ZuwerWS's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[crispy x Solacitude - Boreal Speedway]

THEODORE ROOSEVELT?!
I think I really like the mix here, it tries to push all the instruments as close as possible while not sounding bad. The guitar sounds great, but the instrument I especially like is the melody in the background that plays on what sounds to me like a sine or something, It is whimsical. And the guitar drop that leads to the piano solo also is just so good. The whole piece keeps the racing and ice vibe right to the end. I don't have much to say, other than this is stunning work

crispybatteryacid responds:

Thanks man!

[Arctique Fire]

The sample that keeps playing at the intro doesn't sound that good, I genuinely don't know how to describe it. The guitar that starts playing to lead to the main part I really like. Overall the acoustic guitar here is great. Regarding the atmosphere, it sounds more like halloween to me with the guitars and the chord progression, and also doesn't give me that race atmosphere, even with the lyrics, which I like for their cheesiness. Overall while messy especially around 0:33-0:56 I kind of like it for that? Like "Exotic and nice, racing camels on the ice" is such a raw and funny line. I guess the words that best describe how I feel would be "Really solid shit"

CasualBreather responds:

Thank you a lot for the feedback!

[The Three Guardians]

I don't know why, but this track is really hard to explain. I definitely would change the little chirps that play from the very beginning of the track, I think they'd work amazing if slowed down by like three or four times. I also think that it's a bit too repetitive, but I could see that not being as much of an issue if played in the background of a bigger event, because it sounds like if it was made to play to a cutscene of sorts. The piece builds emotion to what might be lurking around the corner well, and along with the chords and the instrument choice, it makes for quite a mystical experience.

MauveDash responds:

Repetition I suffer with, this shows that wonderfully :(

But hey, glad you liked what is essentially a reject!

[Pancakes]

Okay so we have had Waffles, now it's time for Pancakes. I don't know how you did the rain sounding like sound effect, but I really like it. The piano with the heavy effects put on it sounds really nice and powerful, and the drums complement it well, although I feel like the open and closed hit hats don't really fit, at least sound wise, I'd just try it without them, or with a much lesser emphasis put on them (basically making them more quiet). I wouldn't say the first part is good, it definitely feels a bit too repetitive, with the same pattern being repeated over and over. I think it works better as just an introduction, where as here, at least to me it sounds like if it constantly wanted to go some where, but didn't. It's not bad, but it's not that great in my eyes either. The transition at 0:46 I quite like, although I feel like the more heavy sound does evade a bit too quickly, and maybe it could sound better if it stayed there for another two or three seconds. I really like the melody that's introduced around 1:14. I think the main melody instrument is a bit quiet, but other than that the middle part sounds great on it's own. I like how you spice things up with the drums, that change bit every bar. I definitely think that around 2:30 the mixing on the drums could have been much better. The feet / bass drum is way too loud when compared to the rest of the sounds. Overall I think there's some good ideas here, that especially shine near the middle part, but think that as a whole, even with the cool rhythm and very well made effects throughout the piece, it does fall apart a bit when it comes to the mixing especially on the drums and some other stuff I mentioned.

MauveDash responds:

The hi hats I agree looking in the past should have been quieter! This piece sadly ends up being what happens when Mauve has a cool rhythm idea but nothing more :(

Sorry for the slight disappointment! Though that could be one projecting onto you.

[House Inspired Doodle]

By the description, do you generally mean that you prefer to create sounds rather to use the ones someone already created? If so I can kind of understand you.
I love the bass in here, it's really groovy and definitely helps the mood. I think the ride cymbals are a bit too loud and out of place, maybe I'd try to go with a more hard and certain sounding cymbal, but it's not that much of a deal. I think the snares also are a bit too loud, which definitely is hearable the most around the one minute and a half minute mark. I also like the chords here. And the spicing up in the melody around 2:10. Overall I quite like it, even though simple it does it's job done, though it would be even better with a more worked on mixing, especially on the drum's audio leveling.

MauveDash responds:

By sampling I mean like taking stuff from other tracks, as those feel like stealing.

Daft Punk is particularly bad with this in like one of their songs (Robot Rock).

Also agreed on the drums and stuff, it was kinda painful as this was meant to be BGM to a video I was making.

[Violet [2024 Remaster]]

This definitely sounds really cool for your second composition. I love the chords here, and the melody on the piano sound really nice. Regarding the drums however, I'd definitely change the pattern a bit. instead of (in quavers) X - - - O - - - X - - - O - - -, I'd maybe try something along the lines of X - - - - - O - X - - - - - O - X, and some pauses in the hit hat, maybe removing the fourth crotchet would sound better flowing. The effects on the piano sound quite beautiful, especially around the 1:10 mark. Other than that, I like it a decent bit.

edit: essentially, I believe a bossa nova drum pattern would fit this the best.

