Quarl's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Concrete]

Tight amen breaks. It's cool to see someone ripping it up in Reaper. Between that and LMMS, which is doing which? I'm not super familiar with either DAW :)

Rakshal responds:

Thanks! I use LMMS for arranging and mixing, then put the tracks over into Reaper for mastering since I'm not super familiar with how to arrange things like melodies and pads and such in Reaper.

LMMS is stupid easy to use and is the first DAW I used so I'm the most familiar with it. Though LMMS isn't great for arranging drums on a piano roll since there isn't a MIDI to piano roll sampler, so chopping even fairly standard breakbeat patterns can be really time consuming.

[followin the sun]

lol, I saw the country tag and had to check it out. Good stuff kids. Probably the best country I'll hear all year. Probably the only country I'll hear all year :o

LunacyEcho responds:

honored to be your country fix for the year!!

[betrayal]

"i like the way this sounds...But you tell me what you think about it"

Well, we all have unfinished projects we liked but never posted for fear of not being liked. I have a fat folder of tracks I felt were "too experimental" or just shitty. The fact that you like it is the only important detail. I'm glad you still posted it.

For criticisms, there is so much reverb dulling the mix, I'd start by turning down the reverb on the claps. You can always automate spikes in the snare reverb if you like the sound but there needs to be a little bit of control on it if you want to clean up the drop.

No joke, with a cleaner heavier drum kit this track could bang just as hard as anything else. Can't tell if you layered your drums at all but I'd add some kicks and snares under what you got until I found the right complimentary kit parts. I usually use three to four different kicks and snares per song that work together to create the kits I like to hear. You can than use the different parts individually to create variety as the track progresses.

I don't know a whole lot about FL but in Reason I like to patch my drums so that they all get some EQ and compression. In dance genres, the drums are basically the most important element of the mix. So treat them like the heroes they are and polish them until they shine to the front of the mix.

Side chain the majority of your instruments with the both the kick and snare signals. It wouldn't noticeably effect the synths and it would let the drums pop.

Sorry for the book length review but I took your "tell me what you think" seriously. You got some good acid house here, just needs a cleaner drum kit. Much love Bary, keep it fresh :)

baryiscool responds:

I never noticed it had to much reverb..
maybe i never noticed it because i love reverb like that

And i have layered the snare and kick but only 2 times.. one low end and one high end
i could layer 4 but for me the drum kit sounded messy and to fat
but yes i could have done with more snares..

ill have to work on my drum kits
i always had a lot of work with those and i never get the hang of it
but i'm glad you liked it and told me how i could fix it

And the bigger the review.. the better

-bary

[Retribution (Madness - Retribution sndtrk)]

Damn heavy Cry. Those synths scrape. Heavy kicks. Love it <3

CryNN responds:

much thanks!!!

[Listerine]

I forgot I added the instrumental to my favorites. I need to see if I can write up some rhymes or solos :)

Love that slap bass. Background percussion is tight. Loved that 1:57 build up <3

ADR3-N responds:

Be sure to send me when you do. I have the project file. I can just lay you right on in there. :3

[Deception]

This has those dank hooting Noisia synths and I love it so much.

Demonicity responds:

ayyy you noticed!

[Hardbite]

This is some really nice nuero. Heavy bass Fw. Fills were tight, filtering was ace. I really loved this :D

FwWFW responds:

Thank you so much

[Listerine 2.0]

I'm not sure if we politically see eye to eye on everything but your lyrics were vague enough that we can still be friends! Rejoice! Really nice writing ADR. Back track kicked nice. Loved that slap bass, drums were tight :D

ADR3-N responds:

Haha, as long as you don't think it's okay to shoot people who disagree with you for being "fascist", I can come sit at the table. And I mean that in the sense of you shooting me, not me refusing to talk to you. Bolshevism is a dumb, failed ideology. <3

Thanks!

[Death to Ye Three]

Those violins were feeding me some serious Mendelssohn vibes, couldn't get enough. Sorry to ask but what are you using to get those vocals? They're great but they sounded a little cramped for space at the intro. After 00:17 every thing works out really nicely. Might have just been the highs of that white noise. What was that white noise supposed to be? Is that a result of EQ? Sounded like it could have been perc but I think the mix could have been better without it, imo. I also noticed there was a flanger or phaser on the vocals before the two minute mark. That was kind of weird, maybe that caused the mix problem I'm having?

Seriously, those violins blew me away. Good stuff lsd <3

LucidShadowDreamer responds:

Hey, and thank you for the review!
I think in the intro, what happened is... Normally when I go through a mix I check the sound on many different headphones as well as my speakers. But as this is the NGADM, I finished the song somewhere around 5am, and I used only my main set of headphones. Thus, there is just a little bit too much reverb that is heard in headphones with less space, especially on the high end. All of the parts in the intro end with "nus" or "mus" or "tus". This leads to the "S" syllable becoming a bit intense, which is probably the white noise you're referring to. I wonder if maybe a de-esser could've worked, or maybe I could've worked on the release. I don't really mind it, but I can hear what you mean!

It's a flanger indeed, but the effect is only active between 1:47-2:00, for the slowdown and unconventional key/chords.

I'm glad you like the violins, those were definitely the hardest and most time-consuming part! Even though I knew immediately what I wanted to do with them, I had to spend hours putting all the notes and harmonies in :'D

[ARCADE]

Really clean and hella dancy. The melodies were super kawaii. I felt a little embarrassed while enjoying it but if this started banging in public I'd get down to it. No shame. That second chorus around 1:15 grinded nicely <3

RedSkiesOfficial responds:

omg THANKS!