timaeus222

Agreed with Gario, but I do have some suggestions/comments for further improvement regardless. At 0:51 - 0:53, 0:57 - 0:59, 1:07 - 1:09, and 1:20 - 1:24, I think the violins/violas (whatever's leading) have a weird attack to them - kinda 'pulsey', or like multiple same-direction bow strokes, instead of a smoother phrase. Loving the emotion in the lead at 2:05 - 2:32. OK, not exactly a crit! At 2:54, does that piatti seem a little late to you? At 2:58, 3:03, 3:17, 3:22, 6:05, 6:07, 6:11, and 6:27, obviously a very minor thing, but I'm hearing a small click. I listened back and forth on it, and I'm pretty sure it's there. However, very solid dynamics work throughout! 3:36 feels like it got quiet in lieu of a smoother transition, IMO. What if at 3:31 - 3:36, you had the piano play a few descending single notes to signal its arrival? The hit at 4:57 could maybe have a cleaner arriving connection, as it felt a bit sudden to me; perhaps a cymbal roll, and lowering the velocity on the piatti a little? I did like the transition at 5:35 - seemed good to me. Really enjoyable overall though; relaxing. Neat mood change at 5:35, and nice and mellow ending. Great work!

Well, I do hear the jazz influences, but I think these are more like... jazz with significant hip hop influence (due to the drums, like the claps and sub kick). There are jazz-based instrument choices, but the mixing seems to be by someone who mainly likes hip hop; not necessarily a bad thing, but it's what I'm hearing. Mainly what I'd say is that the saxophone is narrow and upfront, particularly in track 1, 2, and 4, making the soundscape feel empty/not full (not in terms of EQ, but space). The piano in track 1 is distant and narrow, which adds to the emptiness. You can help that by increasing the room width on the applied reverb on both instruments and cutting down on the midrange on the sax. Try listening to other tracks with a fuller stereo field and thinking about how you want to fill out yours, as that's the major mixing issue IMO. Here's an example:

Ah, yeah. I didn't get to say it earlier, but I think the Iwata inspiration is summed up pretty well like this. "Above all, video games are meant to be just one thing: fun. Fun for everyone." ~ Satoru Iwata, Game Developers Conference (2006)

I actually like this more - the decreased effects usage actually helped clear up the low-midrange (phaser may add low-midrange frequency motion, which can get messy sometimes), so the soundscape is clearer. I think this is a great improvement from before, because there's less clutter, and more "you" in the arrangement. I like the new rhythmic variations in the drums and the revised structure. Also, 1:54 - 2:02 was a cool lead-in back to the 'chorus', and the pause right at 2:02 was well-executed. Nice work!

I love this. Normally I find bluegrass to have only a few gears, but this shows some of the versatility and additions to bluegrass that I haven't heard before. The outtro is brilliant, as Jarel says.

Even so, it's to your benefit to settle for higher standards. I give advice for personal improvement, not necessarily just for one single piece of music.

Getting better! The piano does sound more natural than before; what if for every 6 notes on the left hand, the fourth note is lower velocity than the first? Also, if you have a more velocity-sensitive piano sample, it might be even better, since each note is simply getting quieter, rather than softer (less 'spiky') *and* quieter on lower velocities. I actually like the percussion better than before; seems like you fixed that resonance! When it comes to the choir, basically, the volume swells would emulate the breathing of real people, and one way it can be done is by automating the choir's volume up slowly and then down a little medium-slow for a single phrase. Other than that, as a hypothetical vgm song, this could work in an OST.

Nah man - dis is what happens to the FBI!

Not too bad; personally I did find the standard kick + clap rhythm to get stale rather quickly though, so changing up the drums by adding drum fills and microvariations would help reduce the repetition and encourage people to listen for longer. In general, having variation in your patterns (drums or other repeated elements) is a good idea to make your arrangements more interesting. You have a lower dynamic going on with the textural dropoff about 1/3rd of the way through, so that's good. I like the additional pads at 1:48, which help you move away from the sparseness of 1:23 - 1:48. So, you seem to have a nice grasp on textural additions/subtractions---but you can do more. A lot of the track was driving forward, even the texturally sparser sections, meaning that even if the remix were to be all drums or no drums, the underlying rhythm is fairly uniform throughout, and so, the lower-energy sections end up sounding similar to the higher-energy sections. Nothing technically wrong with that, but it can be better, and I think having more rhythmic differences would help add interest. Regarding the ending/outtro, I found the 2:40 reverse-snare-esque percussion to be rather upfront compared to the sparseness of the rest of the sounds, so it felt texturally awkward for me; might be what @Gario was referring to. Lastly, minor thing, but make sure your endings fade everything out completely; the delay on the percussion at the end cut off before it ended. Hope this helps! I did like it; it just has room for improvement.

