ChronoNomad's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[endK - Resonance]

Everything about this is dead sexy, endK. Your mix is so crisp, I want to eat it with salsa. So glad that you decided to dip your toe in the Synthwave pool, man. I felt the same kind of weird ambivalence before finally making "Pulse of the Mind's Eye," but I'm ultimately really glad that I did. Now there's an itch to do it again sometime.

That key change at 3:47 is so simple, but it gives me goosebumps every time. Dropping everything else and focusing on your Toms right beforehand is highly effective. Your instrumentation is vividly appropriate and totally on point throughout the track, and that's half the battle right there. But man, you've crafted some truly fantastic melodic content over the course of four and a half minutes. Huzzah!

endKmusic responds:

Yeah, this was kinda new for me. Genre as well as 'sudden-back-to-chorus-half-step-key-change', no matter how cliche the concept is.
The goosebumps and are what matters. (planting the itch also) ;p
Damn those salsa compliments. I can't even. <3
Thanks for your kind words, always appreciate your insight Chrono!
Now I'm off to listen to Pulse.
Cheers!

[RPG Boss Battle]

Hey, McG! This sounds really good to me, man. Tons of tension, which certainly fits the Boss Battle theme. A bit more on the creepy side of things, which brings to mind such titles as Parasite Eve and Resident Evil. I'm not sure if you've already adjusted the distortion on that bass or not, but the amount of fuzziness sounds good to me.

Lots of subtle stuff going on within the mix, and your percussive elements are quite effective at creating the right kind of atmosphere. While there may not be a ton of melodic variance, you've broken things up every so often with different sorts of transitions, which helps to both ramp up and maintain the overall level of tension.

I'd be curious to know just what kind of boss is actually being battled here, but since it's an ongoing VG project you probably can't say. The music brings to mind something dangerous and dire; a true threat that needs to be vanquished. The previous suggestion of a Lich doesn't seem too far off the mark, especially since I was personally thinking it would work well for some kind of powerful undead fiend, too. That said, it could be for just about anything or anyone who's gone full dark, no stars.

It's always great to hear new music from you, Dan! May the RPG music gig be kind to you, and I look forward to hearing more. Cheers!

McGorilla42 responds:

Hey, Chrono! :) :)

Thank you as always for your long and detailed responses and feedback - I really appreciate it hugely!

As for the boss: I'm not entirely sure which boss it is for specifically (he wanted generic tracks for the time being), but I played his game and the first boss I encountered and was thinking of when writing this was a big, disgusting undead monster, so I'm glad that came across!

I haven't gone back to adjust the mix yet, but I'm working on a whole lot of tracks which I'll mix later (I like to write while in a writing mood, then return to mix them fully later when I've had some time away).

Thank you <3 I will have more to upload before too long! Excited to share the rest of the tracks because they're totally different to what you might expect from me :)

[Fallen Gods]

This is a pretty nice remix of the two Godcat themes! It's really cool to see you jumping into this contest, and I hope that you'll keep making more music in the future.

The panning that starts around 1:48 is a little too extreme for my tastes, at least while wearing my headphones. Since that's the only thing going on at the time it feels a little disorienting.

Although none of the instruments are really high quality, you've done a solid job putting this track together. The cymbal really doesn't do the track justice, but I like how you've applied the organ and choir.

TheFirel responds:

Thank you! I put together most of the instruments myself from scratch, and it was my first time trying, so I'm glad they at least came together well.

[Nolegs' Ringtone]

Really cool medley you've constructed here, man! It does indeed have that classic ringtone feel, and the overall vibe reminds me - oddly enough - of early Castlevania games.

I feel like some of the instruments have a bit too much presence within the mix (like that marimba or xylophone the song kicks off with); and that booming ending feels oddly timed and rather out of place to me, like it was just kind of tossed on there to wrap things up.

Manderby responds:

Thanks! Fair points about the mixing. I find the booming ending actually to be very fitting, but maybe it is just my personal taste. Or maybe it sounds unpleasant on certain speakers.

[Jenny of Oldstones ~ Podrick's Song (GoT)]

As a long-time fan of Florence and the Machine, I of course loved this song the first time I heard its soulful strains. You have done great justice to the original, while the ambient and instrumental differences really make your version stand out.

Suffice to say, you have truly made this beautiful, emotive song your own. Your talents never cease to amaze and delight the senses. Bravo.

etherealwinds responds:

Thanks you very much CN! That's really kind of you and I truly appreciate you taking the time to leave a review. Lots of love to you! <3

[*+*+(Chronamut vs 50N05 - D e x t r o s)+*~_0]

Two great tastes that go great together! This is a really chill, yet uniquely intense collaborative mix.

It's incredibly easy to get lost in the music, and five minutes seems to go by in the blink of an eye—always the hallmark of a great track. Even though there's a certain level of repetition, the song somehow doesn't get bogged down in a sense of sameness, and the progression feels nice and relaxed.

It never quite blows up, but it doesn't have to. The beat is steady, rhythmic, and mesmerizing. That classic Trance sound is ever present, and that's what it's all about. Thanks for sharing the musical journey.

[DJ Ses - No Emotion (Produced By Kenshi Muzik)]

Okay, so here's my breakdown. Ipso facto, you've got good flow, but I'm pretty underwhelmed by all those vocal effects that are way overdone. You do have an interesting sound, vocally. Quite unique, I'd say. But with too many effects layered over your voice, things just end up getting muddy. Also, you need to research how to properly pronounce the things you say, like "flanger," which is actually not said like "hanger" and is instead pronounced /ˈflanjər/. Just look up the pronunciation since sites like RhymeZone will totally let you down sometimes.

