MusicIsBliss's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[High Frequency]

ok, this is great!

really good job on this song, although the blippy main instrument does get very repeditive by the end of the song, you may want to make it transition at about 30 second in, and go back at like 1:10 or so, before the cool part at 1:30.

But ya, your music does transition a little slow, it may work better if you get things a little catchier, but that is hard to do, it is more of doing random things until you fluke out and find gold.

I like the drums too, really good job on putting them in. and whatever that is at 0:54, its awesome!

Jimbobsthebest responds:

Thanks for your review. The main synth does get really very annoying, I completely agree. One of those things that you don't really notice when your in the process of writing... nevermind. I think your right, i need to work on my transitional style, most of my music will spend half the song on an intro and i need to try and wipeout that style sooner or later.

The sample at 0.54 says something like "when your knees start bumping and you heart..." although you wouldn't recognise that from the song... I went a little crazy with the vocoder.

Thanks for a great review, James

[Digging Deep]

not bad

before 1:20, it is too repeditive, in the fact it needs to change more frequently, either than that, what you have is pretty good. Maybe even just make the drum beat switch up a bit, which sounds like some pretty generic drums. never use the generic drums, at the least just use 3 different generic drums, and attach them with the layer tool (one of the awesomest/simplest flash tools).
Baseline is nice and simple, and sounds great, the guitar sounds iffy, all the fl guitars do for that matter, if only there was a cure short of actual guitar recording, which can be tedious
actually, in your case, i would suggest maybe use even a midi guitar.
Ya, after listening a couple times, I would mainly suggest changing the drum beat up at least once in the song.

I got to this song by clicking the random audio submission, never done it before, thought I would give it a shot. And this song is good enough to make me look at the rest of your submissions, though I probably wont reveiw them.
4/5
geeze, submitted over 2 years ago, I wonder if you will ever read this....

Revuen responds:

lol yeah this was one of my first experiences with FL Studios. To be honest i still dont think i truly know how to use it lol. I have always been a fan of simple, yet catchy tunes but i like to hear a nice surprise here and there. Thank you very much for the review, i really was not anticipating to hear anything new about these old songs of mine.
- Revuen

[-=LJC=- My Toys have teeth]

What the fuck!? only one download?

and by me?
I mean sure the song is only 5 days old, but my god, this song is better than this song.
I actually downloaded it a couple days ago, but wanted to save the reveiw until later when I would come back to listen to it. This has got to be my favourite DnB song ever, it is just so awesome, and has such neat little effects. I am trying analize this song as much as I can, because I want to be able to write DnB this good ("...its not gonna happen."). But since I have done such, I will try to write a lengthy reveiw about it, because those reveiws are oh so juicy.
ok.

the distortion/crunchy/bass - Very crunchy, I want some in my cereal every morning. Covers a perfect frequancy range, leaving enough room for the drums to keep their beat. Comes on and off throughout the song, which is great because it lets the drums have their solos, as to not make the song genre just 'bass'.

the ambient pad thingy - For the beginning, a nice mellow, but unique pad intro, which to me almost sounds like it is saying "happy birthday", but not to the normal song tune, I love it, it sounds great.

DRUMS - AWESOME, everything I could want them to be, diverse, fast, yet keeps a rythm at a speed you can bob your head at, if you wish.
kick - sure it lacks a bit of oomph, but that is made up for by the crunchy bass, and the sliding out bass that plays every bar in some parts. Also it has just enough high to keep it in there without all that bass, though at 0:20, when the kick kinda goes for a 3/4 time stroll, or something like that, it kinda kills the beat, but I guess it is ok because it comes back up again.
snare - it sounds like there are at least 2 different snares, but I may be wrong, one may be just playing with the kick to get a different feel. I really like how you cut off all of it's reverb to keep the song tidy, and to leave space for the next beat. I really like this snare, and wish I could mix a snare up as well as this, what did you make it from?
cymbols - It sounds like in some parts there is a constant hi-hat, but in other spots it is a ride cymbol keeping the beat, then again, it may be the smae instrument sounding different from the surrounding sounds.
other - it sounds as if you have the 'distant' simsynth effect from fruityloops? the storm sounding one? i may be wrong, but I can swear I hear it occasionally.

effects - well, mixing was obviously done really well, with the drum, and the bass, and all those little tidbits in the background, actuall, I am curious what the track sounds like with the drum and the bass silenced, just cause there is so many little things.

