4AM's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Everything will be alright]

If you need vocals for this...

Try "Alright" by Phil York & Dark By Design, if you can find an acapella.

SoulburnLV responds:

thnx mate for suggestion.

[BAD ASS -[demo]-]

Good structure

You seem to know where you're going with this, but I think the mix is really off. The drums need to provide more structure, it seems the pace is being set by the bassline/lead combo you have going on, which is far too loud.

I understand that louder = more strength (and therefore more "badass factor"), but the way your mix is now, that lead is sapping the punch out of the rest of the mix, and it ends up sounding less powerful - to take it to an extreme, it's like a 1000W amp + synth next to a guy with a tambourine. This is an easy mistake to make - lots of my own projects suffer from this early on.

Think about layering a second bass kick sound in there and taking down the gain of the bassline - you might also want to try reducing the high end of the mids EQ ever so slightly, as this could allow you to keep your level higher without the predominant portion of the sound crowding everything.

ElectroLord99 responds:

lol i like ur description of the song XD
thanks for the support, ill try to fix the song

[the sun is in the sky]

This is not drum n bass at all

or electro for that matter.

einbiegel responds:

hm, ok.
you know what it is ?
i'm sorry for posting it in (aparently) the wrong genre ..

[Blink 182-The Rock Show Techno]

Please no more remixes

Dance music is dying and it's because no one wants to be creative anymore, they just want to remix songs from other genres. It's turning an art into a novelty, and you score poorly from me because of it.

giftedbuttwisted responds:

Dude, I'm not a techno guy, look at my submissions and you'll see this is the only one

[*Crystalline Ambience* [IZK]]

Points off!

Arg, you need to take a little time with your mixdown!

What could have been a very cool track was ruined by the digital clipping caused by maxing our your mix and having it get flattened at the peaks. You need to compress your audio so that it doesn't turn into a giant square wave (this is how distortion works - therefore your whole track sounds distorted!)

Compress it or turn down the volume a little, leave a mix some space to breathe. You can only make it so loud before you need to depend on your listeners to turn it up (this is a big problem in commercial music these days - there is no dynamic range. Everyone wants to produce the "loudest" album)

Until then, this made my ears bleed a little. Sorry.

Jenni-Harry4eva3 responds:

Hmm... true true...It's not that I just go ahead and make it the loudest as possible. I do try, really I do. But, I will take your word for it, as I have found that this was too loud, myself. Even my ears bled, but I haven't had time for mixing down properly... I rush sometimes =/. But, I will do this right now. I see that it has been of great concern. Thank you for telling me this. I'll get right to it.

~[IZK]

[Bass-Off]

Submit under miscelaneous

Drum n Bass isn't just tracks with drums and bass in them, Drum & Bass is an actual genre of music (also known as Jungle).

Traveosa responds:

Ha...I'm sorry...I didn't even see miscellaneous. And I had no clue that that was an actual genre. Thanks for telling me :)

[N.sndwch-Build up the Stage]

I have very mixed feelings about this...

...but I voted it high because it has potential.

The good:
1. Vocals. Not many people put an MC into their production. Not original, but rare enough to be a treat. (No, it doesn't belong in Hip-Hop because it has someone rapping! Other reviewers who know nothing of musical genre can sod off!)
2. The bassline. My GOD that oldskool organ rumble; and the lowest note bottoms out _right_ at the sweet spot. Sometimes a saw wave with some vibrato is all you need! I almost threw up when i heard it...out of my dick! LOL but seriously, it adds a real big track feel while keeping it in your face and personal - this used to be referred to as "the panic", and you almost never get that rush with modern dance music.

The problems:
1. It's Drum N Bass: Where are the drums? This needs a punchy drum line, or if that will interfere with the vocals too much, a crisp drum line. What you have is muddy and it doesn't really lend any "catchiness" to the track - I keep waiting for the massive hook and it never happens. It sounds as if the bassline is drowning everything else out due to compression later in the chain.
2. The lead line sounds a bit like it's from SimCity2000. I don't know why, it just feels like that. That being said, i think that type of melody line could work here, but it may need to be re-imagined, instrumentally speaking, before it fits well.

Work on this, work on more, I expect to see good things from you! (and with a catchy name like Nick Sandwich, you can't afford to not be good :-)

NickSandwich responds:

Hola, 4AM!
Thanks for the awesome review. This is probably the best, most descriptive one I've got to date! You should seriously consider looking into a career doing reviews. I think you could pull it off.
I totally 100% agree with everything you say, except I kinda like the SimCity2000 lead =p. That's probably the nerd in me coming out, though.
As for the drums, I know. The bass drum is barely audible... Mixing is hard lol

[Musik]

Awesome Smoothed-Out track!

I wasn't sure if I was going to give this high marks because I wasn't a big fan of the basic drums, but man, when you got into the eclectic stuff, this took off for me!

Work on the clarity of the plain drums (the samples sounded a little flat n boxy), and think about putting a low sine wave bassline in, or maybe even a stand-up bass.

The drum programming is top notch, laid out very well. Overall: Awesome!

Fringo responds:

Thanks, I'll mess around with the drums and I'll see if I can make it sound a litle better.

[Pablo'N'Cezanne - Sundance RMX]

Not that familiar with Italio Dance...

...but this had a sort of Hardstyle feel without being hard.

...have you just invented Lightstyle (lol OK, that was corny)? Either way, it's got a good bounce, kept my head nodding. keep it up!

DukeLukeProd responds:

Yeah I wanted to use a 3/4 beat like Basshunter did on Boten Anna without using his clubby sounds. And in order not to misinform you: This isn't actually italo dance, the genre was probably the most popular genre on italian radio stations between ~1998 and 2003 - pretty amazing stuff (but probably only because I grew up with it ;) )
Lightstyle actually sounds quite appropriate for this track :D
Thanks!

[Pseudoepic]

Entirely appropriate.

NG doesn't have a "Breaks" or "breakbeat" category, so we've kind of accepted this kind of thing here.

That being said, this is an extrordanarilly good production. You yourself and other reviewers mention oddities about the transitions and structure of this track, but I think you really did just "feel" how it should go, and it works well. The drops, buildups, and overall structure are more organic than the planned-and-expected norm of EDM.

This took talent, you should be very proud!

DukeLukeProd responds:

Wow thanks mate, that review made my day! I'm especially glad that there's someone out there who likes my transitions ;)
Thanks for the favs too!