JoshuaHughes's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[PWD]

Amazing work, man! Funny enough, I've been listening to King Crimson all day and now I hear some more good progressive music here. Not nearly enough of this kind of stuff floating around the portal. Killer organ. 3:43-5:00 was just nuts. Also, neat description of all these progressions. Kind of makes me wonder if more progressive musicians write their music in a storyline fashion.

Didn't really hear anything too crazy from the drums or guitar. Seems like it's more organ and synthesizer focused, which is alright with me!

Warhector responds:

Thank you good sir! No there are not much progressive out there. But I can mention Kor-Rune, who is a progressive rock/metallist which focus more on guitar. I'm glad you like the song and the description/story line! Hope you like the other stuff i write. Cheers!
- Warhector

[Blood Pact]

Man, what is with all these crazy awesome dark tracks that I keep hearing today? It's so sinister, it doesn't even need a melody, at least not until the latter half, I guess. Some of these sounds like that airy pad become a little tiring, but so mesmerizing at the same time, I don't even know what to think. The bassline has to be my favorite part in the track. You can just feel the meanness in it.

Drums are also pretty solid in the piece, except for maybe that sidestick sound at 1:20. Felt a little iffy to me. And that Starcraft 2 sample felt flat out cheesy to me. Maybe it's just me. Which one was that anyway, the Stalker? Or maybe this isn't a very serious track, even though it sounds wonderful despite the flubs I mentioned.

theabysmal responds:

Wonderful. Yes, the sample is the stalker unit from Starcraft 2.
The other sample at the very end is the same unit.

Stay cheesy my friend ;-)

[Point Of No Return]

An interesting turn from the DnB that I've been hearing from you. It's rife with spontaneity, from soft water drops with some piano to a grinding distortion beat. I really didn't know what to expect. But the only time I thought a progression was too rough was when the glitchy drums and pad came in on 0:29. I don't normally offer a specific sound to use in my reviews, but I thought a subtle reverse reverb would have been perfect for that part and eased in the beat enough to not slightly startle some of the more wussy listeners like me.

Nothing wrong with having a sound that's relatively easy to make. What some people may consider to be overused, others may see it as a sort of signature style! Like Kirk Hammett and his wah pedals.

So when the crazy noise comes in, I'm simply blown away by it. I've always been biased towards cacophonous noise, and this piece certainly delivers. Favorite little part would have to be the falling bass at 1:18. It's a great fill that keeps the beat alive. Good job on taming the high ends in the mix. I know how easy they can ruin tracks like this one when they have even a little more presence than necessary.

Still felt a little bit of emptiness in some areas, even with the panning, but all in all, I like it! Any other crazy stuff in the works?

MutualCore responds:

Thanks for the review! I'm trying to keep writing but I have no real drive. I produced for 8 years as Quarl but when my computer blew last August my motivation to write music kind of died with it. All my files are on an external HD but its Mac OS data so Windows can't read any of it. Computer I'm currently borrowing has no processing power and a lame sound card.

Hey. It's my birthday today. Throw tons of money on me so I can buy talent the way Dead Mouse does.

[Try for Platinum]

Wow, this is quite a lengthy house track you laid out here, so I hope you don't mind if I structure my review so that I'm writing it while it's playing.

So the drums are pretty solid from what I'm hearing right now. A little strange though that they sound so dry compared to the panning synth you have playing over it. It kinda makes it sound like you're listening to two recordings that clearly weren't recorded in the same room. Maybe some reverb similar to the synth would have helped. I do appreciate that one chromatic percussion playing in the rhythm (forgive me, but isn't it called a clav or something?)

That was really a neat way bringing in the sub like that. Super smooth, in my opinion. If it were me, though, I would have added a little attack on the first note to make the transition even smoother. Filtering in that main synth really helped, too. The hat you brought in wasn't that bad, but I'm referring back to the reverb thing when I say it could have been loads better.

The lack of kick in this part is interesting, because I'm not really sure where the track is going at this point. I'm noticing a slight lack in direction, especially since that synth has pretty much been carrying the track for almost two minutes now. The buildups seems pretty standard. Nothing much to say about that. Good use of rising pitch and all that.

