Quarl's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Diversity of Thought]

Unf, dank. Super epic trance Mich. Were you using any of your hardware for this or did you stick to digital? Also, how do you write an 8 minute song? I get to about 2 and am like "time to clock out and call it a day."

EDIT: Oh, so you COPIED SOMEONE ELSE'S STRUCTURE just like a real musician. I'm so proud of you Mitch :')

Mich responds:

Thanks Quarl! <3 The vast majority is just softsynths and samples, but a tiny bit of the bassline (the acid-like stuff) is done with my DIY modular synth thing.

For the structure, getting it to 8 minutes, I listened to a trance track I thought was very well laid out and took notes where what should happen, roughly. Put all that in the FL studio playlist and went to town building the track up that way. Focused first on getting the structure laid down, then made transitions better and tweaked stuff til happy enough. :)

EDIT: Lol, all about those recipes. :P

[Quiet Shores]

Love it, my favorite bit is that I can hear those keys getting hammered. It shows that the recording isn't top tier but who cares. Acoustic piano has a special vibe to it. Being in the practice space of a warm piano is such an overwhelmingly positive memory for me. Curious, what kind of piano are you playing with?

philbofett responds:

Hey, I appreciate it! I may or may not have used my phone to record this- hence the raw the sound haha
The piano I used is an upright Ricca & Son piano.

[Bubbleman 2.0 nguac tryout]

Classy syncopated idm beats. That tech step pattern coming in was a little unexpected after getting tossed around at the beginning. Cute little ditty Snow :)

snoballandthmonyshot responds:

Ta, glad to see you're still on it
Px

[House V1b3S - Audition 2020]

Dank atmosphere and pads. Definitely has it's own funk. Has a bit of that house sound but is far enough removed that I can only agree, putting this under "dance" was a good move. I just looked up tutorials to see if Live 10 can sidechain. This track might groove a little harder if those bass kicks were side chaining some of those pads. Heck, I'd even include the snare signal into the sidechain. It costs nothing to play with it :D

CaptainBoomcake responds:

yeah there's sidechaining in live10 with the basic compressor, but the reason I didn't was because I didn't want it to be tooo punchy just so it could be relaxing at the same time as dancy if you get me, a lot of my other work has heavy sidechaining, I might side chain my pads to create more space when I do the vocal edit though :) watch this space, and thanks for the review appreciate it! Because the bass throb is definitely all encompassing and needs to be dealt with on my other edit!

[Rumble]

Tasty melodies and change ups. Really sexy elements love. Mix sounded pretty mono and flat but that's my only complaint. All those great elements would have sounded more crisp if they all had their own place in the field. Just have to get brave, play with panning, and trust your ears a little.

It's a well accepted rule of thumb to put your bass tones, bass drums, and snares towards the center field. You can play with everything else. I like to split my lead synths into two signals, route the two signals into a mixer, than pan the two channels hard to the left and right. I'll send hi-hats, tambs, bells, rides, and crash cymbals off to the sides where ever they sound best.

Panning creates the illusion that sounds are louder than they really are so you can pan something, then turn the level down on it to give room for other instruments! Go nuts Valent, would love to hear these dank melodies and elements in a crisper field :D

UmValent responds:

Somehow this slipped under my radar, but thank you so much for the review, Quarl!
I'll keep on working on stereo balancing and mixing in general.
:)

[XTC]

Damn, this has some solid demolition room vibes. Lifted podcast used to post tunes like this and I've missed the dark step vibes. Out of sheer curiosity, who are you listening to these days Demonicity? What inspires this sound? I need some new DNB artists.

Clean reese basses, clean drums, creative samples, tight synths. Great stuff :D

EDIT: yo, I was so sad when noisia announced they're disbanding.

Demonicity responds:

thanks!
i listen to various neurofunk and techstep artists and my biggest inspirations on DNB are mostly NOISIA, Prolix, Phace, Malux, Black Sun Empire and Aeph.
Also the mindset of organic expression to sound gives me kicks.
Not forgetting raves tho.

[The Fall that Broke Me]

A beauteous romantic hand slammer. I'm certain people will be making babies to this.

It's good to hear a new LSD track. I haven't noticed you in my feed in a little while and I was starting to wonder if adult life had you cucked. In all seriousness though you really do compose such lovely solo piano work. Never give up the dream :)

LucidShadowDreamer responds:

That'd be quite the peculiar baby-making experience!

That said, I'm glad you like the piece! I have indeed not been uploading much as of late. I was in the risk zone for adult life-cucking, but thankfully I clawed my way out. I shall do my best not to give up on the dream, and I hope you do the say! Thanks for the nice words :D

[submerged]

I never played FF X2. I gave into all the negative reviews despite loving the first one so much.

Great ambiance by the way. Those wet synths were a nice element. The piano was heartful. The vox pad was good low key structural glue.

I almost didn't even catch that delicate loop. I just happened to scroll up right after it did. Great work Troisnyx :D

Troisnyx responds:

I did play it; I am not too much of a fan of the ATB and the JRPG character tropes, but I love the costumes, the changes in scenery, landscape and events going on, and especially the soundtrack. It is now my second favourite FF soundtrack of all time right now, second only to FFXV.

So glad you enjoyed this so much <33333 The feeling of healing was what I hoped to impart from this.

[World Jazz Collective - Balkano]

This jam melted my face <3

sorohanro responds:

Thanks :)
We recorded 3 tunes, hopefully will have time to mix them and post them soon. Want the stem to make a remix?