I loved the way you changed it up almost constantly in this but still managed to keep in on structure. Also, the way you had that goofy background but went serious infront of it, was done surprisingly well.
I loved about every instrument in this, except for the rock-guitar and the drums you used.. The plucking guitar was my favorite though. Along with the bass-ish background. The kickdrum seemed incredibly low, as did the snare, and the guitar. The cymbal even seemed kind of low to me. Its like I could barely notice any of the drums were actually there..
The rock/metal guitar in there was either too low or distorted for me. It just sounded terrible in my opinion and really took me away from the piece. The pattern you used it in, however, sounded great with the song.
Overall, I'd say this may need to be mastered a little bit better.
Mastering is still something I'm learning, and hopefully I'll "master" that concept one that. Perhaps a boost in the higher frequencies would fix the drums. I always hate EQ'ing drums, as I always load them as a whole set (not one single track per individual drum, but one single track for the entire thing). This means I need to EQ the drum part as a whole, which can be quite difficult. Still, practice makes perfect, and hopefully I'll be able to perfect that skill as well.
The electric guitar was artificially lowered by one octave, but that was to prevent muddiness in the mix and provide an equal distribution of frequencies. Sorry to hear you didn't like it though. Not sure what I can do to 'fix' that, apart from lowering the distortion.
I've gotta say, I loved the way you blended all these different elements together into one track. Classical and DnB seem to fit real well when you mix them. The change-ups were also a very pleasant surprise. As well as the instruments sounded great to the ear.
However, while this seems original, it also seems very unoriginal. As in, the melodies you had before the change-ups were brought it, seemed very generic to me. Along with the drum pattern you had all throughout the song was very unoriginal. If I were to get into more details about it, I'd say the violin and classical background melodies I have both noticeably heard before. I'm not trying to just look for an excuse or anything, I promise you that. I'm not trying to be a jerk either. I have to deduct the originality points, as that's a big premise in my judging.
Honestly though, if this is your first serious step into DnB.. then you have a bright future in this genre.
Although I try to understand your points, you seem to be stuck in a narrow vision you label "originality". Everything have already been written around the globe and the fact you might have heard some parts of this track is both undeniable and quite irrelevant, for me. I used generic melodies because it's still a test track, and a starting point for any other possible DnB-like tracks. I made it to give myself an idea on how to structure the tracks according to my imagination and will to carry on what I look for. I thank you for explaining the reasons behind your judgement, but I cannot fully agree with it either because in my eyes, some parts are still imbued by how people generally perceives some aspects of sound. ;) I gotta say though, it's the most honest review I've got in a long while and I greatly appreciate this :D
KKS
Its about time you've come back. I still don't understand why you took down all your tracks.. In my opinion, a lot of them were better than this one, no offense.
I'll start with the good points. Just about everything was good, most of the lyrics were really great. Although some of them, were stuff I've heard before. Your flow, is amazing. Enough said. You have a great voice for rapping and a good singing voice as well. The beat was great. Nice choice in that one.
Now, with that being said, you could've made the voices at the beginning sound less... dumb... I wasn't sure how serious this track was until you hit the beat and started taking over.
Some of the lyrics through me for a loop. I'd hate to say this, but a few of them seemed to just be there because they rhymed. However, with THAT being said, most of them did fit nonetheless.
I love Hip-Hop, so I am inclined to judge this a lot harder than I would other pieces.
Also, I can really appreciate the message you had in this one, I actually felt it.
heyy man! i Appreciate this review no doubt man
this is great because i can only learn from this and become a better artist
as for the tracks that are gone i am busy rewriting them and reproducing the sound
cause i made those in a studio in SXM and i in NL now and i have a studio of my own so i wanted to make them perfect the way i had imagined them, and now it's best to do em cause i can actually take my time with em but keep on the lookout they gunna be dope! and thanks for the support man!
I'm not sure I would classify this as Jazz, if there was a "New Jazz" it would definitely fit though. I'm not sure what I would classify this as, but the saxophone doesn't alone make it Jazz.
