TaintedLogic's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[News X]

It's catchy and cool, but I totally agree with you about the pacing. It progresses really slowly at the beginning, and then the synth at :35 seems totally random. I think you should at least have some sort of synth or pad going on at the beginning, just so :35 isn't a total shock. After that, it's very repetitive and lacks variation. I also thought the drums were a little bit loud on the transitions (like at 2:23), but then got a little distorted in the mix. Still, I like the instruments and mood and I think it has a lot of potential. I like this style of music, but I think the structure and variety could use some work. Not your best track in my opinion, TeraVex, but any way to get out of writer's block is a good way, I suppose! ;D

TeraVex responds:

Thanks for the criticism!
It really helps!
Yea, I'm definitely cleaning this up a little!

[oasis village]

I love the instruments, especially the percussion. It's well-varied and well-structured and climactic. It's a very interesting take on Jingle Bells. That clap that first comes in at :38 seems a bit too emphatic and reverb-y for a piece like this, especially at 1:12. The melodies and harmonies are cool, though. The fade-out ending was a little disappointing, but overall it's a great piece for some light listening during a crazy time of the year! ;D

johnfn responds:

Thanks! Though I have no clue what you mean by jingle bells. Possibly all this christmas spirit has driven you crazy :D Or maybe it's those tams that sound a little like sleigh bells. The clap was a tough call, but you have a good ear for pointing it out for sure, I could have toned it down at points.

I was wondering why I seem to like fadeouts more than everyone else, and it may have something to do with how, like, all of my favorite artists make liberal use of the fade out ending. Though it's also got me studying endings a little more, so I can understand options...

[while i live i hope]

I love the melodies and instruments. It gets pretty repetitive after about a minute in, though. At 1:37, that hat didn't really add much more to the piece, even if it did add some energy. The beat is very danceable, but overall it's too atmospheric and mellow to be traditional dance music imo. I'd call it progressive trance or maybe IDM. To be perfectly honest, I was a little disappointed with the lack of melodic variation, something you're usually very good at. The emotion is good, but I'm not finding as many ways to stay engaged as in your other tracks, Johnfn. Also, the ending was a little cliché. Although dance music can be very repetitive, it also can have a lot of structural variation and a very complex texture. Maybe the relatively thin texture of tracks like Undersea World is fitting for that genre, but I think dance music should have more substance than this, Johnfn. The melody essentially repeats for the entire length of the track, and after a while it detracts from my enjoyment of the song. No more chill basses in "dance" tracks, either, please! I dare you to use the Ableton equivalent of 3xOsc or Ts404. :D Maybe you could even remake one of your old tracks from, say, 2009 or earlier. Maybe later I'll PM you some examples of modern dance music. I'll make sure you end up on my "Party Mix" playlist eventually, Johnfn! ;D

johnfn responds:

Mmm well some guy told me that dance had repetitive melodies soooooooooo

Eh but really I think that the appreciation of this piece stems from whether you enjoy that one melody or not really. The song was a bit of an experiment in having a single melody last throughout the entire song, which is something I haven't done in a long time because I didn't think any of my melodies were good enough. Songs HAVE been written that are just a single melody the whole time (and they can be amazing), so I know it's possible... just probably outside of my reach right now.

Lol yeah though I really do need to use more interesting basses. I switched up in my latest track because of that. Actually my latest is similar to this song in that it lives off the strength of a single melody, but I thought back to this review and added some variation in there ;-) YAY FOR LEARNING FROM MISTAKES!

