timaeus222

Cool arrangement. I like the ideas here so far. If you need a resource for writing your own Shreddage lead, zircon did a pretty good job here. See the 12:51 mark.

You're not the only one! I generally like an 8-10 song album, if it's going to be one I enjoy in the long run (and probably play in the car, if it's not super elaborate dynamics), but I don't mind getting a 5-8 song album if I just find it astounding. Usually I like it if the album happens to be 30 minutes long (5-8 songs) or 40 minutes long (8-10 songs), but I'm open.

No, it either means it was direct-posted, or it is not there and approved yet. If it was of this caliber and also rejected (meaning, if it was not so terrible that it was rejected without judging), then it would be there.

It's right at the bottom of the main page: https://ocremix.org/community/forum/4-commentsreviews/

No worries. It's good that you are actually asking, and you seem to be getting it so far. I don't use Audacity that much, but I can give you my thoughts on the rest. Visually, you would have to inspect the mixer dB meter to see that something went over 0 dB. Sometimes (if the DAW is programmed that way) it'll show red, which should indicate clipping. If you haven't heard it before, it sounds like a crackling, but it might be subtle if you don't exaggerate the volume level. I know I didn't perceive clipping in my first year learning music production without looking at a mixer. You can think of hertz (frequency) as the horizontal span of what we can hear, and dB (loudness) as the vertical span of what we can hear. Hertz is a frequency unit (as opposed to, say, length units of meters, or mass units of kilograms). It just means that for every second that passes, one wave cycle passes by, so 5 Hz means that 5 cycles pass per second. It is also written Hz, or 1/sec. Some producers might say that higher frequencies "brighten up" a sound, etc. Lower frequencies sound "boomy", "rumbly", sometimes "muddy", etc. Higher frequencies span the treble range (generally around 4000 - 20000 Hz, give or take) via high notes, and low frequencies span the bass range (generally around 20 - 1000 Hz, give or take) via low notes. Lastly, midrange (the rest) is where most sounds lie, like the human voice, lead instruments, guitar, etc. It's where you hear presence, and all listening devices hit some of this range. On the other hand, dB is basically just loudness. Louder, or softer, at a fixed frequency. Yes, the net result is what you should pay attention to. As a general property of audio waves, their amplitudes (loudnesses) will add, and also cancel, at various points, and so, if every channel hits 0 dB, the net result will exceed 0 dB. Therefore, NOT all channels "need" to reach 0 dB by themselves.

Yeah, that's true, and it's good that you cover that below; however, it also looked to me like he was having issues with figuring out how he can match up all of his listening methods to hear a consistent loudness across them, because he was unsure of what to adjust (without re-rendering, presumably) and ended up adjusting the internal volume control several times in the process... So, after establishing a setting from previous listening methods (say, headphones), it's now changed (say, after trying speakers), which would then lead him to go back and adjust again... which could be a frustrating cycle. Hopefully either of these approaches (mine + PRYZM's) help though! I think both were good to have.

The point of turning the knob on the hardware instead of adjusting the internal volume is that you aren't changing one of the only things that could be consistent across your listening methods. If your speaker 'noise baseline' is audible, it may be that the impedance on them is high (it takes more power to achieve the same volume as something with less impedance) and you should consider getting new speakers with lower impedance (or an amp to boost their base volume, so that you don't have to turn the knob up so high).

Well, for one, at least start your mixing on headphones, and not your laptop speakers. They are certainly not designed for mixing, and you know they have no bass, and so they will not sound right anyway... ----- There is no exactly correct loudness, but you can get close to what is too loud for you. I probably listen to music about 3 dB louder than other people, but it allows me to hear more detail, it still doesn't hurt my ears, and I still write music with consistent loudnesses. YMMV. I have a loudness reference that I like to use. This song is about as loud as I would listen to before I don't want to turn it up any higher. Try it when your ears are cleared, on your system when using the headphones specifically, and turn the internal system volume up until you want to turn it down, and find that balance (if you are using "Audio Enhancements" or whatever it is on your OS, turn that off, it messes with you). Establish a consistent perceived loudness for your different listening scenarios for the same song, that ALSO uses the same internal system volume. That is, try to make the same song feel about as loud across the board... but keep the internal system volume the same to make it easier on yourself. To further adjust volumes on speakers, turn the knob on the hardware, instead of changing the internal system volume. That way you are at least keeping one setting constant across your comparisons.

Just my two cents; I made a small guide a while back on mixing metal: https://app.box.com/s/ibj5yh5toh2yfc56f4aa You might also find these two tracks to be useful mixing references.

