Quarl's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Realm (NGADM2021)]

I've been waiting patiently to see what everyone in our bracket brings forward, I'm happy to finally hear your track Diossel. Very gentle, very atmospheric dnb. Lush pads and strings. Those sensitive little keyboard melodies are essential. I love that you chose a fractured snare pattern for the rhythm instead of those big jump up two-step patterns common in the scene.

I'm also glad you wrote a little bit about your time getting into music on newgrounds, a lot of us older users share similar origins. I remember collaborating with Fox Stevenson here when he was 12. Emperor was here for a minute under the alias "Parathile." Spacelaces had an account here. I hope one day I'll be able to say "I lost to Diossel in the NGADM and now he's BIG." I won't have to wait long to know if I get to say that, but I really do love watching people grow. Regardless of what the future holds for us, I'm rooting for you D. Good luck and let's hope the judges know good music when they hear it :D

DiosselMusic responds:

Thank you, I'm very excited to know that people like my music, it makes me feel happy, I really appreciate it.
Thank you very much!!! ^^

[LET IT ROLL]

I tend to give a lot of constructive crits but you more or less accomplished what you were going for. Def has the vibe of that DNB time period meets the compression of 2021. Needs some vocal chops from the Commodore break and some filtered drum fills to really give it some more of that early millennium spunk. One of the first DNB albums I purchased was Dieselboy's 2004 Dungeon Masters Guide. Had no idea what I was getting into at the time. I suppose I bought that shortly after I purchased The Human Resource. If there's something I liked about Dieselboy's mixes it was how much variety the drum breaks came with. These loops are awesome, but you can always go back and half time those drums in a section to make the groove a little rowdier. You could delete the drums entirely towards the middle to get a nice break down and let the pads do most the work. Same tactic makes for a nice intro.

There's so much to like about this, but it comes off like a WIP (work in progress). Let's get some phasing drums, some panned risers... on that note, how much panning is going on? Panning creates the illusion that a sound is louder than it really is so after you pan something you can turn it down a little to make room in the mix for other stuff. All those mid to high frequency sounds could bare some panning save the kick/snare drums which are happy in the middle side chaining the sub bass. You could automate those grainy pads from left channel to right channel every few bars? Aux percussion like hihats, tambs, shakers... all that fun stuff can be panned good and hard. Just got to play with it a bit :D

Layer a saw reese over that sub to get some heavy 2000's dark step. Get a gnarly 3x osc sawtooth, add a little distortion, and automate some pitch bends and you got something wild. I find it so funny that you managed to make such a huge sound with just the drums and sub. Those grainy pads are like a small layer of dirt on a new car compared to the car itself. I mean, drums and bass has to be huge for the genre but there is no room for anything else in this xD

I love the fact that you're going up to 189 BPM. I've been spending time at 188 lately :3

I don't leave reviews like this unless I think you got some room to improve and can pull that off. I love hearing people grow and push their sound. I love this so much, I just want to hear you put as much emphasis on variety as you do on the mix down. You mentioned there was a lot of repetition in this on Discord. I can confirm, there is indeed a lot of ctrl c. Now you have the perfect skeleton to turn this into some high action professional DNB <3

triplebarrel responds:

That's a text wall and a HALF holy SHIT. I've not really tried anything with panning to make sounds seem louder, which your tracks seem to abuse for lack of a better word. :p - I've not really tried phasing drums either since there's probably a high chance that'll fuck up my mix. I've been paying more attention to the stereo of the mix, the snares here especially which I guess gives it that huge feeling you mentioned. I've also been giving subs with white noise and a bit of distortion a lottt of stereo at the highs too, I suppose. It's safe to admit I spend most of the effort on the mixing and mastering.

Can't really blame you for the WIP vibes either, according to FL I spent 59 minutes on the whole thing lmaoo. There is room for improvement on everything imaginable, and I guess I should start trying to get out of my comfort zone. Thanks for the review!

[LostBrASS]

Perfect chill dnb breaks, awesome pads, smooth piano, great atmosphere. Drums from 1:01 to 1:23 sound thin, I could use some more textures in them. Layer up a phat subby kick and a clap or 808 snare :)

I kind of get what MisterRedEyeGuy was complaining about, repetition can sink a composition but to hell with dropping zeros on stuff you just don't like. Petulance.

[dududu-du]

Loved it. Mix down could probably be a little more fine tuned but I love the elements all coming together to make some really grimy filth <3 <3

Edit: since you're asking about mix I'll toss out a few ideas. Fair warning, everything is awesome I'm just nit picking things. I'm at max volume listening to this but I like having the option of turning the volume down. Theres more room in the mix to push a few instruments harder. People worry about over compression but you might listen to your track on another set of speakers and realize this sounds different. Bass is great but given the genre you might be able to push it a little more. Snare drum falls a little flat sometimes. Maybe experiment with another snare layer more in the mid range? A clap or 808? I'm really splitting hairs here but I do feel like certain tones are missing. Maybe some more aux percussion? This track would love a vibraslap or a waterphone.

