Quarl's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[=HaruSong= [RMX]]

mawr

lol. haru song is perfect for remixing. I really liked what you had going on here. It was an incredibly simple remix but it really made for an interestingly clean experience. If I were to do anything different here I'd say that this track could use a nice subby bass tying things together and a slightly heavier drum kit. After reading the artist comments it sounded like you tried really hard on this.

If you need help getting bigger sounds I got just the advice for you. I think I type the following up like six times a day so I'll just copy/paste this from another review...

"First thing I notice is how thin that snare sounds. Add some salty layers. It sounds like you're using just one snare. Throw on some more snares to fatten up that sound. Lets get a 909 on it to give it some air, throw on some distortion/ EQ to get the tones out of it. You might even want to just start out with some better samples... "

More on layering...

"It doesn't sound like you know the miracle of layering yet. Have you ever tried stacking your drums to make new sounds? It sounds like your just using some nice samples. Next time around, get three to four different snares and three to four kicks and make new kits by layering old sounds. This will really widen up your sounds and lead to a plethora of new ideas!"

After you have layering down, look into compression, equalization and sidechaining. Those techniques will help you out butt loads once you have them perfected.

Peace and love <3

Daydream-Anatomy responds:

Thank you for the critique:3

I learned a lot about drum compression, eqing, etc from trancecrafters tutorial vids, but he has a whole new set of tutorials and deleted the old ones, I need to watch them, because he goes into a lot more detail about eqing drums.

I wanted to keep this track simple because I thought the song stood up pretty well on it's own. I didn't want to over do it.

thanks again^.,.,.^

[=WannaDance?=]

murp

My opinion is that the intro could have used a softer drum kit, perhaps even some reverb. Everything is punching through just right but that doesn't mean the intro can't have it's own unique drum kit. 1:31 could have used some really high freq pad just mellowly doing it's own thing. Even some crash cymbals would have been nice.

This is a really good start for a really ace production but it falls a little short for me. Melodically it's perfect. The rhythms are nice too. This track needs more mid range background intangibles to really stand out and be unique. G'luck!!!

Daydream-Anatomy responds:

Noted:3

I went lazy on the crashes and stuff until I figure out what I wanna use to transition the parts, tbh all I got is FL stock drums, and like, 5 samples, I edit them like crazy though. I'm gonna strongly consider at least using a different kick in the intro:3 A different kit would really set it apart, which I'm thinking would be good, or making a copy of the drums, and making it softer or something, I'll experiment.

I'm pretty proud of a lot of melodies, usually I try to have simultaneous/dueling leads if it can fit without hindering the other. A lot of times it's just one arping, or something like that, and one playing a melody, but I make it complicated sometimes:3

On the other hand eq'ing, mixing, and mastering are my vice:/

dude you know what's weird, I was listening to your hania remix, before I even saw your user nameO.o coincidental huh? I remixed Haru song too, but your's is a lot cleaner and polished, imo. I really like hte part where the vocals are dropped out and it's just dub.

Thank you for the kind and helpful review^^

[martialmichael126 character]

spot on.

Some times the background sounds wreck the vox but you seem to have a good mic and your ideas are top notch. I'd recommend you for the right project in a second. Also, in response to background intangibles being too forward and front, that's probably a problem for whoever is working the sound on a project, not you.

Good job on the demo reel. G'luck on finding projects'!

[Sheep Herder--_--]

Your style transcends normality.

I never see you in the forums so I kind of forgot about you over here man. You've always had so much integrity when it came to your own style. This really does sound like a zenon track and nothing else ever comes close to sounding like it. If I were a stick in the mud I'd say you've always had really lo fi drum sounds but seeing as how it contributes to your flavor I can't take it away from you. Some people still make love to the amen break. Can't knock something that works :p

sexy man.

PERVOK responds:

Haha, I don't have the amen break anymore :( Those are just samples that I grabbed from a few websites off the net... was getting sick of using the Reason sounds :p

Thanks for the review, fellow!

[LS&L - Dubstep's Future (WIP)]

good start.

right off the bat I felt like some of those sounds were really lo fi. that synth at the beginning playing the melody needs to be phatter. distort, add an oscilator, pan, EQ, compress, filter, phaser/flang... really anything would help things out for that synth. it's just incredibly bland. the next lo fi sound I notice is that click going off at 0:40. given that it's part of the introduction, i might keep it in there but lower the level, add a touch of reverb then bend the pitch until it sounds on. of course, there are a million other samples that could replace that sound but as things are right now it just irks me. it reminds me of the click noise most programs use as a default metronome :/

wayyyyy too much reverb on that drum kit. you want that kit punching through the mix and driving things. the drums are the arguably the most important thing to any electronic music genre... save for ambient for obvious reasons. knock it off and use reverb sparingly. it muddies the fuck out of a mix and this track would be so much cleaner with a little less of it.