I reallylike how you made all the different little drum effect changes after 2:00.
especially at 2:20, where you made all the drum hits cut off very fast, and then made the pitch slide down, that is AMAZING, I love it! I actually sometimes rewind the song when it passes that part, just because I cant get enough, you truely are unique with music, it is great. Even if this is one of your more mainstream songs, it still has your specail flavour.

Alright, I hope I didnt miss anything... oh, I like you your drum patterns change, the addition of all the snare/hi-hat and stuff you do is great.

Um, good luck!
5/5
10/10
awesome/music

LJCoffee responds:

Wow... first off - props right backatcha for the lengthy review!

I'll try to hit some of the points you covered.

The distorted crunchy bass is a patch I threw together using NI Massive. It's a kick-ass synth from Native Instruments and the performance envelopes lend themselves well to these types of rythmic sounds. I very highly recommend it. It's on my list of "must-have" synths.

That ambient pad thingy is a pile of samples pulled out of a hat and then clipped, stretched pitched and generally messed with in a few ways. Honestly, it went together randomly - the end result was not planned in advance it just sort of evolved into what you're hearing ;)

I used a few cheap tricks for the drums - there are chopped up loops and individual drum samples layered up. In fact there are probably one or two too many layers but it all seemed to worke fine. Where loops were used, I got in there to cut a few things up a bit. Some people hear "loops" and immediately turn their nose up but honestly, if you're cutting your loops and re-arranging 16th notes and making new breaks and all then I don't see how it's any less respectable.

Layers, layers, layers. And the drums are split up through a few different busses as well.

Through one bus, I have a moderate amount of compression while the other remains uncompressed - both of these busses go through a third that has a little eq low cut on it to make room for the basses. The compressed drum bus is also being used with a sidechainer to duck both of the basses just a little. I was not aggressive with my sidechaining because I'm not fond of those tracks where it's so easy to pick out. I probably went a little too light on it though.

As far as the ''distant' simsynth effect from fruityloops goes - I don't use FL - this was made with AcidPro - but there are so many VST's and effects that have similar sounds...

The editing at about the 2 minute mark was done in Reaktor5. I bounced a few bars of the drums to a .wav, went to work on it with a few of Reaktor's tools (the pitching and gating) and then dumped out a new .wav which was imported and added back into the Acid project.

My biggets mistake with this track was that I just sort of eyeballed everything... The eq work was done without that use of a monitor so I was just guessing where the cut-offs should be... This resulted in the bass drum lacking the punch... I rolled off a little too much. Next time I'll have to remember to actually break out a frequency or spectral analyzer so that I don't accidentally lose any more than necessary while trying to make headroom...

I hope that helps a bit!

Thanks a TON for your vote of confidence!

[Rage of the Champions]

well gee..

I am judging for the mac 07 contest, and I have to say, the most difficult part of it to me, is choosing which of your songs not to include. This is only because out of 10 song, i think it would be slightly unfair if 5 of them were yours.

Your songs are all so epic and amazing, this is truely a difficult decision, I would have to say that this is my favourite though.

Also, I am sorry I have never reveiwed your songs, although I have listened to all of them, and voted on most. It is just, I really am not a classical music person, so I have no idea what to say about these, except that they are epic. And the samples are awesome, I wish I had something better than FL basics.

OK. i am actually going to try and reveiw this song.
Amazingly mixed. The drums being based mainly on the sticks was a vert nice concept, I think that is what makes this song my favourite, as well as the snare, with its abnormally flat sound, yet almost sounds as if it were played with a tom as well.
In some parts I can actually just hear the tom, so i beleive that is what you did.

The violins sound awesome, well, it sounds like there is more than one, did you use a sample of like, many violins together?
Also, I like the use of the bell, as well as the brass, as the first hit of each bar, gave it much more of an effect, more oomph to each bar, well played.
The loop is awesome too, sometimes i notice it, but more often I dont, another good job on your behalf.
I wish I had your talent.
And good luck with the competition, even if you don't need it.

MaestroRage responds:

Hello MusicIsBliss

I am glad you are taking things seriously for the contest, I agree that having 5 out of 10 songs being mine would be unfair, and truth be told there is a LOT of really great tracks in this contest that deserve a shot! So by all means, do not think I will be irratated by having some of them taken off. I personally feel that this is my favorite of the entries too, it's my most percussive oriented piece.

Don't worry about the reviews, I am glad you listen to them, if they can bring you some entertainment, that is all I wanted from them!