I can't tell how much panning is going on but I think you can really push left and right further. Panning creates the illusion that sounds are louder than they actually are. By getting braver with mid to high range panning you can then turn those sounds down a little and make more room in the field for other sounds. Things to try panning with include pads, aux perc, and various sfx. Favoring a left or right side can also lead to issues but you can always find ways to balance the mix. Just takes some playing with :)

I've been advised to keep bass frequencies mono or in the middle. That includes the kick drum. I like to put a small bias on the ghost snare but the bulk of the snare layers stick to the middle. Then use them to sidechain sub bass frequencies.

Again, you did an awesome job. I only came back around because you asked. I'm always willing to clarify stuff :)

djhoohaa responds:

Thanks :) i thought i did a really good job on the mix lol. what aspect of it should i look into? or just a bit of tweaking over all?

Edit: Thanks, i really appreciate your time and reply
Nice, loads of ideas here. i am pretty lazy with panning but mainly due to when ever i have tried it, i dont get the results i want lol however i do try seperate the hi hats a bit. ive never thought about just panning certain frequencies of a sound before. that sounds fun to experiment with. ,Also just had to google what a waterphone is, i kinda want one now.

[Chained Promises]

Just wanted to say I loved this. Great atmosphere and textures. I'm a little confused by the prolonged silence at the end, clip that a little before the judges come around! Looks like there is more space in the mix for extra tones and textures but even with all that extra space the track really holds down strong. Good stuff Wolfgang :D

WolfgangMiakoda responds:

Genuinely wish I could fix that silence, but I’m out of the country atm. As I mentioned in the description, it’s a rendering error; FL Studio sometimes has this weird tendency to just add 30 seconds of nothing on the tail end of a project, and I have no idea why it does that. Unfortunately I was strapped for time, so I won’t be able to fix it until I get home

[Bored at the Midnight]

This sounds like some nice late 90's jungle. Classy drums and pads, soft reesey saw synths. I just wish it was longer Dieswyx :)

[Hardest technology punk]

THIS ROCKS SO HARD. Buddy Rich wishes he could drum this fast. Had to listen at a really low volume but the visualizer shows a surprisingly phat wave shape for a drum solo. You could probably find a way to fit a bass in this :)

Thomas-Collins responds:

Hello lady AIDS ....
This song is a remix of the song, TBE "created by TBE-punk861 but in a different way and longer than the original, and this song is good I recommend 9/10.
Link of the original:
https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/887

[MRRDRR]

I listened to this for literally two seconds on the front page before I was like "snap, gotta stop by and fully admire those crunchy drums." What's the BPM we playing with here? Love that break down a minute in.

When did you die and become Aphex Twin's twin Aphex?

[2984]

Gah, hella cool atmosphere and pads. Icy bell like synths and relaxed drum samples. Kind of wish the track was longer, those pads could hold up the track for a little while without the drums, chimes could lead into a section with a powerful gong, tambs could color up the spectrum a little...

I'll share some panning advice, I've typed this a lot but I salivate every chance I get to say it again. Panning creates the illusion that sounds are louder then they actually are. You can pan aux percussion like hi-hats and tambs then turn them down a little to make extra room in the field for other sounds. Experiment with where to pan aux percussion :)

Track could legitimately be a little louder with proper compression. There's room in the field for more of everything, amp something or turn off a limiter. Other than some mix stuff this track is really cool and has a nostalgic feeling :)

[Pixel Plains]

Sweet melodies, drum fills, patterns, and lovely harmonies between instruments. Very professional stuff Ketyri <3. I'm only gonna nit pick a minor mix detail, I'd have sidechained everything tonal just a little bit to allow the kick drums to pop some more. I may even include the snare in that sidechain signal. Only a sound nerd like me would nit pick something like that though, very minor detail to point at. Some of those lead synths sound like they hit with more emphasis than the kick drums. I'm really listening to those kicks, wishing they could punch a little harder. While a side chain signal would max the fidelity, another mid freq bass drum layer might also help? I usually have three bass drums layered regardless of genre to create a nice solid kick sound and I'll use one or two of those layers on off beats to create the illusion of velocity change ups in the drum rhythm. Those off beat bass drum kicks are a little less powerful than the kick that falls on the first count but since they're included in the side chain signal they'll still pop a little bit more.

Track would bounce nicely as a video game menu screen or background track. If you ignored my main crit you'd still impress a programmer looking for music or anyone else for that matter. All the classic elements like rhythm and melody are perfect. Again, only a sound engineer is going to nit pick anything and to that extent you're showing off professional skills. Compression is letting you take advantage over the full range of the spectrum. Track is perfect, don't let my nit picking take away any pride you might have for this ditty. 10/10 :')

junipersona responds:

When I made this track way back when I didn't even know what sidechaining was.