ErikMcClure's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[{425} Invincible]

Repetative

This song isn't bad, per say, it just needs a little help.

The first thing I notice here is that the melody doesn't seem to match up with the song's feel. I would think that a melody like this, with some more variations, would work great in a less... angry techno song. It would fit an echoing piano extremely well, but instead of giving the piano the lead melody, you give it something else. *facepalm*

The songs structure is good, and isn't *too* repetitive, but you can't get away with a melody like that for an extended period of time. It doesn't help that the notes in the melody don't really seem to line up too well, and they seem discordant. The melody is just plain weird sounding in a way that bothers me. Its hard to explain how a melody is bad, there's just something wrong with it D: (I could transcribe it to figure out exactly what but I'm not THAT bored).

Oh god, the compression, and processing... The compression in this song isn't bad, but it really doesn't fit the song. Its just trying to bang against the max dB level as hard as it can, plus you either sidechained almost everything, or the compressor is making everything really obvious. The compression just kills the entire song by crushing all of the instruments together and making almost all volume variations pointless. You can really tell at the end when the compression murders the reverb. The filtering gets excessive in some parts too.

In general the song is trying too hard to be creative and cool-sounding at the same time. This is a situation where a song idea is being forced into a specific genre and trying to follow a bunch of cool things when all they do is detract from the song's potential as something completely different. Really good songs are really good because every single element in them fits together like a jigsaw.

As usual there isn't enough stereo seperation, mastering needs help, etc. etc. but those problems are present in most songs (like mine). I like the cello, btw.

A word of advice: You either be pro for being way better then anyone else or being completely different.

7/10
4/5

Michael425 responds:

Try to remember that I've only been making music for three months now.

Thanks for the detailed review though. Everything you said is pretty understandable.

[*Forgotten Aura* // ZeRo BaSs]

Wow o.O

While I'm not really a fan of the grindy bass stuff you put in 1:18 to 2:14, the rest of the song kicks so much ass it makes up for it a hundredfold. The whole song has an adventurous feel to it, and would be seriously awesome for a game.

10/10
5/5

ZeRo-BaSs responds:

^^ Thanks!

[Castles In the Sky (MilkMix)]

Bad start, awesome middle, repetitive end

I'm not going to bash the melodic content of this song too much since its a remix, but there is still significant room for improvement, especially at the end of the song. The beginning of the song for me was very unpleasant, but that's mostly a matter of personal taste. Once you got into the melodic middle, I really started to like it, but I think the soft part was too short, and you jumped into the main portion too quickly without fully realizing the melody possibilities there.

The later half of the middle was an interesting contrast to the rest of the song, both in tune and in synth and overall feel. However, the end had the exact opposite problem as the middle - it was extremely repetitive. There was no melodic variation, the instruments hardly ever changed, and the outro was simply an echo crash. In terms of a trance song, I think you could have easily dropped out into another idea (or even the idea that was too short in the middle) in order to both extend the song's playtime and provide some much needed variation. Doing so would give you a song structure similar to A B C B C.

The end crash has an excessive amount of silence on the end as well. The mastering, of course, was very good, and overall the production quality in this song was extremely good.

8/10 - Not your best work, but not horrible, either. I also want to try and remain unbiased genre-wise.
5/5 - To counteract those blasted 0 bombers >=D

P.S. The early middle part is SO GOOD. It could have been a song all by itself, and it only lasts 30 seconds! =<

Mrmilkcarton responds:

Thank you, don't exactly have a response for it but we talked over MSN.

[[MAC8]Origins]

The drums

...are not very good. Now, thats overridden by some really crazy awesome synths, but the drums have the issue of being about 2 or 3 samples and not utilizing different areas of the EQ. They are also completely mono, which all adds up to them being extremely fatiguing to listen to.

That said, you have some awesome melodies in here, and the atmosphere really feels very madness-ish.

9/10
5/5

...but t3h drums! AAAAAAA!

Mrmilkcarton responds:

Getting there but still a newb to them.

[-Orr- Four Brave Champions]

The definition of Epic

Is this song. There really is nothing more to say, except that this song is just that awesome.

10/10
5/5

DavidOrr responds:

Wow! Thanks!

[Requiem For a Dream (DnB MMix)]

Power much?

The pitch-rising thingymasynth combined with the drums and a strong mix have created a stunning combination of strings, an awesome song to begin with, and crazy-ass drums to create an even more awesome remix.

Now, on to the nitpicking. On the strings I think you should have emphasised the quarter note string hits a little more to give it more feeling. Also, while the remix is awesome, there is a whole lot more you could have done with the melody, including a rising/falling string arp, and probably a lot more synth variation. Yes, its DnB, but you really didn't put that much variation into the drumlines either - they sound cool, but they don't *change*

Also, for some reason, I feel like if you removed some of the stereo from the bass synth and centered it a bit more, it would feel a bit better and more like it was "under" you instead of around you, which is more appropriate for a bass synth (IMO). The ending could have been a little more climatic as well, once again with the rising string arp that you never did and it bugs me because it fits this song so well.

Listening to it again, I also feel like the melody could have been elaborated on and upgraded in speed so as to match the frantic drums. Its good to have a contrast in speed, but the strings are already providing that in the background, so going crazy with the synth probably would have yeilded a catchier result.

As a final note, that pitch-rising background synth-thing is just jaw-droppingly awesome sounding.

9/10
5/5

Mrmilkcarton responds:

Well I already went over the string issue with you over MSN but as far as the ARP I'm not so sure about that. I think I heard it in my head too but never found the notes.

As far as the stereo of the bass I think I actually widened it more. In Drum & Bass I prefer the bass to have power and a big presence in the song. It's called DnB for a reason no need to hide the bass.

I wanted to make make the melody a tad faster but I soon found the sliding on the synthe wouldn't allow for that. It would sound pretty dumb sliding any faster then it is.

Last but not least thank you.

[Milk{Looking Back}]

Only The Carton.

An incredibly complex chord progression, variation up the wazoo, a catchy melody, beautiful mastering, synthwork only The Carton is capable of, rolled into one mind-blowing, unbelievable song. This is going to get first of the week on tuesday.

In terms of criticism, I think the do-do-do do-do-do that comes in at the middle of the song would have benefited from going one note farther and hitting the next chord. I also think that the song would have benefitted from messing up the rhythms a little bit, or providing an alternate bassline.

Either way, this is crazy awesome stuff.

10/10
5/5

Mrmilkcarton responds:

Thanks man I appreciate it.

[Reasoner- I'm Still Here]

A slow saturday

Is precisely what this sounded like. Superb job, and excellent as background music.

Reasoner responds:

:-)

[Rose At Nightfall]

Wow

This song starts off amazing, becomes incredible, goes into a breif bout of unbelievable, and is simply beyond words. This song is made of win.

10/10
5/5

NemesisTheory responds:

This review is made of win, too! <3
thank you for the kind words!

[Entrance Me (Original Mix)]

Good Ambient

Not entirely that good of a listening song, though. I can feel this song in the background somewhere, but its missing the variation and massive feel of your other songs. That massive synth seems a bit lonely and out of place with all the other light, ambient, echoey synths in the song. It might have worked if it was faded even more into the background, but when its trying to carry the melody it just doesn't fit.

Either way, a good job, just not a spectacular job.

8/10
5/5

Mrmilkcarton responds:

Hmmm thanks for the input. I think I could dramatically change the style of the song by removing and replacing that synthe. Always room to improve and makes me want to try even harder on the next track.

Thanks for the vote and review.