to tie everything together.

As a whole, the piece does not clash internally with its arrangement, melody, and progression. It's very easy to follow, and no part sounds BAD. This is great -- you're making songs that are coherent and easy to listen to. I think it just lacks some special sauce to make it truly unique. You will pick this up in no time, I'm sure!

As far as your leads, I would take them down by .2 dB to 1 dB, and your bass I might pull down an octave for drops, or write some more interesting rhythms, even if it's just 8th notes going back and forth between low and high octave of the same note -- a technique you often see in techno.

Other than that, nice work. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

burningmagma responds:

You're welcome! I will do my best in the competition.

[Zero_Em & Bonfire - Dream In Digital]

Blazing fast pace, dirty bass, nice beats, and great transitions.

My only complaint is it's hard to make out the percussion in the beginning and it sounds a bit mid-range heavy throughout the piece. Everything but the bass at least. Particularly 1:09 could benefit from just a bit less on the synths on the side, slightly less sub bass, and a bit less compression. Or a bit less volume on different elements going into the compressor. Take your pick. Cleaning up frequencies and levels would make this a solid 9.5 for me.

I'm not sure if you meant to leave in the clicks where string samples come in at 2:48 or so. That can be smoothed with a bit of playing with attack.

The whale-like ooooo is a bit too present for me.

Otherwise, fantastic piece, great listen. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

BonfireRMX responds:

oh! Thank you! I was really waiting for this opinion. me and my friend will take into account what you thought, thank you very much, and what you had said at minute 2:48 I think it was not intentional, that part was made by my friend but really thank you very much :D

[The Deamon]

This is smooth as hell. At 0:30 I am only thinking to turn down the chip synth in the intro by 0.2 dB

Your melodies flow like an orange sunset going down over the horizon, smooth, effortless, and a pleasure to observe unfolding. Great writing on your basslines. I supremely enjoy them. I might apply a bit of saturation or distortion, turn them up a bit.

2:17 is a nice suspenseful transition. 2:28 was unexpected, returning to the same groove, but hey! The track itself is varied enough I don't mind.

Spanking nice work. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

BAOWZ-Tobass responds:

glad you liked it! love the comparison XD. I'll try slightly more saturated baseline next time 😉

[Mr.Market]

I'm sitting at 00:40, and so far good development of elements but the progression seems slower than it should be into melodic/bass material. You have a lot of cool ideas and interesting composition.

I once was listening to a channel by a guy named Kush, and he said a great idea is to add 2 things and take 2 away for each transition. A man by the name of Adam Neely said "repetition legitimizes." Take what you will from that, but I think some study of song structure will do you really nice. That bass riff at 01:39 slaps, and I was sad to only hear it clearly for like 5 seconds!

I think you are on the cusp of discovering who you are as a song writer, and you will get there. Keep studying. Keep writing. Keep doing what you do, and never let anyone dissuade you from following your passion, whether you intend to keep it as a hobby, or turn it into a job.

Also, the piano at the end was random, lol.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

AthosBR64 responds:

i appreciate that you make a whole review about my song.thank you very much for the feedback!

[Dim Dimension]

I love your lead writing throughout and your chord structure.

I don't have much critique beyond those related to software and mixing. Obviously, drum samples could be better, and it could use mastering and compression. I have tons of freebies hiding out in my newsposts if you would be interested to sift through.

I think the track as a whole would benefit from bringing up your kick and snare in the mix, turning down reverb and delay wet signals, and experimenting with panning.

Beyond that, the piece holds together really well and is well structured. Your ideas are clear. At no point am I ever bored. It moves on with a definite idea of what it is and where it's going. Great job in that regard.

The bass is not obtrusive but could be taken down a slight amount.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

AnnieHer responds:

Yeah, experimenting with stuff is pretty fun. And as I improve with time I will understand how to properly use every part of my toolkit! Thanks for the feedback

[AniGleb - Inner blast]

Хочу сказать, что давно не писала отзыв на русском, но стараюсь, чтобы вам более или менее понятно то, что думаю о песне.

В общем, она классна, громкость разных инструментов ровно балансирована. Барабаны четко бьют, и прекрасно слышу их характеристики. Сжатие канала мастер также звучит вполне нормально и не мешает. Этим я всегда удивляюсь, слушая от новых исполнителей на нашем сайте. Значит что 2 года с нами не зря потрачены!))

Дроп второй неплохой. Только хотела услышать немножко побольше басовых частот среднего диапазона от 01:21 к 01:46, или, возможно, больше суббасов. Ревущему басу это поможет.

Кроме того что структура и мелодии песни относительно просты, у меня другой критики нет. Спасибо за вдохновляющую работу, и что пришли на NGUAC!

If someone speaking English wants to know what I said, you can copy the text and paste it to Reverso Context or another Russian translator :)

AniGlebGD responds:

Glad to hear that! And thanx you caring about language.)

[Laurie's Interlude]

This piece is pretty quiet, and there is a high pitched ringing in one of my ears over 20khz. It's louder than a lot of the other elements.

HOWEVER the vocal elements are enchanting, and the ride cymbals are nice. I would just bring the metal dings down very slightly.

Beyond the low volume, very hard ringing, I don't have much critique. I think the piano could do with some more gentle velocity, and not be layered in that lower register on the chords. I think that detracts from how ethereal the track as a whole sounds.

But overall, wonderful atmosphere and great work. It was a pleasure to hear and very relaxing!

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

anadevar responds:

Thanks a lot! It is nice to hear that.

[Battle Spirit - Quest to Kill God OST]

I don't have much if any critique. A bit less volume on your offbeat stabs and I think the leveling will be as good as can be.

I want to hear just a bit more of your counter melody.

The lowpass transition is a nice touch. Just a bit less volume on the snare coming in during the transition and it will be perfect.

The piece and melodies flow with effortless simplicity. Wonderful work. Takes me back to playing gameboy color, with better sound quality :P

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

amishpimp responds:

Thank you so much for the feedback, I really appreciate it!