Okay, drop time. I really like it! Feeling a different mood from it since it sounds like it's taking on a more industrial approach. Nice job on the bass. I know it's really easy to go overboard with the distortion. That gliding synth is really what's killin it, though. Sounds like that are what cause people to go crazy and break shit. Out of happiness, of course. The horn coming in was a great addition. A little cheesy, but at this point I'm starting to relate this to a lot of late 90s artists like VNV Nation and the like. Not saying that's a bad thing or anything.

Anyways, good on you for coming back to that melody at 4:40 to seal the deal. Felt like a great time to bring everything at full circle. The second buildup was kind of weird with that snare and all. I know how you kind of just lowered the pitch on it, but the timestretch effect that it gave off made it sound a little cheap.

Second drop wasn't my cup of tea, but I can't knock it because it does kind of work with the track. That square synth I hear it pretty cool. At around the 7 minute mark, I'm really starting to hear a lot of instruments conflicting with one another. It's not as bad as some of the stuff I hear, but some stricter EQing would have made it sound a lot better. 8 minute mark gave the track some room to breathe, and I'm liking the more minimal sound I'm hearing compared to before.

The piano was alright enough, but the word that came to mind when I heard it was "dusty" lol. Might be the EQ again or something, but the little melody was nice. I'm actually guilty of using variations of that melody too many times because it's such a good melody.

So this was a bit of a ride, but I really enjoyed it for the most part. Just felt like highlighting some critical points and offering my measly two cents. Take with it what you will. If this was playing at a club, I could totally get down to it. So keep it up, man!

Cacola responds:

Thank you for the very detailed review!
Good point about the drums, I'll keep that in mind!
Listening to the song again, adding attack on the bass would probably have sounded good, should of thought of that.
Glad you like the drop! I can't really tell if you're saying the glide synth is good or bad though.
I wasn't really intending on giving it a 90s vibe, I just really like that type of brass synth.
I was trying to avoid too many instruments going on in the 2nd drop, guess I failed, I'll try to EQ more often in the future.
The piano sounded dusty because I bit crunched it, I just really like that type of piano sound.
Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks for the review!

[Abyssal Depths]

Sytrus is such an underrated vst, and this just goes to show what kinds of incredible sounds you can get from it. I love the panned distortions you have playing throughout the track. They kind of serve as a good eerie contrast to the quiet mood going on, although I wouldn't be opposed to having the volume on them lowered just a teeny tiny bit.

The reverb on those drops are just awesome. Reverb like that instantly makes me think of a big creepy cave. And that soft bass with a touch of distortion is like icing on the cake. When the pads started coming in, the piece was starting to remind me of Earthbound when I used to play a long time ago. I think it was around the last level? Someone will surely correct if not.

This might be a little weird, but my favorite part had to be 4:32, when everything except the distortion seemed to stop for a second and then resume. I thought it was a great touch that kind of gave off a "what's behind you?" sort of feel. Like the distortion caused the track to actually skip a beat or something.

This is an awesome piece, dude! Best of luck in the contest.

JRob responds:

Sytrus really is underrated, but making good synths in there takes some time and practice (and a bit of production knowledge could help some, too); however, Sytrus synths typically a lot sound better with some added effects (like layering synths and stereo widening). After hearing what full wave rectify does to the song when put on the master track in my song Descent into Psychedelic Madness (I went a little overboard with it in that song), I thought putting a couple short bursts of extreme distortion would make the song a bit more interesting so it didn't stay completely flat throughout (unlike Descent, this also has a second instance on the master track of WaveShaper set on bitmunch instead of just the full wave rectify - probably pointless to have two, but it made something of a difference at least). The only burst I was really worried about being too loud on was the second to last one; I made the automations on it only turn the WaveShaper instances on about 50% instead of at full since there was an extra synth in that burst that didn't exactly work well with the distortion.

Using the right amount of reverb had been a bit difficult for a while back; I usually feel like I use too much when I do. Odd you would get an Earthbound vibe from this, since I never played any of the games from the series.

Thanks for the review

[Frolic]

I really like the upbeat tone to it! The piano sounds pretty bright, and the melodies seem to flow together very well. There are a few problems I have with this one, though. The instruments are pretty simplistic overall, especially the sampled drums. Maybe you could throw some reverb on them to make them sound a little bigger? I think there's also a little clipping going on. Are you keeping everything below 0dbs?

I like your style though, man. Those melodies are really catchy, and I'd be hard-pressed to find someone sustain a bad mood over this. Keep on keeping on!

