DreamEater's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[HT || Not So Suspenseful WIP]

Not bad but this sounds more like house music :p

I really like what you did with the fade ins, and soft leads. The drums sound good, but have a really house-like pace. I like the melodies here and things don't sound bad, but the structure is a bit off.

- My first suggestion would be to speed things up a bit; work at around 132-136 BPM.

- Second would be to plan your build ups, and break downs before hand; try to make your builds very dynamic yet gradual.

- Thirdly; That bass line is very house sounding as well... I suggest that you shoot for a more driving bassline (Check out my original song "Fail", and you'll hear what I mean)

- Finally; trance leads and fx are usually very soft, clear, and airy sounding. Focus more on mix clarity (Clarity is everything with trance imo)

I Hope these suggestions help bro; I really like this song as a house submission, but I don't quite hear as much trance influence as I would have liked to.
Keep at it, I'm sure you'll get it :]

Cheers!
~Sonik

-Review Request Club-

HyperTrough responds:

Thanks so much man! Very helpful points mentioned. I really had no idea what to do. So I'm sure I can incorporate those into the finished version.

Once again, THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. Greatly appreciate your time. Most helpful review evar! :D

[Acid Paradox - Creepy Mansion]

Can't believe I still haven't reviewed this

The best October 2011 NAC submission by far IMO -.-;

Love the driving grooves, Awesome leads, FX, and SICK vocal sampling/ vocals!
The evil laughter that you used during your breaks was also really professional sounding! I honestly had this song stuck in my head for the whole 2 weeks that I worked on my submission man; I was pretty sure that I couldn't even come close to this. x.x
You've got some serious skills bro! (I totally disagree with the NAC judges this time around >.<, and I really hope you take 1st for halloween 2011)

I can't wait to hear your next one bro, and good luck! :D
~Sonik

-Review Request Club-

Acid-Paradox responds:

Thanks man with the review !! remember that we have a pending collab for the tagteam nac man. (of course if it comes lol)

If not well then , let's still do it.

Cheers

Ruben -Acid Paradox-

[HDC Presents: Computer Crash]

Thats what i'm talkin about

First off.. Sick ass beat dude, I really love the drum kit/ bass/ Keys mixture; really dope sounding. The lyrics are pretty sick also, but I really didn't dig the quality of the vocals in every part of this; it seemed like some of the vocal lines got clipped or poorly recorded. It's weird though cause with the way that the beat sounds, the weird vocal tones actually kinda work in some spots too... it's hard to say whether it works or not though :/

I would really love to hear more stuff like this from you honestly, but I hope that the vocal quality improves with time; I'm sure it will...
Untill then though...

Madd sick work! :D
Cannot wait to hear the next one!

~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

HDC responds:

XD Thank you! Stay tuned, more collabs to come!

[-A New World-]

Jazzy, smooth, and chill

I rather enjoyed this piece bro, and I'm sorry I took so long to finally getting around to getting this reviewed... here it goes

I really love the professional tone/ quality of all of the instruments you used here; one thing that really stuck out to me with this song was the melody at 0:23 as it is reallyyyyy similar to a melody of my own in my submission from back in the day titled "The Aftershock". It was really interesting to hear you use this melody in such a different way.

I really really liked hearing all of the different influences in this song; from the smooth jazz/ contemporary side of things to the orchestral/epic sounds on the opposite side of the musical spectrum.

Honestly Steph... I don't think I would change a thing about this song :]

Really great work bro!
~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

Step responds:

Hey, thanks for reviewing!

"I rather enjoyed this piece bro, and I'm sorry I took so long to finally getting around to getting this reviewed... here it goes"

No worries about the late review, naturally. I really appreciate that you took the time to review :3.

"I really love the professional tone/ quality of all of the instruments you used here;"

That's all thanks to the good VST's and sample libraries I used. East/West was definitely a massive help!

"one thing that really stuck out to me with this song was the melody at 0:23 as it is reallyyyyy similar to a melody of my own in my submission from back in the day titled "The Aftershock". It was really interesting to hear you use this melody in such a different way."

Wow yeah I can hear the resemblance! Our songs are both pretty different in terms of atmosphere and mood though :P.

"I really really liked hearing all of the different influences in this song; from the smooth jazz/ contemporary side of things to the orchestral/epic sounds on the opposite side of the musical spectrum."

I'm very glad you liked that! I love using different instruments that usually aren't associated with each other (in this case, orchestral, pop, jazz and tribal influences) and seeing if I can make something good out of them.

"Honestly Steph... I don't think I would change a thing about this song :]

Really great work bro!"

Thanks, I owe you one! I'll see if I can find the time to review back. We're being given insane amounts of Maths homework so it might not be easy, but I've got mid-term holidays next week so maybe I'll find some time then.

Thanks again man, much appreciated!

[Superfluous High (NGADM '11)]

different, but I think I get what you are going 4

Not a bad piece, and I really enjoyed the different directions that you when with this piece; I could hear a lot of drum & bass influence to the beginning part, while the break really reminded me of a progressive rock jam break (almost Rush style). I also really liked the organ/ guitar samples that you brought in through-out the song :) very different :D

Somethings could have used some touching up here as well though; the drums didn't not sound too great and although I loved the drum patterns, the samples themselves didn't sound nice with the rest of the song... seemed like that could have been taking away from the sound you seem to be going for. The mastering is good, but I would also take a look at that as well; this piece seems like it could be mixed a bit better as well.