I'll be honest - I saw the title and thought "this is going to be metal. Cuz face-melting." When I read "complextro", I also expected a, well, complex breakdown, but ah well. Very energetic, funky, and in-your-face. This pretty much stands on its own as a ReMix + Club Mix at the same time.

Well, I think there is still a difference between: copying someone's notes intentionally (specifically verbatim or very similar), but is not necessarily a textural similarity (it could be). copying someone's notes by accident (a coincidence; may be verbatim or just reminds someone of a particular song), but is not necessarily a textural similarity (it could be). imitating someone's instrumentation (like the selection of instruments often used by a particular artist you like--- a stylistic similarity), but not necessarily their notes nor their exact soundscape's EQ, reverb, instrument placement, etc. imitating someone's soundscape (i.e. an extremely similar selection of instruments, similar panning, enough to call it a stylistic similarity, down to the frequency distribution, filter motion, etc), but not necessarily their notes. NOTE: This is a closer similarity than simply imitating instrumentation. While those are all forms of imitation... (which I think is when you said "in the end it's the same thing") I think #1 is not OK. That, you might call "theft", because it was intended (unless it's a cover). I think #2 is excusable, and is not uncommon to have happen. However, if the person then realizes it, and does nothing about it, I would say it becomes intentional after-the-fact. It's like saying "oh, you're right, it sounds like so-and-so. Whatever, I don't feel like fixing it." I think #3 is OK as well. This is something I've done a few times, and I would call it inspiration, as it might remind someone of an artist, without leading them to accuse you of plagiarism. For example, this was inspired by Weather Report in the drums and bass. I didn't, however, copy exact notes outright---mostly, I used similar instrumentation and occasionally playing styles. I think #4 is a little sketchier, but can be OK. This can sometimes be construed as a remake or cover rather than an inspired-by, but this does not necessarily have to involve copying someone's notes. However, I think this can make someone say "huh, this reminds me of something..." and they might really try hard to convince themselves that you didn't intentionally steal notes, because it's so similar in feel. The point is, I don't mind if imitations or similarities occur - what matters to me is, was it 'malicious intent', so to speak?

Thanks for asking - I started two days ago and finished yesterday, because I recently bought Blakus Cello and wanted to give another shot at remaking the song after having tried once before two or three years ago. Back then I couldn't discern all the notes/chords I needed to fully realize the remake, and I didn't get past the first 20 seconds. Since it is one of my favorite songs from my childhood, I really wanted to get this done.

I would recommend something where you can rewind repeatedly to trace each note, like Audacity, or most DAWs---I use FL Studio, which has an unlimited-time free demo, but others have suggested Reaper. Audacity should be able to slow down sequences as well, though any stretching artifacts can be a bit offputting. Besides that, I actually try to register the sequence in my head and hum it back (even if more slowly). If it's any faster than I can hum it, I just play it back in my head instead of humming it. Nothing much I can suggest to be able to do that other than try to do it, and practice it using sequences that are easy to distinguish above the accompaniment. As for registering chords in your head, I would listen to simpler harmonies (like minor/major thirds, perfect fourths/fifths, etc), think about how they sound when combined, and get those to heart. That helps me break apart stacked chords and dense soundscapes and discern what I want to transcribe at the moment. That was especially needed in this, which is a remake I attempted of this (I could probably improve the cello some more, but other than that I'm loving how it turned out), since I couldn't find any sheet music and had to do it by ear. What I did here was try to identify each distinct element in the soundscape and follow what it was doing. If I couldn't quite hear what it was doing, I wrote something reasonable to approximate what it was doing.

Sorry, I should point out that I was referring to: Honing in, I'm looking at 3:27 - 3:35, and I think ultimately I have no 'busy-ness' issue with 3:35 - 3:43. Thanks for trying hard to see what I mean.

Yeah, I get what you mean in the bold. I'm not saying it's not counterpoint. It may be technically correct, but to me the voices that are there now are *conflicting*, rather than playing off of each other "while still working well harmonically". It's hard for me to explain, but what I hear is that the voices are 'vying for attention at the same time', so to speak, so if I try to listen to one, the other 'butts in'. I would prefer that I can choose to listen to each voice without feeling like the other is 'intruding'. Maybe if you don't want to adjust the actual notes in your counterpoint, it can be helped through more separated panning.

It's a pretty old iPad, and doesn't have 3G, but I wanted to check it out anyway.

I get a 'GPS signal not found' message on my iPad 2; Location Services are on. Not sure how that might be a problem, though it seems my avatar isn't responding when I move, or has a delay after I move. I got past the "Catch a Pokemon" screen here after restarting the app, but it's still pretty buggy for me. Apparently it's not designed to support tablets (yet?).

