Deemo-R's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[everyday life]

This track is just what the doctor ordered. Fantastic stuff as expected!

johnfn responds:

Dr. electro prescribes 50cc of ... uh.. whatever genre this is!

Thanks for the review!

[Valley of War]

Saw your review on dem0lecule's piece. I don't see why the pessimistic view, you've got a pretty good grasp on writing music for this being your first upload. I liked the change at 1:20 a lot. There's a lot of pitfalls on the mixing side (and this is the pot calling the kettle black; I still struggle with every bit of mixing), but that's something that gets worked out the more you make music. You'll only grow better as you keep writing, so keep it up!

Free soundfonts are tough to sell to the listener in a piece, but good composition will always bring the best out of what you have. If you want realism from your soundfonts, start trying to humanize them when you've got their parts finished (or even beforehand). Vary up velocities and use volume automation to give your strings (or any instrument, for that matter) a personality and direction. This is a great habit to get into early on if you want to write for virtual orchestra instruments. Bringing that element of dynamic expression is essential to any piece. Your piano part is pretty nice in that regard. The sustain + long reverb tail combo kind of bleeds into the string parts a bit, though, and sections like 1:43 suffer from it. Careful not to let reverb steal too much definition from your song. It's also worth thinking about how often you clear the pedal on the piano when busier sections happen, because it no longer focuses solely on the piano, and things like the string section need some space to breath in the mix. Those kinds of things will come up endlessly when writing, and you'll definitely get the hang of them. I like your handle on composition already, I'd like to see how it progresses from here. :3

TearsOfSadness responds:

Thank you for the long review.
I was not as much pessimistic as I was complimenting his incredible skills. I don't think I'm striving as hard as him to make music, as to me it's more of a hobbey. That is why I will never reach his level.
Yes, the mixing is pretty terrible.
I agree that the composition is more important than the production and quiality of instruments.

I should have spent more time on the humanizing of the strings, but the piano is as humanized as it can be. This song isn't even in a specific tempo.
I will consider your advice in the future Thank you, for the motivation as well.

[The Al Gore Rhythm]

Took me forever to get around to writing on this one, but it's good to see you finally upload something to the site! I really like the percussive drive in this one, personally. Looks like you're already scouted, too!

[They took my nose]

I somehow wasn't expecting this lmao

DESHIEL responds:

good ;D

[Betrayal]

I like the guitar a lot in this, though it kinda brings out some of the flaws of the other instruments a bit more. I'll admit right off the bat that the title of this one confuses me, haha. I'm not exactly sure what it's going for, though I do enjoy each of the sections for what they offer. I don't see it fitting into the context of a game with some of the sudden mood shifts, but I think it's a nice standalone piece. I'll try and take it step-by-step:

The intro is very sparse, and I like it a lot. The organ and guitar both sound good together, and it only helps that the quality of the steel string vsti is strong enough to stand on its own. 0:22 has a nice thing going on with the guitar, organ, and very heavy wet reverb bell-ish instrument. Some of the notes get a bit messy with all that reverb, but it's not too bad. When the drums come in, I don't find myself a big fan of the snare sound. It's a bit dry and lifeless, and for some reason the hits sound incredibly quiet even though it sounds like head was struck quite firmly with the stick (which is very possibly just a limitation of cheap drum vsti). It does get a bit better when it's playing the louder velocities in the middle of the song. The hi-hat is panned to the left, but most of the drums are firmly stationed in the middle, including the snare. Personal preference here, but I'd pan the snare slightly between the hi-hat and bass drum since that's where it sits on a real kit. Most of your instruments are panned down the center of your stereo space, too, so those big sections (1:30) can tend to get a bit crowded with everything going on.

When the two flutes come in at 0:43, some of the phrasing is a bit unrealistic (0:51) in how the notes are played. I'm no expert of legato phrasing for wind instruments, but definitely listen carefully to how real players phrase passages and try to apply some of that into your pieces. Some of the notes here sound too separated and all at the same volume. Singing the line to yourself (and carefully listening) as expressively as you can may give you a good idea of how to properly phrase things. Oftentimes conductors do this to paint an image for the orchestra members to observe. Singing your melodies to yourself in general is a really nice habit to get into :)

1:04 takes the song in a direction that I wasn't quite expecting. It sounds like something out of The Dog Island, actually. Good job on the subtle hi-hat(-ish) rhythms floating in the background, very subtle and effective. I almost didn't notice them happening. This is just personal taste, but when the snare comes in, I might have opted for rim knocks instead of the snare head just to help differentiate the texture of the section even more from the following section. That's just me, though. At 1:25, this might have been a conscious decision on your part, but one unspoken drummer law (guideline, really) is that we tend to always accent a crash with the bass drum in order to give a nice low-end impact to the sound. It's pretty rare that I'd ever play a cymbal without the bass, unless someone directly asked me to omit it. As for the rest of that section, I hear the bell sounds from the intro making their return. They fit pretty well here, too. The chimes you added in this section sound pretty good to me, though I think you could make them a little more present in the mix. They're a bit lost in the background at the moment.