Drums: compress, layer, EQ, sidechain your synths/bass and repeat until that drum kit is clean like a babies rump. if your unfamiliar with how to do any of that I'd learn how to do each in that exact order...

another thing I want to touch on, that drop at 0:57 is messy as fuck. are you familiar with clipping? you'll want to watch your levels at that point because my headphones hear nothing but good old fashioned digital clipping. don't overdrive that signal to the point where your driving your clipping indicators to the red. back down on that mix and compress where you have to.

last thing to hit on is panning. panning gives of the illusion that sounds are louder than they really are so when you pan a sound up a lot you can actually turn the levels down on everything to help keep it all clean. it's like you can have your cake and eat it to.

[LS&L - Dust]

Needs a lead.

No offense man but this song is kind of boring. My opinion, it could have used a banging distorted sawtooth filtering through mad crazy like. Those vox samples are unbecoming of this track. The guy says "I bring death." I wish he brought pillows and blankets instead.

This song is incredibly empty. Throw a pad in there for great justice. Anything in the background would help fill the track up. You started to hint at it at times but something bright like a piano or some strings would have really helped out the track. And don't give me that "oh, but I was going for a really dark and boring atmosphere kind of vibe." This is just lazy all around.

Some more background fx and instruments would really have breathed some life into this. I guess I've already said that but I'll put some emphasis on it. Actually, experiment with putting some heavy distortion on that "lead" you already have and EQ the fuck out of it until you have something powerfull. What DAW you using man?

DLBeezy responds:

Well, I wasn't exactly going for the melt your face off track that most people love to hear. Given that I only spent a couple of hours making this I really just dropped some powerful wobbles in there with a nice back end sub to really WOMP the speakers. I guess I was a bit lazy to add on more effects and random percs but again, I was quite limited on time. I'm trying different things. This wasn't a 100% serious of a track either. Just testing the flexibility of my producing skills. I'm using FL. Though, a lot of my new stuff is the "melt your face off" dubstep.

[S.U.I.A- Augmentation (RD2011)]

lurp.

Saw this sitting in the adverts thread. Right off the bat it sounds like things are clipping pretty hard. If you're not familiar, clipping is distortion that arises when you overdrive the signal. Clipping can be nice in the analog world but digital clipping always sounds really lame. Try compressing your sounds a little and turn some levels down.

I liked what you were playing with in terms of panning. Panning can create the illusion that sounds are louder than they really are so if you pan things up a good bit you can actually turn your levels down and have more room to mix. I noticed that some of the panning was moving from side to side. I always love the sound of that but keep in mind that some speakers can't handle that. Some people will loose a good bit of the sound if you pan like that :(

Other than that I liked what I heard. Awesome melodies, cool rhythm. Drums sounded a little iffy but not enough to really bother me. You're on your way for sure. Keep working on your sound, keep making jams and you'll be pro in no time. Practice makes purfect.

superuberinsaneausm responds:

the clipping in the beginning was NOT deliberate or just a side effcet of the filter i put on it but had nothing to to do with the DAW itself messing up.

yea i had alot of fun with pan-omatic plugin in FL10 maybe too much lol

thanks!!

[{RD2011} Mecha Marauder]

lol

illlll stuff right here. that melodic intro followed by filth mania. on a scale of one to ten, I'd say this is about pretty awesome. you got such a clean sound, maybe if i were to do anything different I'd say some more variety might be nice but the songs so clean I almost don't really care that it loops 100 times. <3

alextheDJ responds:

Thanks! Yah the lack of variety is just laziness on my part. I'll look at it this way - at least I know what my weakness is :P

[Death Of A Robot (RD2011)]

dddfdfdfdfdfdff

I liked a lot of the ideas you used in this track but I had a major issue with the mix and choice of drums. I didn't feel too kindly about that snare. There wasn't enough bass-mid in it and that reverb/ long cut off time sounded kind of messy to me. The track was really short and I felt like it could have gone somewhere else. The background sounds are cash. I loved what I heard sitting back there. The melodies were spen-tastic. I thought that maybe the lead synth could use some distortion/ EQ to phatten it up.

All in all, great work mister. G'luck in the comp :)

RedHydrex responds:

Thanks for the review! I'll do my best to fix the drums and stuff up! I wasn't a huge fan of the drums myself :/...