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I-Saved-The-World

7 Audio Reviews w/ Response

All 9 Reviews

Hi there, I saw your post here: http://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1383267 and figured I would write you a constructive review to help encourage you, and give you some advice from the perspective of someone who has been posting tunes on Newgrounds for a few years now.

First of all, I would like to mention that review scores are subjective, and can be modified for many reasons. For the most part, from what I've determined from experience, if people like your music they will vote it a 5. If they don't like your track, they will likely vote a 0. There is much fewer users who vote in the mid-range, as it influences the posted score less.

Secondly, I would like to mention that a review score doesn't provide much purpose other than a vague guide as to how a user was feeling when they listened to the sounds you produced. Basically, you might get put slightly higher up on the "high rated" charts, but unless your song is Paragon-X, Rig, or Mrmilkcarton good, it won't make much of a difference in plays or downloads.

Alternatively, posting positive reviews with cognitive thoughts and reflections helps you to grow as a musician, and learn a little bit more about what people were expecting. In addition to that, if you write other artists a lot of useful reviews, you get more reviews, and they tend to include more complete feedback.

For example, have you tried posting your songs anywhere other than Newgrounds? The typical response from a randomly selected user is usually something along the lines of "This song is catchy, but has no lyrics, thus i do not like it".

Anyways, enough introduction, let's get to your review!

I took some time to listen to a couple of your tracks, but this is the one I've decided to review for you. It's a catchy tune, with high quality synths. The EQ sounds alright, but every musician knows you can always spend more time mixing / panning things to sound more spaced out. The beat is structured well, but it loops several times within the (short) 2:16 duration, without much alteration or creativity outside of the loop. Try making a couple drum patterns, and doing a sequence such as 1 2 1 3; or extend the drum loop to either 16 or 32 beats to allow for more creativity. The hi-hat sounds alright, but gets repetitive as well since it's just got the one loop playing. You have a lot of sub sounds, and kicks, but I felt like the melody could have had a more dramatic presence.

Keep your chin up, and remember! Learning to produce takes time, and getting low scores and reviews is a part of the learning process.

If you have time, I would love to hear a review from you.

The most useful learning experiences come from people who hate your music with a reason, not from people who love it without one.

Hope this review reaches you, Goodluck!

3.5/5

PS: watch your downloads / subscribers to get a better feel for how successful each song is; 0 bombing used to be a bigger problem, but it still exists.

-ISTW

Dovabeats responds:

Hey thanks for taking the time to respond in the way that you did. Haha, you know, I kind of regret posting that to be honest. It was more philosophical in nature and I just wanted to say that for musicians as a whole. It just so happened that I needed to give an example of myself since I was the one posting.

In fact, in one of the reviews that I did (I don't usually review as in depth as the one you were courteous enough to give me), but I specifically pointed out that I felt bad that the song had been voted down because it deserved better. It was a really cool idea and well written. And that brings me to another point. The fact that people don't really realize that he/she didn't even have to post anything at all. They could have just withheld that track and kept it for themselves... but they decided to share it... and that's how they get treated? It's just a really ungrateful mindset in general. Everyone here enjoys sharing their stuff and just like you and I, we all dig the concept of newgrounds. It's not about making money. People willingly know that they are going to give away their music for free. They just love music so much to the point that they would rather share it and appreciate it's art form, than view it as a commodity.

However, the format of this audio portal is unique in that you are going to get a lot of stuff that is in between. Not excellent (some are) but not too crappy either. Think about it. Let's say you made a super sick original edm track. Like the kind where you're really taking it seriously, working hard, and maybe even going to a third party to master it professionally. Why would you post that here? You wouldn't. It would be better to submit that to a big edm label as your demo and try to blow up rather than to post that on here and have everyone download it for free or have someone use it for their game and give you little to no compensation at all. That's the flaw in the system. Philosophically, the concept of newgrounds is amazing. Which is why I am still here and why I am typing this right now. But the format of the audio portal is terrible. For example, with the zero bombing... It's more than just the score. Think of the people that take 3 months or 6 months, or maybe even longer to write their music and then when they finally share it, they experience negativity right off the bat. Of course, they are used to criticism and they know how it is in the audio portal, but it still stings to be so unappreciated like that and to feel taken for granted. And then they would be like, fuck this place this is wack lol. Then they leave and the community possibly misses out on something special. They should just have it so that if you consistently vote 0/5 many times over without a valid reason, you should be banned for a few days with more punishments coming if you continue to do that. Or maybe posting the name of the user would be cool as well, because then trolls wouldn't think they are so slick when people find out and go to their page and zero bomb all of their stuff too. An eye for an eye right? I just wanted to talk about that because I don't think it gets talked about enough and it's just more of a respect sort of thing. That's all. I really wanted to get that out there and give love to the people that share their music without getting anything in return except the joy of creating the music in the first place, because they deserve it. I want to give them props and I want to let them know that not everyone here is a typical dreg in society that uses and abuses, but that there are considerate and thoughtful people here as well.