The saxophone, melodies, and instruments used in this we're very pleasant to the ear. Along with the melody patterns, I really enjoyed those as well. However, that didn't sound like much of a Jazz bass to me either. You could've tried to make a better pattern with that.
However, the drum/snare we're way too low and sounded terrible. I can't think of a nicer way to describe them, my apologies. You should really work on creating your own drums or finding a different drum pack. You can easily make better drums by trying to combine different kicks together, or combine a small snare with a bit of a bigger drum, and a snare with a clap, or bring in a hi-hat to combine with in. Anything works in that area. The drums really took away from this though, so low I could barely hear them and when I did they just weren't sounding as good as they should have.
This could also probably be longer with more added solos and different instruments. As I said above, I would've added a bass solo and made the bass melody more complex. The melody you had was good for the song, but I think it needed a solo with a different melody. You could also always add a trumpet solo or a guitar solo, something to bring in an epic part of the piece.
I understand you were trying to go chill here, and I think you did. The problem with that is, it leaves so much more to the ear to be heard. You should really go back and try to add more to this and work on it a little more to make it as good as possible.
Well. This certainly was a harsh review, I'll respond to every point in it.
"the saxophone doesn't alone make it Jazz."
Yes. That's true. That's not why I called it jazz though. I was using the blues scale quite liberally throughout this, and the chording is much more jazzy than a lot of songs I've heard. That and the rhythms was why.
"melodies, and instruments used in this we're very pleasant to the ear"
Thanks.
"that didn't sound like much of a Jazz bass to me either."
I didn't use a walking bass. Is that the problem? The initial and ending bass was more 'trance', I admit, but... the middle was most definitely more jazzy.
"drum/snare we're way too low and sounded terrible."
I'll take this paragraph as saying "I didn't like the drums at all". I can see what you're saying here, and I can say that most of this I don't agree with.
First, the 'making-your-own-drum-pack' thing would be awesome. Unfortunately, I do not have much in the way of music production, and more in composition. I would love to make my own drums, and I actually do put a lot of effort into finding decent drum samples for the songs. I'm sorry you didn't like this, but I am kept from giving too much sympathy from what you said in the rest of that paragraph.
The snare wasn't in the low frequencies at all. In fact, the only thing that could be called 'in the lower frequencies' was the kick, and it had the lowest frequencies pretty much to itself except for the bass, I hear it quite cleanly even with that, they don't mess with each other at all. Not to mention, it also has a higher frequency in it with the hit. As for the high-hat, were you even listening to the drums at all in the sections with the synth guitar?
"This could also probably be longer with more added solos and different instruments."
Granted. I did not want this to be one of those 5-6 minute long songs that just goes on and on with the same feel. It's meant to be short. But I do see what you mean, and I suppose it could be longer.
"something to bring in an epic part of the piece."
An epicness feel wouldn't really work with a chilled-out song.
"I would've added a bass solo and made the bass melody more complex."
Perhaps. But as I've been told before, complexity isn't necessarily a good thing. While I did not say this, this was my attempt at making a simple song that has
While I appreciate the honest review, I can't help thinking that you didn't really listen to the song and instead just looked for all the bad things you could think of, even throwing in a few things that weren't even really problems.
However, that doesn't mean I can't recognize the things that make sense. I do appreciate the good feedback you gave me, and am thankful for it.
I'll start off by saying, that was some amazing mixing right there. The DJ'ing you did in this completely blew my away. Sounded damn near perfect and I've gotta give you credit for that. I don't know many people that can do it that good.
With all this being said, the piece didn't seem to be mastered very great. As in, the piano should've been done so it didn't have an echo with it. That really took away from the piece as a whole. Probably start working on changing up the instruments.
The instruments used in this just didn't sound very appealing. The piano sounded clearly fake and had a terrible background noise to it. It's like a good that tastes good but then has that weird aftertaste to it.. The drums killed it for me, those were not the drums I would use. You need to try and find better instruments to compliment how good you are at mixing up a song.
The pattern you had was also very simple, although you fixed that with the mixing added into the piece.
The instrument changing in the headphones didn't sound too great either but it definitely had a good pattern to it. It gave me that ready for war feeling. Also, the song didn't seem to loop as good as I had hoped.