ADR3-N's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[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!!

[Cubiks - Neovitalism]

Very nice, interesting chords in your intro. Sounds like everything is super chorused though so there's this really spread out sound, in a thin way.

Now, I really like the bass notes you've chosen. I would take it down about .4 dB

Really interesting rhythms on your percussion. Reverb or something is making them sound really muddy though. I would say everything but your hihats could stand to have more crisp high end from 8khz up to about 18khz.

This is super trippy but repetition legitimizes.

The only chord I don't particularly like is 2:32. Change a note or two around in there subtly and I think it'll do what you want.

Overall I really enjoyed it. Interesting choices, a fairly pleasing sound design. I would recommend cutting a lot of those reverb sends or choruses down to size some. Your synths already have a very spaced out vibe. Chords are naturally already there. Bassline is the cheese to the cake if you feel me. It's like house meets dnb.

I would like to hear a bit more of your drums. You can try multiband compressors or compressors in general on each individual instrument lane. There are also transient shapers which you can look into, some of which I'm sure are even free.

Anyway great work. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

CubiksPlus responds:

Woah, Thanks for your feedback :D

[Suns3t]

Nice, functional intro. I would say by the first half-repetition of chorus, we should get a bassline going, something like a D, B, F#. Not having that bassline makes me feel like I'm not really going anywhere, despite the rest of the song otherwise being quite well written, if minimal.

That said, take this song, experiment with just adding some quarter note basses, and you will have a great synthwave feel. That DMaj chord just sounds juicy with some bass.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

c0mc1ol responds:

I definitely agree that the song is way better with a bassline and yes, I was going for a minimal type song because I didn't really have much experience in fl studio but I am trying to get better. Thanks for sending some feedback and criticism though!

[Lost Energy]

Interesting effect with the detuning going on here. Feeling good as we bring the intro in. I was expecting a quicker intro, but I'm not complaining by 0:50.

Mix wise, I would bring up your percussion by 2 dB... Or just bring everything else down.

This is a little pleasant sunset driving groove. I really like it.

For your snare, I can't hear if you're using gated reverb or just delay. If you're using just delay, look up gated reverb. It will help the grit of your snare so much. Then you can cut the delay wet signal and feedback down some. I always recommend cutting reverb and delay signals as much as possible due to their tendency to muddy up a track.

I would have skipped that stutter and re-entry into the chorus before 3:13 or so if we were going to fade out and have gradually faded over two choruses or so. Where would that have taken you, maybe 3:30 seconds? That's not bad. So I would either cut the intro and do that, or leave the fade completely off and just let it end on a nice I chord.

Anyway, really enjoyed this little groove. Nice work! Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

BrandonTurner responds:

I'll definitely look into gated reverb! Getting the snare to sit right with the delay was a pain and definitely could have been better.

Thanks for the critique, I'll keep all this in mind during future projects! I appreciate it!

[Abendmusic - Wilderborn]

Some muddy chords here, and mix is reverb heavy, but the structure is sound, and writing knows where it's going. Honestly, I would take the reverb tails you have going here and cut them by about 25-40 percent, depending on instrument. It's very low end heavy and washes out the great writing on your percussion.

By 2:12 I'm not hearing a lot of variation of texture. That section, the lead is particularly synthy with ... it sounds like a high portamento on the tonic. I think you could cut most of it out and the piece would stand well.

I don't have a lot of critique beyond that. The piece is solid and a good listen. Great work. Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

Abendland responds:

Hi ADR3-N
Thanks a lot for your thorough feedback! Helps me a lot to improve! I appreciate it a lot, thanks for your time!
Cheers, Chris

[MADE WITH FL STUDIO 20]

Drum beat isn't bad. Song itself reminds me of the forest theme in pokemon.

We've got chord changes every two beats. Lot of diminished sounds going on here. That leaves it sounding disjointed almost on purpose, but repetition legitimizes.

It's pretty short.

Now, I actually like the section with the low bass. I'd focus more on that and repeat it more often so that it becomes our chorus. Everything else doesn't really seem to be leading anywhere, especially because of how short the song is in general.

It's important to remember in kinda just tossing out a piece in 5 hours, it's probably not going to be great, unless you've got a full template up with all your instruments and you have in mind EXACTLY what you intend to do with it. During the average song making process you'll probably spend just that amount of time listening, referencing... maybe hear your piece 200 times at minimum, until you go ear dead. For one thing, I'd go onto some song writing channels, see if you can study up on some very basic music theory (it really does help to fill in the gaps when you're just banging away on the piano roll, hating life because you can't get the sounds you want)

Recommend Signals Music Studios, Holistic Songwriting, Ben Levin... The last one is pretty advanced and almost makes me feel like an idiot when I completely zone out on some technical explanations, but he has a lot of great inspiring videos for when you get that awful writers block making music.

In any case, if you really enjoyed making this piece, and trust me, for starting out, this is pretty damn good, it's worth getting a full version of whatever program you feel comfortable with. Some I'd recommend are FL Studio and Mixcraft, though I've heard good reviews for Cubase and Reaper, and Reaper, if you can learn to use it, is borderline free, or, free trial until you can actually afford to pay for it.

Good luck in your music making endeavors! You're off to a great start!

Here from Review Request Club

Samuka31 responds:

Thanks!

[[REMAKE] Re: Reveris]

I dearly want to hear you revisit this piece. Singing. Has been one of the most moving melodies. Absolutely can't get it out of my head.

Also, your production has really improved.

Troisnyx responds:

Yes, at some point I think a remake of the vocal version of Re:Rev is due. O_O I imagine it'd be quite the spine-tingler when it's done.

Thank you so much for the kind words, and for favouriting this piece! <3