[Press A to Jump (WIP)]

Okay, here we go. So, I'm glad you're trying out new plug-ins and all, and trying new things is a great way to improve, but you need to work on your harmonizing skills. The clashing harmonies give the song an overall very harsh and unpleasant sound. My guess is you used a lot of harmonies like major seconds and minor sevenths (your notes were very close together on the piano roll in FL Studio). If you copy and paste notes from one of your patterns into another pattern of an instrument playing at the same time (and maybe move it by an octave or two), you'll find that the notes are very close together. This creates a very rough texture which should only really be used in some classical/jazz pieces. A general rule of thumb for me is that, when your notes are all in the same octave, they should usually be between 3 and 9 piano roll notes apart, including the black keys. Also keep in mind that a chord like C-D#-G#-B may seem like it follows this rule, but B, when transcribed into the same octave as C, is really just 1 note apart, a big no-no in pop music. Instead, C-D#-G#-C is a much more pleasant chord. The notes of these "chords" don't have to be played by the same instruments, btw, but please try to think more about which notes are playing with each other at the same time. Anyway, back to talking about the particulars of your song: despite the dissonant harmonies, I do like the instruments, and the drums would've really added some meaningful flavor to the piece if they were mixed a little better. Otherwise, I'm sorry that this review is so negative, but if you want to improve, I hope it'll help you! ;)

Unfairy responds:

It's quite appreciated frankly.

[snowy night]

I'm thrilled to hear that you continue to push yourself to improve, even though the improvisation you did on "Footsteps Through Freshly Fallen Snow" was amazing. This is clearly an excellent piece. I love the emotion and atmosphere and dynamic contrast, and the melodies are beautiful. It's amazing that you played this live. How long have you been playing the piano? I've been playing the cello for 7 years, and there's no way I could improvise a piece with such complexity and depth and emotion as this. I really feel something when I listen to this music, Johnfn. Amazing. Also, as much as I hate to say this, it's a really easy fix: please make sure the ending doesn't cut off suddenly. This piece deserves and demands all the grace of a proper ending. That is an extremely picky detail, however. This is an incredible piece. I rarely favorite anything immediately, but I'm going to have to make an exception (the last song on NG I favorited immediately, btw: "Ablixa" by Garlagan). Keep up the inspiring work, Johnfn! ;D

johnfn responds:

Thank you! As a matter of fact, "Footsteps" was actually not really an improv piece in the way this one was. When I wrote that piece, my strategy was to fiddle around on the keyboard until I found something I liked, then restart and explore that idea some, then repeat the process a couple of times until I got something interesting.

I've been playing piano for a good deal of my life (but probably not 7 years!). However I started getting a lot better at improv when I started focusing on just improvisation. This last year I've been working at improv practically every day, just fooling around on the piano for like 30 minutes and going wherever I felt like, noodling in a really unstructured way. And this last month I've spent every day writing an actual structured improv piece. All the earlier ones were really bad though so I didn't put them up here :P

I agree with your comment about the ending (I STILL haven't gotten used to how Ableton can't render out the tail like FL Studio can <_>) and I uploaded a fixed version!

P.S. If you like this sort of stuff, go check out BlazingDragon - he does a good deal of it, he's way better than me, and he was actually my inspiration to do improvisational pieces.

[ECHO - Awake]

I love the drama and instruments, especially the percussion. It's very climactic and cinematic, and you communicate the mood very, very well. It flows very smoothly, and I like the structure and transitions. The mixing was excellent. Makes me think of a busy Asian village on a morning in the mountains. The ending cuts off a little suddenly, but it loops pretty well. Overall, excellent work, of course. I'd expect nothing less of one of the NGADM maestros. ;) Keep up the great work, Echo. :D

Echo responds:

Like I told etherealwinds, the ending cut-off was completely unintentional, and should have been fixed with the re-upload. Thanks for mentioning it

I'm happy you liked the track, I'd suggest checking out a couple of the other tracks on the album if you're into this style of music. Thanks for your support!

[-Snow!-]

Yay! :D It's very bright and upbeat. I love the instruments, some of which I think you've used before, but whatever! I like the melodies and harmonies a lot. It has a lot of variation, and I like the structure as well. The bells at around 2:14 are cool, and I really like the way you ended the piece with that music box-like instrument. We only got about an inch of snow here in Boston, but I'm sure more is on the way. Happy holidays, Waterflame! :D