Quarl's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[BARY- Downpour (ft spacedubz)]

I hate hearing something awesome on my low fidelity tablet speakers. I'll give this another listen later using headphones but I'm loving this grimy, darkstep, atonal goodness. That lead squeals something good.

Only constructive crit revolves around length, track could be another 20-30 seconds longer with a half time section. You could fit some drum step in this with a snare drum on every other note instead to give it a heavy breakdown feeling... but that's only if you wanted to keep working on this. This is awesome for six hours of work. Barry this is cool.

[X3ll3n - Secret Santa 2021 [WakerLink's NeuroFunk]]

lol, waterlink getting all "this isn't nuero." He's not wrong, this sounds more like jump up or tech step with that two step drum pattern but these are all subs of DNB so I don't see the problem really. Mix is great, everything is powerful and well put together. When I think nuero I toss Noisia to the front of that pile. This sounds more like Pendulum pre Hold Your Color, imo. Kids these days have no love for jump up.

I'm vibing to this, thanks for this musics :3

X3LL3N responds:

Thank you very much for the compliment !

I would have liked to make Neurofunk like Bastion's remix of "Stomp" by SubFocus, but I did not have the knowledge or the technicality for it. So I did go the Pendulum "Plan B" route for the drop and tried whatever would sound good for the rest of the song.

[Piano Rambling]

It's an awesome jam and could manage a lot of cool ideas/harmonies. I tried sampling this but that rubato is hella pronounced. My sequencer was not having it. Do you record MIDI at all?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xIiSrFT4QP6bEFADyhx_iLY0rmB-ipPe/view?usp=sharing
^lol remix

junipersona responds:

All I do is MIDI. Well listening to this now, yeah I played it live on my keyboard. I like the quirky synths especially at the end

[Spiral]

Love those reverse perc pulses, glassy pads, and contemplative melodies. Those pulses @ 00:35 were powerful. You've compressed those sounds to a nice full atmosphere. You've found the edges of your sound field and can now work to that max volume. I love the experimentation and exploration, you have such an artful style. OH FAK, those breaks at the end were hella tight. WHY DID YOU END ON BADNESS?? GIVE ME SOME DRUM REVERB AND FADE OUT ON A KICK OR A SNARE SLOWLY RELEASING ITS REVERB, OR GIVE ME A PAD FADE OUT, THAT ENDING IS WACK. YOU WROTE SUCH AN AMAZING SONG BUT THAT ENDING, WHAT THE FUK, YOU NEED TO GIVE THIS A BETTER ENDING.

lol, sorry for caps but I just can't express with words how wack that ending is. You can do so much better than that sudden cut off. You got a day until Christmas. If this is really secret santa material, go back and fix that ending with some reverb or something. Move the end of track marker a little further away and give that outro a nice little cool down. You write incredibly atmospheric stuff, ending on a cut off like that is wack <3 <3

EDIT: you didn't disappoint me dear. This track is awesome. I'm like half a nueron away from trying to make an ending for this...

larrynachos responds:

I'd consider this song incomplete, I stayed up from 2-6am to make it cause I'm at my parent's for Christmas and don't have time to work on it further. Yeah the cutoff is lame as hell, but honestly it was a struggle just to get the track to the state it's in currently. I'd like to revisit it soon and give it the proper progression it deserves.

Thanks for stopping by and giving your thoughts Quarl 💕 I'm sorry for disappointing you :( Happy holidays!

[Smooth World of Joy]

WOAH, THIS WAS FACE MELTING, I DIED SIX TIMES. THAT DROP, PERFECT. Seriously though, you and Sorohan should collab next year on some trumpet downtempo jazz whatnot. Soro is my super hero Romanian trumpet homie, old school newgrounds audio REACH OUT TO HIM. TOUCH JAZZ. FACE MELT.

https://sorohanro.newgrounds.com/

Spadezer responds:

Lol. Man I need to brush up on my trumoet practice, but I appreciate the compliment

[We R Venom]

I respect the fact that you went with a "general rock" tag when you could have snuck this into the much sexier "heavy metal" sub choice. Yo, go back and toss this into grunge. The longer I'm listening to this I can hear lots of cool concepts that vibe across genres. Loved those little synth melodies and pads/samples, I did not miss those adorable intangibles. Sexy deep vox at 2:19 gave me some good chills. Loved this dude2312.... can I just call you Mr. Dude from now on?

Only critical feedback might revolve around mix quality or guitar distortion. I don't even know where to start to get that David Maxim Micic/Chimp Spanner quality of heavy metal, sorry I can't pin point my crit to a specific instrument or tone. I make dumb edm, I kind of envy artists that can produce stuff like this. Love that 90's grunge sound <3

dude2312 responds:

Quarl, thanks a lot on your insight for this track! I could definitely use a couple tips on mixing. I think I am barely beginning to get it where I want. Been taking classes and tutorials here and there so, with all honesty, anything helps!

[Last Resort]

"From 2016" love it. You're old now. I was actually surprised your account page says "joined 2019." Thought you'd been around longer than that?

junipersona responds:

I've been around since 2014 on here. I was Seprix in the past. You can still see relics of this if you look at the yearly NG album comps. One year I got Castle Crashers Peacetime and I think also Tom Fulp Goes To Heaven on an album. 2/3 on submissions is pretty good. I've been here a long time. Hahaha

[Poof, Gone]

Lol, I sense a little identity crisis in that one sentence artist statement. It's all good love, write what makes you happy. Don't get too caught up trying to please the rest of us. Experiment with vibes and ideas that are interesting to you. These tones, textures, melodies, and ideas would all sound great at 172 BPM. Take what you learned here to the next track. Hell, I'd use this song as the intro. Put an automation lane on the BPM, speed up towards the end of this and hit us with some smooth jazzy liquid or idm. It's just an idea, shrugs. Nice name by the way, MoustacheExpress :D

Hairmilked responds:

Thank you for the vote of confidence, I really need it lately

[F-777 - Stay Tuned]

Love the new tune F-777. Bubbly happy melodies. Classy experienced risers and synth programming. I was gonna say something about it being nice that another old person is around then I checked your profile page and cried that you're still in your 20s. ENJOY IT WHILE IT LASTS BUDDY, YOUR 30's ARE COMING FOR YOU AND YOUR BACK IS GOING TO HURT >:'C

[Adreanaline Sample Pack!]

I came to hear the samples but stayed for the 6/4. Very pretty rhythm, fidelity sounds great *checks notes* on my poverty Walmart tablet. I'm gonna have to fly out and visit my dad in New York for the bandwidth necessary to download things again. I regret deleting my overplayed steam games now :c

ADR3-N responds:

You know, I actually made it 6/4 to not have to change the tempo and screw up the delays I set up hahaha. Instead it just made the timing wiiiiiild. I don't know if I could make a whole track like that, but it definitely is something to keep in mind if I ever get boxed in. You learn something new every day

Let me know if you want me to hold onto any files for you or zip things up differently. I know the feeling. When I'm at work, it may as well be dial up -- and I remember those days <3

I'm super excited to hear what you do with these, or a combination of them and your drum pack, which I still have btw. Your drums make me want to be a gremlin from Darkness II, galloping around smashing things