Overall, not a bad submission... could use some work though
~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

Birdinator99 responds:

Hey, improving's the name of the game here -- just trying out some new headphones; stuff might be a bit bass-heavy at first.

Glad you thought it sounded like Rush -- they're pretty cool.

"the drums didn't not sound too great" -- I take it you didn't like them! I felt they were appropriate samples, but I was compressing them, so maybe that was it. Doesn't matter; duly noted.

The mastering was good, but the mix needs work?!?!?! Is that even possible lol

Ah God, what do I know anyways, hehe. Yeah, I was attempting to make it brighter at some point; didn't quite work.

Sounds to me like one step forward, two steps back, eh? I'll see what I can do for next time. Thanks for taking the time to review this!

[The Darkness Choke]

Nice jam

I really dug the instrumental work, and the mix of instruments didn't sound to bad at all; the vocals however, sound pretty bad and are very quiet :( (mic also has some really bad feedback issues at some points)

As a whole your band sounds pretty tight, but a few spots could use some cleaning up; I really like the different blend of influences that I hear within this song though. The guitar tone really reminds me of an old Cure song or something along those lines/ while at the same time you guys seem to have that chill element to your sound that reminds me a bit of minus the bear :)

Overall, not a bad piece at all; but work on those vocals, and make sure everything is staying in tune x.x
~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

Sawdust responds:

thanks man

[Brazil (Bugg Remix)]

Shweet shweet :D

I really like what you've done here, and you did a really great job of transforming this song. I really liked all of the samples you used, and for the most part you got the melodies/ notes right :D

The drums were a bit weak for trance imo, and I honestly wouldn't have let the intro run on all the way until 2:45 if I were you; that's a ridiculous build up time for the simple/ repetitive melodies you have going on here.

Things to take a second look at:
- Spend more time on your drums, and people with notice :)
- try layering some of those leads, and smoothing out your cutoff automations a bit
- Watch that clippiness

Overall, not bad work my friend :)
Quite nice!
~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

BuggMusic responds:

Definitely some good points here. I must say, Trance has never been my genre, I've always loved listening to it, I guess that just doesn't translate to producing it. I will take this on board in any future Trance endeavors :)

[Fluttershy's Model Music]

Not bad!

Composition wise this is not bad at all, and for your first song... wow dude, really amazing work! :D

This is is a great sound for just starting out, and I'm sure that as you get the hang of music writing programs you will excel quite quickly :)

The melodies and composition are great, but I would have liked to hear a bit more on the bass end of the sound spectrum :p. The samples chosen here... work... but they could definitely be better. Most of the actual samples used here are rather loq quality sounding, and really basic; you managed to get the point across, but if you really want to grab peoples attention you have to put just as much time into creating your sounds as you do composing complex melodies.

Friendly suggestions:
- Look into some new plugins, and look up some tutorials on creating original sounds
- Add some percussive elements to this
- Add some reverb to those "real" samples to get an even more real sound from them

Overall not bad for a first submission!
~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

shrimpchris responds:

Thanks alot for the review! I thought something was missing since I uploaded it and I think you just might've helped me figure out what that is. Like I said, thanks and there'll definitely be more coming in the future!
EDIT: I forgot to mention, Melodies and rythm have always been my strong points while I'm a little weaker when it comes to chords. I've always been able to figure out melodies to songs I like or my own basic melodies alot easier than the chords of those songs or chords to match my melodies. Also, I didn't want to use alot of percussion here (and I need better percussion samples) but I can see why you want more. The song I'm currently working on will be alot more percussion heavy than this and have more melodies going on at the same time. More colors if you will.

[The Apple That Fell (WIP)]

Simple but really nice :)

Your string samples/ melodies sound wonderfully composed and blended. The mastering/ quality of everything sounds very nice, and I was rather happy to hear a less repetitive piece from someone here on Newgrounds; as that seems to be a running trend among most new audio portal contributors.

I love the soft tones and subtle dynamics in the piece, but I really would have liked to hear more percussive/ orchestral additions to this song towards the end though; this kinda builds up to nothing as-is.

Friendly suggestions:
- Keep going with this, and build up to a really epic break
- Add some percussive instruments into this song

Overall, not a bad song mate :)
~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

Usernamemyarse responds:

I was expecting something a lot more harsh coming from the RRC, and you where quite spot on:)

Thanks, I really need to get back to this piece :)

[Stargenx - Drink the pain away]

Really beautiful piano melodies

I really enjoyed all of the piano work in the piece, and the guitar work was a nice touch as well; the drums do sound a bit cheezy though I can't lie x_x. The mixing/ mastering sounds good, and the tone of that piano is to die for.

I can tell that there was a fair amount of emotion put into this song, and I can really appreciate that a lot. The blend of different instruments was refreshing to hear, and rather original too. The guitar work in this was really nice, but I would have liked to hear a guitar sample to stand up to the brilliant piano tone.

Overall this is a really interesting, different, and moving piece.
Very well done
~Dj Sonik

-Review Request Club-

Stargenx responds:

Thanks for the review! I know the drums are kind of cheesy. Sometimes cheese tastes good, though. I did the best I could with what I have.