Once again, your beats are pretty much on point, and that seems to be where you really shine. Hearing the same old tired "Testing one, two" and "mic check" in the intro almost literally made me cringe. I feel the same way when I listen to a Rock track that starts with the '1... 2... 3... 4...' count-off with drumsticks. It's boring, clichéd, and has been done to death. But sometimes you want to add it to your track, or even want to hear it as a listener, just because it's in the comfort zone. Dare to be different. Always.

So yeah, this is a solid track, and it has more to keep the listener interested than "Grustler." That said, the message feels - as it often does - very mixed. Bitches, niggas, and f-bombs on the one hand; God on the other. I'm just not thrilled by those kinds of lyrical ideas on a personal level, though they don't actually *sound* bad. Except that your lyrics really do need to be more crisp and have more actual presence within the track. Enunciate as much as you can, in order to make your words sound nice and sharp in the mix, and dial back those vocal effects.

[T.E.O.M. - Grustler (Produced By TheEyeOFMusiK)]

This ultimately really feels like a background track. While the percussion really stands out, everything else - while sounding nice enough - is extraordinarily repetitive. I do feel as though those first 9 seconds of empty beat are superfluous, and you should probably have started out with more going on. In any track, especially one that repeats the same motif over and over again as this one does, too much lead-in is generally a bad thing. That said, many artists are guilty of taking too long to "get to the point," so to speak, and end up with lengthy intro sequences that seem to go nowhere.

The ending of the track isn't really one at all. Is this supposed to loop? Is there supposed to be more, or is it just moving straight into the next track on the album? Either way, the lack of a proper ending left me feeling like things were unresolved, and that's not so good. Even if this track is just a link in a much larger chain, it deserves to have its own conclusion.

In the end, while I do like what I hear, especially on the drum beats side of things, there's a whole lot of missed opportunity to take this from generic to epic. There's just not a lot going on in the grand scheme of sound, and with little change from start to finish, especially melodically, it gets pretty old by the fourth minute.

Like I said, what's here is good, and those beats are legit, but I believe you have the potential to do much more with this. I've read your Author Comments, and you've mentioned that this is merely an "appetizer," but it leaves me wanting. Even as appetizers go.

I'll be checking out some more of your tracks, so hang tight. I feel like you've been PMing lots of folks to check out your music, which seems evident by the bloated number of reviews, but you've at least gone about it respectfully. Keep that attitude, even in the lean times, and I believe you could go far.

[Invasion of the Court of Hearts (snes version)]

Man, I think this is a legitimate instance of taking lemons and making lemonade! Yeah, it's true. You had little time to work on a track back in 2017, and you were already on vacation, but you still threw down with something. And hey, if I'm being completely honest, that's more than I can say for some. The quitters and walkovers really miss out. Frankly, your courage in the face of adversity was more than admirable.

And here you are now! Reworking and retooling this story that was barely able to be told at all, and bringing it home. Are there still technical issues? Sure. Some of these instruments still don't strike quite the right chord with me, but much of what you've presented here is fantastic.

I personally believe that you've done great justice to your vision and maintained the integrity of the original piece. Very well done, SourJovis. Very well done, indeed.

SourJovis responds:

It turned out nicely in the end. I can't complain anymore.

I've got a new computer now. There are no technical issues anymore. I can think of 3 reasons why some of the instruments still don't sound great.
1. In the 2017 version I didn't have the large expensive sample packs required for the sound I was going for. I gave the choir and strings legato but didn't have any legato samples. I had to use a pitch bend to get the same effect, but it just sounds very fake and ugly. With the snes sound fonds I had the exact same limitations as with the first version, but with samples that sound even less realistic. Only now I no longer have to say "the quality of my sample packs isn't high enough", but "it's supposed to sound like that because I'm replicating the SPC700 sound chip with all of its limitations."
2. I may lack the competence to make this sound better than it does. I'll always thrive to become better.
3. Maybe I just don't hear the flaws you hear. Perhaps I never will, but who knows.

Thank you for your kind words.

[Ex Tempore]

Yet another fantastic Cinematic Orchestral track, Collin! This really is your wheelhouse, man.

My biggest complaint is that the arpeggio which begins around :26 sounds incredibly familiar and kind of generic within the mix, and the timing seems to be somewhat odd at times. Maybe that's just the humanization at work, but since it's of a more electronic nature, it actually sounds stranger when it's not almost perfectly timed to me.

Besides that, there are a few points where the vocals seem to overlap, causing the vocal volume to suddenly increase exponentially at an impossible rate of speed. (e.g. 1:05~1:06) Due to this phenomena, those moments don't sound quite as organic as they could. Of course it may actually be intentional, but I thought I'd mention it anyway.

How come you don't sing all those fantastic upper-register vocal bits yourself? ^__~ jk

Despite my admittedly rather minor gripes, this track shines with the brilliance of a thousand suns. Odds are, the points I've brought up are just a part of your aforementioned experimental mixing techniques, anyway. Regardless, the overall mixing is very good, and your instrumental choices tend to work exceptionally well together. Bravo!

Keep compos(ed/ing). Oh, and hey—Happy 2019! Hope life's treating you well, man. Peace.

CloakedSoup responds:

Thanks a ton! :D

I knew there were some little things here and there that could be improved in the mix, but I finished this track near the end of November and figured it would be better just to finally post it and keep moving forward. I'm still not 100% there, but I think I'm getting the trailer music sound down pretty well. The biggest thing I have to do at this point is keep improving my mixing skills until I've got that legit professional sound that I'm going for. I don't think I've got a 100% lock on the new 'advanced' mixing techniques yet (many of them are from Joël Dollié, who is an amazing audio engineer and composer who specializes in orchestral and trailer music). Once I get a bit more used to them, I think my tracks will really start to shine in the mixing department and I can really start to show what I'm capable of doing!