As for my actual music, thanks for the review. Haha, I definitely appreciate your critique but keep in mind that I don't work on these songs for more than a few hours. Like I want it to be decent of course you know? But it's NG so I know what to expect. Couple plays, couple downloads, a few normal votes and a few troll votes, and then it just fades away into the abyss. I just love being involved with music in general and that's why I post. Like what I said up above, I didn't want it to seem that I was complaining about myself but it was more about exposing the flaws of the audio portal as a whole. I really regret attracting attention to myself and I am now realizing that you cannot delete any posts lol. I know some of those tracks are mediocre but I just wanted to post some of them anyway to feel the sense of community and to hear new music while I'm here. This eclipse song I know is average. But it means something to me because I created it while I was just chillin' at night hanging out with the moon. I pumped it out in an hour and I really lived it and felt it. It was a great experience and I wanted to share that. Surely, that doesn't deserve a zero bomb does it? Which is what happened. I have a track called Galaxy Cruising and that is more of my style. If you listen to that, you can obviously tell that I know what's up and I can write to some degree. Although still not serious and just for fun you know? Bah... sorry for going on a big tangent but yeah, I think I was able to convey to you how I felt and thanks for philosophizing with me. Although I would enjoy breaking into the hardcore hip hop or edm scene if I was good enough, I'll probably always be a better musician than I will be a producer. This is me playing drums https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdaX8bLuONY

Thanks again for taking the time to respond and for being cool. I was thinking of doing some video game remixes actually to cater to the gaming community on here and relive fond memories, instead of posting original stuff. Maybe I'll start doing that to enjoy my experience here more haha. Take it easy, bud.

I like it, sounds pretty cool; but i think it would sound better with a more pronounced kick, and maybe a hard snare with some reverb on it. The vocals sound cool, but are a little bit repetitive after 3 min, try to change it up a little bit more. Possibly try play with some filter effects on the master channel.
Good work :)
-ISTW

thesounds responds:

Very helpful review. thanks man.

I'm definately a fan of this :D

Ikari025 responds:

I was hoping you'd see it! I'm glad you like it. :D

PEWPEWPEW

good intro, really liked the bass and transitions. im not sure im a fan of the hi-hat, other than that, really good start to a song. :) keep up the good work

-ISTW

Prodigal responds:

Thanks for the review man

The full and FL Core version will be out as soon as I get authentication from Rig about my whole 3xOsc problem.

Nice start

Really liked the piano and the drums, though the piano got a little repetitive, and i wasnt a big fan of the cowbell. you could have changed it up a bit more.
cool effects, made for cool transitions

keep working on it, i would like to hear a finished version :)

vote 4
rate 9

If you have some spare time, maybe review one of my songs, thanks :)

Aydin-Jewelz123 responds:

Thanks dude, there's an updated version at this link which is much better than this version >>

http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/liste n/297512

And of course, I will be checking out some of your songs :)

A great experiment. =]

A very nice song, good chord progression. I really liked ~1:30, where it picked up. It sounded great! I would give you a 9.5, because i feel that theres a few parts it could flow a little more smoothly, but i'll round it up :D. 10/10. 5/5

A great experiment. =]

I would also appreciate it if you took the time to listen to and possibly review some of my other newer songs, such as ISTW: Telos.

Thanks lots, i enjoy a lot of your music, such as stop making sense, which i have on my iTunes playlist. :3

tijnn responds:

Thanks for the kind review, i personally really love the chord progression too, really sweet. I guess a few parts could've been smoother, but ah well... It was hard as it is to mix these genres all together, so i guess i'll never get it perfect, it'll always sound a little strange i guess.

I'll be sure to look at the song, and it's great to know that you have one of my songs in your itunes playlist =3

Anyways, thanks for the review!

-DXM

Awesome!

Not going to lie, im not one to write a review, but two days in a row you've posted something that impresses me.

And i dont even like hip hop / rap. It's not really my thing.

But i like this, a lot. Keep it up!

Kurse-of-AME responds:

Thanks bruh, I definately appreciate that. It says alot to me. Anytime that I can touch down on Hip-Hop and put out sumthin that people who aren't typically fans of rap can feel, then it tells me that maybe I'm headed in a direction that is another chapter of "evolved hip-hop"
...and that's always a good thing.

But thanks again for takin time out to listen to my material. It means alot! Respect.

-Kurse

I saved the world

Age 32, Male

Saving the world

i saved the world

BC, Canada

Joined on 10/30/08

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