PaperMikes responds:

Oh! I don't think I've experimented with reverb much, but I'll totally explore that in the next one I make. I never noticed any clipping, and I didn't really pay much attention to my decibel levels. Thanks! I'll be sure to take those two things in mind. ^.^

[Descent Into Psyche...]

This is crazy! Definitely don't want to be in a dark room with this playing. I really liked the degradation of noise towards the end. Really trippy. Only thing I didn't really care for was those squares at 1:20. Felt just a smidge out of place. Wonderful atmosphere, though. Is all your other stuff as wacky as this?

JRob responds:

Thanks

Towards the end I used a wave shaper to give the master track a shit ton of distortion. About the square synth, that was somewhat intentional. The song, as the title implies, was supposed to gradually become more demented and eerie starting from a minute in; after that point, things start to sound off (that detuned synth, for example), until it goes full psychedelic.

This is the most psychedelic song I've done so far, and nothing else here on NG I've done comes close; the first song I'm going to be submitting also has something of a psychedelic vibe to it like this (and I also use a similar method to that of what I used at 2:40-3:00 for short bursts of extreme distortion in it).

[The Virus Is The Cure]

This is amazing! Where do I start? The piano in this piece and the use of delay behind it is off the chain. The quick melodies make me think of a sort of psychological tick that's beginning to creep its way into the mind, and a bunch of pent up anger is ready to be violently expelled on everything around it. I can imagine something like a neural parasite ready to activate a killswitch and assume full control of the host.

Your unique distorted noises in the intro really set the tone of the track in motion. I was already feeling the virus theme to it. The hats in this are pretty solid, and it's great to hear some chopping and pitch altering to keep them fresh. It's cool that you used different snares too. I always hear a lot of heavily layered snares that hit throughout entire tracks when in some parts that kind of thing isn't really necessary.

Now for the big noise. Yeah, it's kind of rough, and I'm not really a fan of not-so-subtle phasers/flangers, which is what this sound seems to be running through (or maybe a high-res lfo filter?), but it just works so well with the track, I couldn't possibly be that negative about it. It delivers the message so well and knocks you on your ass at the same time. And the distorted bass backing it up helps tremendously.

Glad I started following you, because this is really a wonderfully awesome track that I'll definitely be favoriting this for future listening. Can't wait to hear something that you'll actually be excited to release!

Also, you may or may not know, but Tom likes this as well. Check out his latest news.

MutualCore responds:

Woahhhh, Tom Falp :D

(He's famous.)

[Chimera 2.0]

Thrills don't always have to come through fast-paced genres! I enjoy every intense moment as a thrill, such as your wonderful piano that starts of the track. I do have to say though that your drop is pretty messy and seems to be forsaking a lot of clarity in exchange for loudness. It's interesting because I've never really listened to chillstep as dramatic as this one. It's usually very minimalistic with some ambient themes. Or maybe I just don't listen to enough of it. What would you recommend?

I love arps, and the one in this piece is no exception. I always find plucked arps to be great in orchestral pieces because they just seem add an aura of mystery and epicness to everything. All in all, this is a good track that unfortunately has some noise conflict diluting the mix. Nothing some EQ tweaking can't solve.

Kabalist responds:

I'm really glad you liked the intro! I've been working on the mix lately, and this song is currently undergoing some changes.

Well, people define chillstep in different ways. I think what separates chillstep from any *insert random word here*-step is that it doesn't necessarily focus on a bunch of wobbly mumbo jumbo, but instead creates room for other musical aspects which, in this case, is orchestral elements.

If you haven't already, you should check out NG-user Haywyre. He's a great artist, although he might be more in the dubstep area.

Thank you for the constructive criticism, Josh! Sorry for the late response.
Take care.

//Kabalist.

[I Miss When I Was An Astronaut]

Strange tune here with what sounds like a spoonful of pretty much everything, but I would've pegged it as really chill trap with video game elements. Not that genres matter THAT much, but there is a bit an identity crisis going on here. Some of it blends very well and some of it throws me off a little. I think the strangest thing I hear is that DnB loop you used during the drop, which sounds a little off-putting to say the most and not mixed all that well to say the least.

I can't knock it too hard because everything sounds great in pieces, if that makes any sense. I especially liked those detuned chords you used in the drop. The stabs in the track also sounded very good. Nothing wrong with the drums that I would call you out on. Actually, I think they add to the video game atmosphere with their simple design. It's an interesting piece, dude.