Music-story's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Rain {durn}]

Review

Hey, nice to here some music that older audiences may enjoy. Yay, no happy hardcore. I'm not a real fan of this song. Its well produced, but it really isn't showing me something new. The beat sounds like your typical house song. Not many instruments in this song. I know you were going for the mellow feel so I can't complain really for the lack of instruments. Its just I don't think this song is that difficult to make. Your lead panning instrument is playing the same rhythm over and over again. Same goes for the bass.

I give you kudos on the gentle drums used. You really like panning your instruments. Nothing wrong with that.

Though I may not be impressed with this song, I'm so glad you produce here. I'm going to stop by your profile more often so I can listen to real music. You know that anime bang bang hardcore stuff really gets annoying on this site. Keep producing and I'll keep reviewing. Of course, let me know when you produce new stuff. I ain't going to check 24 hours on your profile when you make a new song.

5/5 and 9/10 review

Bye for now

durn responds:

heh, yeah, people at the office seemed to like this one. reminded them of bygone days. and true enough, it was a very simple song, melody-wise. I actually came up with it entirely on the computer, no midi-input for this at all. may be why it's lacking the soul of some of my other tunes. :)

and for not being impressed that's a hell of a score. ;) lol. thanks for the review, music-story! :)

[TRICK - NoNonsense]

And commentary you shall get

Sometimes I find a gem in one of the song's not recognized on NG. I visit the last page of the dance section where all the 0/5 songs are and I listen for fun. I give you tips now.

First, how long have you been making music? I don't want to be too harsh because this song would be pretty good if it is your first ever.

That aside, you need to have other instruments going besides the kick and that panning instrument. The lead instrument can not be generic! Generic = boring. Don't be like the others who produce music for many years and still have not broken the habit of using generic instruments.

Your drums sound so random as if you just picked some drum loops in your library and just slapped them onto the song.

Add melodies and harmonies. Not enough instruments in this mix. Do you have the fl demo? That might explain why you did not have enough time to finish the song the way you wanted.

Most of the comments I made take time to get better in. Keep making songs and you will eventually get better. The key things is to work on making your own instrument and staying on beat with your notes. Use the quantize feature. Good luck.

5/5 and 8/10 review

TRICK1994 responds:

Thanks for your comment ;)
it was my first time, and the problem I have is that my computer isn't fast enough to play the song fluently in FL, and when I ad more tracks, the problem get's worse :(.

[AznPB - Tuesday Night]

Review

The last review got my attention. On NG radio do they just play random songs on the AP? I don't pay attention to that radio station at all...not popular I guess?

Let me guess, are you asian? Okay, getting on track now. How did I think of your song?

The beginning isn't that bad. The lead sounded nice at certain notes but at other notes it sounded like a cheap piccolo....the high pitch notes I'm talking about. The background sounds were calming. I'm not a fan of the sparkly like fx. Still, nice job on the idea.

13 seconds in and a straight jump to a minor key???? Umm, generally its good to stick to the same key in your music, flows better. The hardcore part is not bad so props for that. Doesn't really go anywhere though.

45 seconds and all of a sudden the nice calm stuff. I think your transitions need to be worked on more.

Kudos on the kick. The bass pattern is your typical bread and butter rhythm. Standard kick n clap drum loop ain't bad. Some off beat hi hats might have made the drums a bit more exciting

Is this supposed to be a loop? The song tends to loop quite well. If that was what you were going for than good job. If not well then I suggest fixing the song's ending.

Overall, a very contrasting song between peacefulness and mad hardcore. Quite a interesting idea, but I think some of the instruments need to be worked on more. The beats tend to lacking in originality. However, you sure know how to work that boom sub bass.

Why did you call this "tuesday night"? Do you want me to vote 5 again for your song on Tuesday so you can get on the top 5 on wednesday 12:00am? I can do that for you if you want.

9/10 and 5/5 vote.
Bye for now

AznPB responds:

Oh wow. Guess I'll start at the top of your review and work my way down.

Yes, you guessed right. But it's funny really. I'm technically 50% Pacific Islander. The only part I was really concerned about when I made this I think was that main melody. I usually construct the main course of the track first, then try to develop the appetizer's around it as I go along. And being the lazy bastard I am, if it's good enough I kind of just leave it.

I have no formal music education or anything like that. Plus I'm told that I'm tone deaf so I don't really serenade my girlfriend that much. She still appreciates it though. :)

I like to pride myself on my beats since I can't really make a more than decent tune so that's where I concentrate - somewhat. And when I make a song - unless I have some sort of inspiration to make a badass track rather than pass the time then I don't mess around with the way instruments sound or the EQ that much. In retrospect, I'm not the great of an artist on a professional level. I'll just stick with drawing lines. :)

And no - it's not supposed to be a loop. The song just cuts off before it should. And it's called Tuesday night because well - I needed a title after it was all said and done. Can you guess when I finished it?