MauveDash responds:

Ooooo, that's not a bad idea! If I wasn't lazy I would have tried to change up the drums a little bit from the original.

I'll keep that pattern in mind though! Since I might be able to utilize it in the future.

[Cool Beans]

I like how you used the orchestra hit here, as I almost never can get a good place to put it in even though I like the sound it makes. I'm not quite sure though if you meant to make the saw (or at least that's what I presume is making that sound around 1:16) sound so out of scale when compared to the rest of the melody, it sounds kind of out of place, but if it was on purpose I think I get what you were trying to go for. I also don't know if this was meant to be yet another demo, because if so then yeah it's interesting. There's definitely a lot more effort put into the project overall here than in the last one you sent, so it feels kind of wrong to give it a lower score even though this you put more time in. I still like the overall progression, with how there's basically three different versions of the same theme that all get different ways to get to them, that is an interesting idea to flesh out, into a full out thing. Regarding the mixing I feel like the hit hat might be too loud when compared to the rest of the drums, and the bass definitely is way to loud. Overall I'd say this is alright, but with some weird mixing choices. I once again don't know if it's a demo or anything like that, and I wouldn't want to make you feel like I'm gonna criticise you for ever single thing that you're gonna do. If it is a demo then cool, you're definitely making progress in the program, and this is pretty fun composition wise, but if it's supposed to be a full fleshed song then I already wrote out everything I had of note.

MauveDash responds:

Its not really much of a demo, its more like a rejected experiment that I chose to put online.

Mostly just due to the issues stated above, I personally think this is very bad but to see you found it interesting and a slight improvement with the program is nice!

[ROBOT DAY 2024 COLLAB ALBUM]

Listened to the whole thing while on a train, really cool stuff, although I for sure will have to fix up on some parts of my compositions in terms of the mix and the transitions. I think the first one is perfect the way it is, other than it being really quiet for some reason. I don't know why or how but even though I always have my compositions while near, below the 0dB limit so it doesn't peak, it always ends up sounding much more quiet. Other than that, yeah some fixes will be needed for Like Never Before, and I liked most of the songs here

Aalasteir responds:

All cool! Awesome you would like to make your music.

[Sample Slicer Test]

Out of curiosity, what were you using? I tried composing in that program quite a decent amount of times before, and I never personally found it, but knowing what my attempts looked like, you seem to have gotten it a lot more than I did. It's nothing extreme, but as a test / demo, it's quite fun. I won't get into details since this is supposed to be just a test, but I still had fun with the drum pattern you made, and it sounds like you did too.

MauveDash responds:

I was using SlicerT, which is NOT in the stable releases yet :(

Great fun!

[Less is More (Cambio)]

The beginning is quite interesting, but the effects added onto each instrument clash. One of the piano thingies (can't quite dysect which one it is) is really low quality sounding, and I think I get what you meant by adding it, but It does not fit the rest of the instruments, and creates an unpleasent mix. I like how you mixed the strings / winds into the mix, and their panning, I think that adds a bit of flavour to the overall thing. There's definitely a lot of stuff going on here, but not everything mixes well together, a lot of stuff just comes and goes, I'd maybe suggest experimenting with extending some of the sections, and then adding a melody onto it, like the one from 0:24 to 0:30, because that was one of my favourite parts of the whole thing. Personally, I'd extend it to possibly 1:15, maybe keeping what's normally after it, maybe not depending on how it'd sound and add an ocarina, flute or a whistle as the main melody there, I think that'd add a lot of character to this piece. I also quite like the part 1:00-1:12 and how the two pianos interact with each other. The part that's right after it has drums that are way too loud when compared to what came before, and the crash at 1:23 is really weird, it kind of sounds like lightning. I'd also turn down the volume of the drums in the next part, and look into the piano's, because some of the notes (f.e. 1:51-1:52) there definitely stand out more than the rest. I quite like the slow ending. Overall it's not bad, it's quite alright, but there's definitely a lot I'd go over, I'd recommend maybe reordering some sections, toning down certain instruments in volume, and extending the track so it doesn't feel like the many ideas you had are clustered each into 10 second sections. Hope you found this useful, if not, let me know what I might have gotten wrong, or where I was too pushy, I haven't written a review in a long time, and since then my approach to music and what to think of each piece of it has changed a lot

DaxCamdaxian responds:

I like your ideas to expand the piece, this particular piece is mixed in a very unconventional way, I compressed and arranged the frequencies to give it a colder feeling and to give a concrete spatial image, I prioritized certain sounds in the mix and that's why you can hear some disparity especially in specific moments, the only thing I can say about it is that I love how this track turned out and that I have found that people who focus more on the mix of the piece enjoy it less