As for FL basics, you can try using soundfonts, that is what I did before I moved up to these VST's I have. www.sf2midi.com was my home for the longest time.

The percussion on this song is actually mad layered. I used pretty much every drum and wooden instrument given to me by the VST I was using.

Bass drum
Timpani
Tom
Taiko
Snares
cymbol

All sticks, I forget their name, but they are there!

As for the violins, yes they are a 18 violin section patch. I was thinking of solo, but I just didn't like it like that. So threw in some 18 violin action in there.

As for my talent, I am fairly confident anybody could do what I could do, I neglected a LOT of school work for this craft, and from time to time, my grades would prove it ;).

Thank you for your review, I am glad you liked this piece alongside the others, and thank you for the luck, I am fairly sure it's going to be a bitter fight >:D!

[The Epic Dance Battle]

freakin awesome

I love how the drums come in, like i know they come in on beat, but is sounds like the dont. and The drums just sound so awesome, with the bit of snap back or whatever the hell it is on every second snare.
this song kicks ass.
but i agree with mcRash, too short. either than that, i love it, and want to have a flash that this would fit in, so i can use it.

Kombat-Chuck responds:

sweet, I am glad you like it!

[AoE Overture (Bezo)]

ahahahaha

i totally heard part of O Canada in there man!
at :33, and again at :49
sure it is only 5-6 notes, but it still is totally "a true north strong and free"
or whatever.
anywho, nice song, good job with the orchestral feel. do you use samples or what? and if so, where can i get them.

crap, there are so many parts that are just twisted from our national anthom, you little sneak. good job.

Bezo responds:

I'm not very stealthy I must admit.

Most of the samples I use for my orchestral stuff come from the Vienna Symphonic Library, but they're really, really huge and really, really expensive.

If you'd like something almost as good I'd recommend the Garage Band Symphony Orchestra Jam Pack.

[Remission_Warder]

ok, THIS one is now my favourite

I have serisouly been listening to this song for over an hour and a half, and I plan on continuing to listen to it for a while longer. It is just so ingenious and well done. I love your sudden stops with the beat and music, goes beyond the meaning of syncopation (well, cant spell it, but whatever). Your drums consist of too different styles, bongos for the background, and then the nice crips drums in front keeping the beat, and leading the song... until that awesome guitar comes in as the drums EQ out a bit, and just kicks ass. Seriously, what did you do to get that awesome guitar sound? And like, the mario sound coming out of the guitar part, confusing to understand where it came from, but it sounds great. And is that a choir sound? or strings, that i can here mainly at the intro and ourtro, but fade in and out throughout the song?

what is a tabla...

LJCoffee responds:

Oh teh NOeZ!! I'm really sorry that this response took months... I just didn't notice a new review! 0_o

Where did the guitar sound come from - a guitar silly! Also, a tabla is a percussive instrument - those warped little "bongo" like sounds are made with a tabla - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabla - :)

[-=LJC=- Pureed Guitar strings]

wow

this is awesome, I always wished I could get strings to work on programs and make them sound good, just because recording with a guitar is a pain, and i hate using guitar picks (you need them if you want smooth sound).

This is by far my favourite song of yours, and I have been listening to it for an hour, without having to change it, Not often can that happen. Everything just sounds so smooth.

I like all the exhoing background synthy effects, they arevery subtle, but add alot to the song.

Keep up the good work

LJCoffee responds:

Hey wow thanks! I started with some very good samples - actually it's a combination of worked over samples and synthesized parts all mixed in together. I liked the end result though and I'm glad that you did too!

[Last Nite - The Strokes]

hahahaha

this is awesome. I mean the strokes version is better just cause it has that wailing singing in it, but this is a pretty awesome cover, as it is a totaly different style.

but the part "no they aint ever gonna understand" and around there is really well done by you. I like how you just have a higher piano to replace vocals, good job.

Turning-Japanese responds:

Hah, I'm glad you liked it, and yeah, the strokes version is pretty badass. I'm glad you think I did them some justice though - thanks for the review!

[Toybreaker]

awesome song

I really liked this song when i first heard it, so i DLed it. I was planning on using it in my little flash game, but i realised that it is so bass orented, that you wouldnt be able to hear the song when on a laptop. I was about to give up, then I played it on a laptop, and heard the very high musicbox style notes played the same time as the bass. VERY SNEAKY SIS.

so I ended up using it, thanks for the song.
I like the claps, and I also like how the whole song feels syncepated [sp]

Kombat-Chuck responds:

Awesome! Thanks!