But after all of your constructive criticism, I'm surprised to receive such high scores from you. I could've swore your score would've reflected your critique more and be a little harsher. But in all - I do enjoy your in-depth review and the time you took out of your day to do it. Much obliged, Music Story. Perhaps one day I'll take a course on music theory and pick up my program again and find you to review a newer track of mine.

[Mind Blank]

Hahah, you seem like a nice guy.

Well, its great that you find yourself improving. It only makes NG better if you aren't one of those guys that leaves NG once they get good. Keep posting your music on NG. You have high confidence in yourself so good things will happen soon. Honestly, I couldn't stop laughing at your comment "it's kind of depressing that I'm so good now". The good news is that you will get over that slump and want to learn more. I wouldn't be surprised if next year you say your music now sucks. There is lots of room for improvement.

Anyway, your song sounds relaxing. Good break from the hardcore tunes. However, those weird panning vox like sounds don't work for this song.

The bass is decent enough. The vox splicing is okay. I would have liked some delay on it. Maybe a fade out could have worked too.

I'm not a fan of your simple piano chord pattern. I find the piano overpowers everything too. Your background instruments for the most part are good. There are the rare occurrences where you get this cheesy instrument that I don't like. eg. 2:06

This is trance so the repetitiveness is almost expected. However, you want to reach out to the non trance fans? Make some non-super repetitive trance. Trance can still be repetitive (not too much), but have enough diversity to keep the listener's attention even to the non trance fan. Good luck with your future composition.

9/10 and 5/5 vote.
Bye for now

codbarley responds:

well the sound behind the piano is a sound clip, so I made the piano that loud so that it would be harder to hear the click every time the sound started over.

[[JMS] Sound of Goodbye [Final]]

Armin van burren

Hmm, nice remix. I can't really give you kudos on the originality for that reason. However, the beginning of the song is just great. The vocal sample splicing may need some working, but it didn't get in the way of the background beat.

I'm not a fan of 1:30. The fuzzy bass really made the song so messy. You should change the bass up quickly before this song gets more listen. It just takes away the professional aspect of this song. Generic fuzz trance lead = bad.

2:30 what's with the vocal "beep beep" words? That didn't work out. The song started out fantastic, but later on the whole generic instruments just didn't get my interest.

Overall, if you didn't start using those generic trance pads and leads, this song would have been amazing. Anyway, the beginning portion sounded like armin van burren's trance song, but later on the song kind of took a more original role. Good job on that. This is definitely one of the better trance songs on NG so you get a 5/5 and 9/10 review.

Bye for now

djt93901 responds:

Thank you for the review! i understand what you mean with the fuzzy trance lead, i took it out now along with the beeping, but majority of it is now left alone! i'll change it soon when it's done exporting XD

Thanks again for the review!

Jaymuhsin

[Lackadaisical Cohort - Part 2]

Review

Very short review because honestly I don't know how I'm supposed to critique this song.
Keep things short and simple, if you like to produce this kind of music keep doing so. This is definitely a original piece. However, the warning is that not all original songs sound pleasing. Making a unoriginal is easy. Making a original song is a little bit harder. Making a original song that sounds pleasing is very difficult to make. You can set your standards anywhere you like. Its your music, your art, do what you want with it. That's all I have to say.

InvisibleObserver responds:

I'll assume thats all very positive in disposition towards me. :)

Glad to hear from you.

[~ElpH~Energy]

Review

Looks ike someone seems to have wrote their life story about this song of yours already. :) I'll keep mind less informative so to speak.

This is a weird song. It kinda gives me a vibe similar to a old trance song I heard before. Those bells are a interesting idea to your song, but I feel some parts don't belong. At the mellow quiet parts it works just fine. Your song is called "energy" but it seems to be in contrast to what I imagine.

I would have liked the trance lead to actually lead the song. It seemed to play a background role more so than the lead. Of course this would mean that you would have to change up the patterns it is playing.

Your transitions are getting a bit more fluent. Thank you loud boom splash fx. Seems to get the job done most of the time. However 1:52 I'm confused. This last portion just didn't seem to mesh with your song. Its chaotic, but still not quite energetic. Kudos on the weird digital sounds.

Overall I can see you are trying to be more original. Being original is easy, but sounding original as well as good is a extremely tough thing to do. For the most part your song was original as well as good sounding, but some parts were just original weird to me. 9/10 and 5/5. GL in school.