The little transition between the deviation and return to the theme (1:25) is decent. I don't know what it is about it, but I feel that it could have been slightly stronger in some way. Disregarding that, there's some reverb tail that's persisting through there. I don't know if that's from the instrument currently playing or from the chimes/bells in the preceding section, but I think it would be a good idea to try and dampen some of that feedback. It sounds like undesired air slipping into the mix.

Onto the payoff, 1:30. There's a nice homophony happening here with the flute and oboe in unison (a texture that I tend to personally enjoy myself), and the organ is an interesting choice for the harmony. The bass gets pretty active with an 8th-note pattern here, which works fine. The problem I have with this part is that everything sounds like it's being brought down the middle of the stereo space, which makes some of these parts compete with each other for presence. I'd at least pan the flutes and oboe a bit away from each other. The second time the section repeats, I hear the organ increase a bit in volume and play along with the flute/oboe melody. Feel free to ever-so-slightly adjust the velocities in the flute and oboe part to allow the organ a bit more wiggle room. Adjusting for other instruments is a very common point of consideration in real bands. I think I hear some of those odd reverb tails coming back at 1:50, are those coming from another instrument? Am I just hearing things there? Anyways, the transition back to 0:22 works just fine, and I don't really have any issues with it.

I definitely don't mean to imply that I didn't like this piece. I quite enjoyed it, in fact. You are still quite creative in making melodies and have some really good ideas peppered throughout all of your songs. I simply had a moment of time and felt like giving as much of my thoughts on it as I could. I have no doubt you will be making some really kick-ass stuff not too far down the road. All the best!

ILG924 responds:

Wow, that's quite the review!
I appreciate your panning tips, I really need to get better at figuring out where to put instruments. I'm really quite limited when it comes to drum vsts (I have one that doesn't vary much in style), but it is already set up to pan properly with real drum kits. I think what happened there was a slight reverb squished everything (especially the low end) together. Now I know what not to use over the entire plugin!

Flute phrasing, I think its one of those things I don't know how to listen for, so I'll keep that in mind.
I didn't know about cymbal + bassdrum, so I'll be using that in the future.
I think the instruments you hear lost in the background is from my bad mixing skills, I couldn't bring much more out without drowning something else out. I imagine panning everything properly was all I needed to fix that.
The reverb you hear at 1:25 and 1:50 is intentional, it's actually the lower octaves of that heavy wet reverb bell thing you hear in the beginning. I thought it sounded neat, though I probably could've made it a bit quieter.

I checked my project at 1:30 and I do see how little I panned the instruments, the oboe's right in the center. Again, that's something I'm not good at listening for so thanks for bringing that to my attention.

As for the title, a much darker theme would've fit better I agree, but I figured the semi-dark sounding melodies and unexpected change in the middle fit the elements of a betrayal. Probably would work better during a cutscene or something, but I don't really think of a theme before I write a song. I'm also pretty bad at thinking of good names so the first thing that popped into my head was what I stuck with.

You're the first person to actually give an in-depth review of my songs, so I really appreciate it. It's helped a lot!

Also, I'd like you to know that you most likely won't be getting massive walls of helpful text from me on your work lol. I do listen to them all though. Clearly you're more experienced with music production so you'd only be getting my personal thoughts, and I've yet to dislike one of your songs.

[Ling Kano's Fighting Show S3]

Went back and checked the old ones, and it's really cool to see how much the original composition has been improved upon. Love the way it's mixed compared to the old one, and the new erhu SoundChris brought in sits better in the piece than the older versions.

The drums and bass sound familiar. Speaking of which, I like the attack on the bass. It keeps that funky slap-like sound from the original intact.

SourJovis responds:

Thanks! It's strange how I ever thought it was finished. Maybe it still isn't, but this is the best I can make it at the moment. I hope new songs I make will immediately like this, so it doesn't take over a year of improvements to finish it.

Sound Chris' did a great job indeed. I don't really have Er Hu samples myself. The old Er Hu was just a very distorted string section, that acted like an Er Hu (with the legato and all).

These drum samples I got for free when I updated Reason halve a year ago. I only use these drumsets since then. Mainly this particular preset called harder harder. Though I've changed it a lot, to make it even harder.I've changed a lot in the mixing and added lots of distortion, compression and other effects.

The bass is a sample pack by Shreddage. Before I got it I didn't realise it would only be a pick-bass, but it works for this song. The early bass was fingered, with a lot of slaps. This pick-bass has that slap-like quality as well, but I had to boost a lot of the highs to get it to sound like this. I still like it better than the early bass. This one sounds more life-like.