Awesome, there's a lot of heart that went into the guitar performances! I especially liked the build back up from 3:40. A bit heavy on the bass frequencies, and the kick is pretty light on the punch, but overall the arrangement is super engaging and this is pretty sweet.

Wow, I never expected Bluegrass to sound like this. Really brought a new perspective on the genre, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

The playlist and piano roll actually allow separate time signatures, but they can be matched up by clicking the upper-left triangle on the pattern itself and going to "Use current time signature from > playlist to pattern" to use the playlist time signature for the pattern, or "pattern to playlist to use the pattern time signature for the playlist. I assume it was done this way so you can subdivide measures how you want; for instance, 4/4 then 3/4 pattern time signature within a 7/4 playlist time signature.

Just my 2 cents here, but the "swell" you speak of in the strings is a minor 2nd trill (fast alternating notes a semitone apart), and in terms of notes, what I'm hearing is an ascending scale in a minor key (seems like E relative minor, meaning you start on E and end on E, but use notes in G major, having only F#). Among the textures, what I perceive is a harp glissando on the left, a flute (or perhaps piccolo) playing the scale legato in the middle, and probably some violas playing legato on the right (ending on a perfect fifth below the flute)

Wow. This is one of those mixes that you really shouldn't skip through, not because it has such a wide span of genres, but because you don't want to miss anything. Been a while since I've put something on repeat.

Well, that's true, a melodic focus isn't necessary, but I do think some sort of leading contour could still shape, say, a desert track, using your example. It doesn't have to end up being a melody, but you could hypothetically hum a melody on top a chord progression you try playing, but then not put a melody. It can just guide the chords you write (or help you visualize which chords you could write), knowing that one can write a chord progression to any given melody (in principle). And then, that wouldn't have a strong melodic focus, but it may be easier to construct by using a leading contour as a guide.

As a note, whenever I write a song with a strong melodic focus, it does go case-by-case whether I write the chords first or the melody first. I do get that sometimes the melody can be hard to think of, or to be original with if that's an issue one has. Most recently, I did what @TTT was describing: playing out something rough on keyboard and getting that down to MIDI. Then, I dumbed it down to a more basic chord progression as the intro to an original WIP, with plans to, later in the arrangement, add in the full deal of what I was playing. A few months back though, I also wrote and finished an original where I thought of the melody first, playing chords with my hands and humming the melody on top of it to test it out. Then, I used the melody throughout as a motif, to try to make the listener familiar with it... and perhaps even make it more catchy. This is done, but here's an early WIP example. A few years back, I actually had a burst of inspiration in college and sat down in the library to mouse in raw sheet music for one of my songs, purely because I thought of the melody first (I was humming it on the way home every day for a week), and then the accompaniment came to me while sketching it. Here it is: https://www.noteflight.com/scores/view/3829339a06f1f5fefe6c1978a5ac8a4dd86e0894 And here is an early WIP of the now-finished song. In all three cases, in the DAW itself, I did write the accompaniment first, but I had the melody in mind early on in the second and third cases, and sketched the major bits in the third case outside the DAW.

Menu 1 and Final Destination are two SSB themes that never really get old for me. DaMonz has shown that he can improve upon a classic, and make it his own!

I think even though the ending is the same, the ending works better now, because of the fix on the production in the low end; now you have noticeable high pass automation, which has more contrast than it did originally. Comparing to the judged version again, this is much improved! It has more bass body, less shrill highs, and leads that are more foreground. The track is also at a good loudness now. Perhaps one final thing I might do is let the final delay go on a bit longer, and fade it out a bit more slowly. I didn't think it was too short, and would chalk it up to a nitpick, but each of the judges seemed to think so, and it's an easy fix, I think.

Regarding "Time Traveler", I think the low bass is kinda flooded starting at 1:37, and would do a small cut (1 ~ 2 dB) on those low-drum samples at around 60 - 80 Hz. That may help give headroom for the guitar to breathe, since (and I'm guessing here) perhaps your car has the bass turned up? If you do that, I would suggest you do it in context (meaning, instead of isolating the drums and EQing, EQ the drums without muting all the other tracks). Another reference I like to use for low bass (sub bass, bass drums, gran cassa, etc), for cinematic music, is this.