Bye for now

Elph responds:

Thanks for review :)

[{Dj-L} Essence of Creativity]

Review

Hi Link,

Well, congrats on the top 5. I have not listened to your past songs but if you find this is your best then that means you must be getting better (being one of your latest songs). There are some issues to consider.

Probably the biggest concern is the lack of unique instruments. They don't seem to be made in a way that brings a originality factor to your song. I also think the drums are missing some excitement. Nothing wrong with the standard kick n clap drum loop, but with this energetic song could use some more high hats and more off beat stuff.

The other issue is the transition at 2:51. Sorry, not even that popular fx transition could make it work. Kudos on trying to make your song more diverse. Next time try to make it sound more fluid versus abrupt. Probably the easiest way of doing that is to just explode into something quiet and then crescendo into the new section.

The good thing is that i found the pattern at 1:36 by your trance lead to be catchy. Nice job. Here is your 9/10 and 5/5

Bye for now

Meonly70 responds:

I've been making music for under less than a year at this point, maybe a month away from my 1 year mark.

I know a lot of the things are not original, but I am still learning a lot about making music. I am happy this got top5. I spent a lot of work and time into this song. I guess I was caught up in building and fixing the other aspects of the songs, I forgot about the little details, but its too late to change it now.

The transition for me was... very difficult to make something of. Switching from 2 scale progressions in a second's time was not easy.... Thanks.

[~ElpH~Snowstorm]

Review

Huh? I'm going??? Where? I'm just at school. :)

Thanks for the support so on with the review.

Happy hardcore instruments.....well this might not be an easy review for me. For some reason I just don't like happy hardcore instruments. Doesn't matter how dancy the pattern is, I just don't like them due to the cheesy factor. However, because this is only my opinion, this won't effect the score of your song.

I think you need to add more drums or make the high hats louder. The kick is nicely audible, but the rest of the drums are drowned out by your lead instrument.

Haha, 55 seconds brings back good memories when I started making music. This is like the super cheesy part of the song, but honestly I have to thank you for doing it. Made me happy inside.

1:22 just took away the super happy feel. What instrument is that lead? Sounds like a clarinet drowned out. Wierd. Also your transitions seem to be a bit shaky. I know transitions are probably the hardest thing to do corrrectly in a song with this much diversity (For me I spend probably the longest making smooth transitions in all my songs and I just get so frustrated when it just doesn't work out), but we just got to deal with it.

Overall, you seem to be getting better with the instruments. More time needs to be put into your instrumental patterns. Come up with some crazy catchy beat rather than some simple beats. If you want to continue with your happy hardcore instruments, do so. Its just my pet peeve, but you make music the way you feel like it.

5/5 and 9/10.
Bye for now

Elph responds:

Well thats good to hear that you're not going :D

At 55 was pretty awsome. I thought that i have to do that atleast once in a song so i chose this one. Glad it made you happy :)

Drums have always been a problem for me. I might just have to focus on drums and HiHats for a week or so. And atleast enhance my skills because i do have songs that have good beats, but then the melody and transitions are sketchy.

Anyways, thanks for the review. Good to see that you're staying. But keeping up with school is importent i guess lol, i dont even think i spelled that right.

Cya!

[[DJ_ITD] - .:Bleak:.]

Review

Hi Bryan,

So I reviewed your demo quite a while back. May have forgot how it sounded so this may just be a completely new review.

I like the percussion and fx sound at the beginning of the song. 39 seconds the transition is smooth. Crescendo of the bass brings a nice epic feel. I don't think any of this is new from all the other epic based trance songs, but fortunately you transition into something more original at 1:34. I'm actually pleased with your transitions. The trance lead may need some work. Sounds too muffled and not EQed right.

I suppose the bass return at 2:21 seemed fitting. I think in this part of the song the bass needs to be a bit louder.

i would have liked it if the song actually changed up a bit. From 2:20 to basically the end of the song it is the same thing. I kinda got bored before the song finished. Especially the 4:19 part. Don't need that extending percussion solo.

Overall, there isn't anything unique to catch my attention. I want to hear something different that separates your epic song from the other epic songs. Great job on your kick and the mastering.

Oh and you probably already know this...but this song is not house music. 5/5 and 9/10.

Bye for now

djInTheDark responds:

Nope I didn't forget, (In fact I was looking forward to it...)

You must have not heard a lot of House if you can't see this as House at all (no offence of course). The trance lead, was actually a bunch of things all crammed together, rather than one thing. As for the EQing, thats because of inexperiance ^_^.
The bass I did try to make louder (everywhere) but the kick didn't agree, thus there was to distortion and I had to sacrifice it for the overall quality. Solo's at the end of the song, yep, should have avoided that one two.

Either way, your reviews are invaluable, tanx a bunch,
DJ InTheDark