[Rathunas - Cinematic Trailer]

Professional and resplendent in its colors, as one would expect from you at this point. There is a clear journey here and the orchestration is wonderful in all parts. The mixing brings everything out quite nicely, as well. Always a pleasure to hear a master of his craft at work! :)

What drum is that in the background (panned a bit to the left) during the second part? The timbre interests me, it sounds too punchy for the typical taiko drum (unless I'm stupid). The realism of it didn't quite convince me like the other instruments, though; there seemed to be a lack of humanized velocities for the drum strikes. I think it would be even more effective if you emphasized the dynamic variation of them more, bringing some of those inner notes down a bit.

But here's me, grasping at straws. Nitpicks are all I can really offer seeing as I haven't the foggiest how you even begin to put something so grand together. Wonderful work as always, Chris! The mod looks very cool. ;)

SoundChris responds:

Thanks a lot Darkmetroidomega for your kind and detailed review! I would not consider me to be a master but i try my best to improve my skills. I started to compose in 2012 and i think things are becoming better - but i am stil far from where i want to get :D

Btw - you have a good ear. The midpart percussion indeed wasnt s standard drum / taiko. I wanted to avoid to get a muddy mix and tried to bring in a patch from stormdrum 2 - the godzilla hits. Its advantage is that it cuts clearly through the mix without making anything muddy. Also the sound reminded me a lot of the terminator main theme. If you listen carefully you will see that these drums are quite similar to those in the secondpart of the trailer.

Thanks a lot for your kindness good sir - especially for the "as always" part :D

Best wishes,
Chris

[Imminent Threat]

I somehow missed this one somewhere in the December holiday-fever, and what a coincidence that it's also a pretty rockin' battle theme! You definitely have a good track record for interesting melodies and progressions, and this one most certainly continues that trend. The progressive feel of it definitely lends towards that highly-revered FF vibe, but it's got a lot of its own quirks. Your guitar tone sounds fantastic to me, though I'm not a savant in that area. I hope you'll make use of it in more of your future uploads, too. It's really got a lot of potential!

Starting with one instrument is always a good way to get your ideas hashed out cohesively, so if that is working wonders for you, I say keep going at it! Good work, you need some more followers! :D

ILG924 responds:

There's a slight phasing issue with the lead guitar because of the doubletracking method I used, so I'm glad someone still liked it. I'm really trying to improve in that area, so I definitely will be using it in future songs

Thanks for the review, I appreciate it!

[Fall Of An Angel]

So glad this made the front page. You make great use of those pads, man. The ethereal feeling is oozing from this, and it only helps that you've mixed it so well. I find myself very often taking notes from what you do, because you seem to do everything you touch with a very consistent level of professionalism. I'd love to hear you take a stab at some more genres in the future just to hear what you'd come up with.

I can't say I dislike anything about this. I know the sound of software brass a little too well, but the realism is close enough to where it doesn't really matter. Definitely one of my new favorite things by you ;3

[LogicBots - Wires and Gates]

I'm surprised I didn't see this one go up! It's been quite a long time since I've heard about how the LogicBots project was going, so it's cool to finally see something you worked on from it. I like the lead and the delay you had on it; I think it turned out rather well on top of the track. I'm actually more a fan of how you've done the background. The pads sound very smooth and really don't get in the way of the listening experience, but they do so much to add to the atmosphere. The subtle sweeps are strong in their effect. Very cool! The loop doesn't grow old after the first round, either, so kudos on that!

The guitar bits didn't bother me, to be honest, but I can see where someone may tilt their head at it. Personally, I like it. A little acoustic element inserted in there doesn't really take away from the "technological" vibes of the overall piece. Does this track play when you test the bot? I feel like the sudden dropout of the drums at 1:44 may be a bit too quick/jarring of a transition to the next part, at least in the context of background music. It's context-sensitive material, though, so I can't say for certain that it detracts from anything. I feel like you had a good idea of where you were going with it, so maybe it's intended and I'm just overthinking it.

I've never been good with mixing feedback, but I definitely don't hear anything that really bugs me. Everything seems balanced and nothing would overwhelm the in-game SFX. To me, that is the essential quality of this kind of music, and you've got it thoroughly in check.

Good work, Neon! :)

Neon-Bard responds:

Thanks so much for the feedback, DMO. It's great to hear that the track turned out as I intended it. As I mentioned in my description, there were some frustrating qualities about the track, but perhaps I am being a bit too harsh on my own work.

Wires and Gates plays while you are watching your robot as it traverses the puzzle or task that it was programmed to do - there are 2 other tracks which play during this mode of the game. I wanted these to sound upbeat and (hopefully) catchy so that you get that excitement of watching your work (in this case, programming) unfold. The 'building' tracks are much more atmospheric and finely detailed in an ambient way, so that players can focus on crafting their robots without too much sound interference. :)