I gave this a quicker listen yesterday, so right now here are more specific thoughts after I downloaded the track: 1:06 - 1:22 gets cluttered by the organ reverb coupled with whatever pads are in the background. This is in the low-midrange, near 200 Hz. It doesn't make the melody any less clear, but it does mud up the accompaniment. At 1:31 - 1:38, it's a little cluttered, but I'm not that bothered by it; the lead, chordal instrument, and the short+plucky arp are all centered, which is probably why. At 1:39 - 1:54, while I agree it's as cluttered, I think the organ was intended to lead together with the pulse lead, but the pulse lead is a tad loud. I wonder if it could be improved by simply low passing the pulse lead temporarily there. Overall pretty well balanced though. 1:55 - 2:28 is pretty sparse (not a bad thing), but I liked it as a short breakdown/reprieve. 2:12 - 2:28 for me is comparable to 1:39 - 1:54 in terms of the mixing. 2:37 - 2:53 and 4:00 - 1:16 for me are comparable to 1:06 - 1:22 in terms of the mixing. 3:27 - 3:43 for me is comparable to 1:31 - 1:54 in terms of the mixing + busy partwriting. Keep in mind though that I don't think these become dealbreakers overall. The organ reverb clutter is the largest issue IMO (Gario's concern), and that is probably followed by the potential for the soundscape to be less dense and more '3D' (which would address most of Nikanoru's concerns), but I think the arrangement is so good that I would love to see this on the site. I don't think it's necessarily that the melody is "too intricate"; I think that's fine, but if two melodies don't play well as counterpoint (i.e. they have conflicting motions, giving the idea of two leads fighting for attention), then I would be bothered by that. EDIT: Maybe it can helped with more separated panning, but to my ears, the current notes are both 'conflicting' and technically proper counterpoint.

I remember hearing this on @zircon's soundcloud, and I was wondering when it would hit the front page! I think this is the level of ultra-compressed aggression that probably only zircon could be daring enough to do, and do well, because despite those blasting drums, a lush, fitting breakdown was still managed. The soundscape is super dense, but not overly cluttered, and Shreddage is certainly well-showcased here. Sweet solos as well!

I wonder if simply using more distinctly different waveforms amongst the background waveforms (e.g. triangles are generally pretty soft-sounding, and saws generally have strong harmonics) would make the soundscape feel less dense and more '3D'. Arrangement-wise I love it. Another production thing you could try is play around with panning the background arps around so that they have more motion, and that way, they can be dropped in volume and leave room for the melody to be heard while the ear can follow the moving background if it wants. Example

Indeed; as a note, I would say that the strongest notes are usually (but not always) the note that emphasizes the "pulse" of the song, or the note that starts a long phrase. It's not always the first note in a measure, but it can be. I agree though, that having a MIDI keyboard and practicing on it would help you have a better idea of how you can write more realistic velocities.

Quoted for truth; I'm pretty much the same way, except for that last phrase. I do, however, still compress, but that's because I write punchy electronic music, so that's normal. I do EQ a bit less drastically these days, but that's mostly because I've designed many of my go-to sounds to be polished and usable right out of the box, in EQ, reverb, tweakability (XY, Modwheel, etc), and so on. I do mix while I compose as well, and it's so I can know how my track sounds in context at each given moment. I never feel like I can make a good decision on sound selection unless I've considered the mixing aspect of it as well. I wouldn't say it's crucial to learn both composition and mixing to the same extent, but if you have the motivation, definitely go for it. Better to be well-rounded, IMO.

Stephen Anderson collabed with Lindsey Stirling to make an FF1 album. An epic-cinematic mindset meets talented violin skills. The result was an electronic violin album with an edgy touch! Here's an example track: @The Nikanoru Haha, I have a feeling some people might have been like, "it's REEU" about the pronunciation (EDIT: yup, found one on the YouTube comments!). I like the humor in the lyrics.

Well, the piano and choir are fairly mechanical. The choir is lacking volume swells that a real choir would have, and the piano has mostly quantized notes, so they come off as robotic. What it means is that the note rhythm is too perfect to be human, and the note velocities aren't that varied. Also, the percussion at first was reasonable in terms of the amount of activity it has going on, but at 0:52 - 1:18, there is a persistent resonance in the treble frequencies in the percussion that feels a little grating to me. I think you did accomplish the vibe you wanted, and I'd say the percussion mostly works, but ultimately, the major issue is that the sequencing of the piano and choir are pretty stiff, and could be improved by varying the velocities on the piano and adding volume swells to the choir. As a suggestion, you might also want to make the choir parts more interesting with more movement in the higher registers. You may find this a suitable reference track.

Hm... I'm definitely loving the overall soundscape here. The toms could have had a bit less low end to clear up the low-mids overall, and the kick was a bit "flabby", but not really a big deal. I actually liked the guitar tone, which aggressively shines through at 2:45. The mix was a tad cluttered, but I could still make out most elements, so I'm happy with it overall. The arrangement is clearly well-conceived, and pretty well-executed. Awesome!