Are you saying you've only tested listening through the headphones on your own music? If so, you may want some reference tracks that should be clean: General reference (orchestral) Low Bass reference (glitch hop) (yes, it's my own lol) Upper Treble reference (Rock / Drum & Bass) Right now I don't have my good headphones with me at school, so with these temp headphones, I wouldn't be able to give proper feedback on the low bass (which is lacking) or upper treble (which is overly boosted). For example, when I write something on these temp headphones and I think the bass is good, it's too much when I go home and listen on my Beyers, and I spend a few hours fixing it (both partwriting and mixing; if it was just mixing, it would take less than an hour). However, if I am looking for overly weak treble and overly boosted midrange, I can do that.

I would give it a day, listen in the morning, and then see what you think, but if the preset is for a lower impedance, I would think there is overcompensation, since the 250 ohm headphones need more drive than the 32 ohms. I am curious though, whether the effect of Reference 4 can be turned down, so that a parallel correction (some percent of on/off) can be used instead of the full correction.

Took me long enough to hear this, lol! I'd call it a SMASH hit, with some BURNing solos, showing you once again that WILL shall ROCK. Too much?

It takes a certain mind to proceed with this kind of vision and invest in it; each song has a logical progression to it, in both textural development and arrangement. [For example, "Constellations" is largely atmospheric, and it can be hard to nail proper textural progression while maintaining interest. You got that balance.] There's a large amount of stylistic diversity here, but I can hear the jazz influence (in terms of the chord progressions and time signature modulations) and the attention to detail that I would attribute to you. In terms of mastering, the track flow also makes sense. Great job! I think my favorite track is "Colour of Time".

tldr; you get out what you put in. ----- A good way to verify this is to rip audio using Audacity's "Windows WASAPI" audio host, and then render as WAV; then, encode using WinLAME into an MP3 using VBR1 on the "High" Encoding Quality setting. That should be enough to allow for what should be the highest bit rate based on the current time in the song, rather than providing a flat bitrate for the song (like you would get with CBR). [I do think that youtube is more efficient in its audio compression than soundcloud. I always hear a slight, or sometimes quite noticeable fidelity issue with the upper treble on soundcloud.] ----- Here is an MP3 based on the steps described above, of the first video from 2007 I showed, a raw AVI recorded of a 160 x 144 dimension video: https://app.box.com/s/r750tyd1hxufw6vda13j500qsanbewfw The most prominent bit rate range it has in WinAmp is 112 ~ 160 kbps; it goes no higher than 160 kbps. I think that sounds pretty accurate... it is just an emulation of a GBA game. Here is an MP3 for the second video from 2016 I showed rendered using Adobe After Effects and Sony Vegas on the highest settings possible, with the audio stream before uploading being the original VBR1 MP3 file that would be distributed on OCR: https://app.box.com/s/ytv60g8s766ban58qrx3iehjl3n3xr9c The most prominent bit rate range it has in WinAmp is 192 ~ 320 kbps; it goes no lower than 192 kbps. The actual MP3 I put in, for comparison, can be found here. Based solely on bit rate, these are nearly identical, with a few flashes of 160 kbps in the ripped MP3 above. Based on an explicit A/B comparison, I can tell that the actual MP3 sounds slightly better in the upper treble. But I think youtube did a pretty good job at keeping it sounding good, even if it's not identical. And for good measure, here's a third test with a third video, this time from 2009 processed through Sony Vegas (instead of uploaded as a raw AVI) into 720p HD, but recorded in the same way of a 160 x 144 dimension video. The MP3 that resulted is: https://app.box.com/s/bgq8bnn9as35tzyq7igpulgub5x87eh1 The most prominent bit rate range it has in WinAmp is 128 ~ 160 kbps, occasionally making it to 224 kbps and occasionally flashing 112 kbps; it goes no higher than 224 kbps. This is fairly consistent because the recording input was the same as in the first video, so it makes sense that the bit rate ranges are similar, but the bit rate is slightly better because it was rendered at a higher audio quality ceiling instead of being uploaded as a raw AVI. ----- So yes, the audio quality ceiling that you feed into youtube does "change" what bit rate you get out... because you get out the bit rate that you put in (more or less). I'd say, oh, about 95 ~ 98% of the original quality stays. I'd approve!

Experimental is fine, but yeah, it can be hard to pull off. Redg manages to pull it off: However, in this case, I do agree with @Cubeshark that this is a bit too sparse. You may want to add something to fill in the gaps, like a glitched drum loop to add interest, a pad to create some sort of tonal filler, or a bass to glue the mix together. Near the end of the mix, the glassy pad you had was doing that job. Something else you may want to consider is finding a structure; I typically want to be able to skip 15 seconds forward and notice a forward change in something, whether it's faster hi hats, more bass, less drums, etc., rather than just a change. Something where you can tell whether you're in an intro, a "chorus", a breakdown section, an outtro, etc.