Yoooooo, I love the response my feedback post got, y'all some cool dudes, I think it's dope more people are offering to jump on the feedback bandwagon. I think it's easy and sort of fun to do anyway, and good practice for my analytical listening skills because I can just ask people what they did and if I guessed right. I do emphasize that I'm not the decider (G.W Bush is) & everything I say is the opinion of a (sort of?) educated amateur.
While you're at it mind doing mine? Should note that the structure is pretty rough
https://soundcloud.com/alcoves-2/enddays
I'd love doing yours, where she/he/it at? j/k. I checked this out twice, when I woke up in the morning and when I woke up in the evening after crashing out earlier. It didn't super-like it the first time, but it worked out for me the second time. I don't know if it's mere-exposure effect or my ears being less shit during the night. I think overall the track sounds minimalist, apocalyptic, ominous and kind of cool. But I'll try to get more analytical.
Are you sidechaining the hi-hats in the intro to the kick? Or is the limiter pushing them down? I don't know, but your hi-hats go down in intensity and sort of end up sitting under the kick when it comes in. It sounds sort of cool/intentional so it's not an issue imo unless you think it is. Furthermore I think your structure isn't terrible actually, it's definitely long form and builds slowly and isn't something you'd do in poppier track but it works for the track. The big issue structure wise imo is that things aren't telegraphed all that well, when that roaring synth stab comes in at 1:18 it's almost unannounced and sort of catches you by surprise. It always feels better to me personally when I can predict a change is going to occur in the music I'm listening too.
I think you could find a way to keep the jarring end of days there's a reaper blasting synth music down to the surface of the earth feeling but still announce it. A reaper doesn't just land and blow your shit up, you can see that ominous fucker approaching and then he slowly spools up that red eye laser of death thing. (This analogy makes less sense if you haven't played mass effect) Maybe render it out with a huge 100% reverb and reverse the reverb as a long swell/sweep during the intro? I don't know I'm just spitballing stuff. I agree with foshy on the structure change and removing the section from 2:05 to 3:05 you're essentially just rehashing the intro there but with a high pass on the kick and it's sort of boring. I also think since this is essentially minimalist techno you can get more creative with the mixing and vary and build the volume/panning/filtering of some of the elements more, specifically the flute, because all flute all the time makes flute a very flute boy. Cool track overall though.
Doin good work FD, get that ball rolling. Lets make 2016 the year we all comment on each others tunes fo real. I'm as guilty of posting and running as everyone else but I'm gonna do my bit from now one.
I'd hold you to it but I'm not that much of an ass, I expect you to hold yourself to it. Also post more tracks dude, I'm lazy and never remember soundclouds but I remember you having a bunch of awesome stuff with big kicks and fat vowel basses. I want to hear what those crazy ass modular synths sound like.
I really do appreciate this feedback, it's some of the only honest feedback I've gotten in my short time as an amateur producer, and I agree with most of it. In the last year, I took a bit of a hiatus when it came to making stuff, and as a result, I don't feel as good as I did when it came to crafting melodies and counter-melodies and whatnot. A lot of what I'm doing are just proof of concept pieces to prove that this is something that I can do. (I have to disagree with you on Silhouette, that one is a personal favorite of mine!)
I know right, who knew that getting people to actually listen/respond to your shit was this hard. I'm trying to change the world one track review at a time in 2016 though. I've also taken my share of hiatuses when it comes to producing music too, in fact most of my production career is one long hiatus stemming from self confidence issues. So I totally understand what you mean with trying to prove to yourself that you're not insane and chasing fairies or something. But I think the most important aspect of music production is actually producing music and enjoying yourself with it so keep going dude! The thing I sort of prop myself up with is that producing music is a journey not a destination, there's no track that everyone likes, there's no perfection to be had so just have fun and do it man. And I think it's cool silhouette is one of your favourites. Not everyone likes the same thing and so much in music is about culture, exposure, and just overall variation.
Haha, i know what you mean. Both parts were originally separate tracks, in a different key. But they both tell a different part of the same story for me (to me it's literally a mental and emotional road movie). The title and talkbox lyrics are very symbolic (to me, personally). By the way, only the sequenced bassline, the sequenced phased synth that gets stacked on top of it, and the talkbox are analog. All the rest isn't. The other track i posted earlier, has much more analog stuff (including the beat section) in there.
As for the jarring part, like i explained, it's the way it has to be. I also think it's what keeps the track interesting.
I'm happy I correctly guess worked my way into accurately judging a key change
. I've messed around with them a lot myself but haven't gotten them to work at all. I'm never bold enough to just do it by assertion and I'm not theoretically gifted enough to write one that doesn't sound like cheeseball city. Again feel free to disagree, it's your music not mine and it should reflect you.
thanks!
yeah i'm still looking for the perfect 808 sound. after a bit of tinkering i ended up just using the Trap Bass preset from Logic heavily sidechained to the kick and it sounds good enough buuut could be better I guess. good call on the release time, i was going for a soft bass with long attack in the hook but i'll play around with it a bit for other tracks.
First off I love the overall vibe of the song and the instruments you picked are great, so big up from me. As you said I feel like the de-essing is a bit weird and unnatural when you start listening closely, I can't unhear "she has diamondthh in her eyethh" lol.
Also personal opinion but maybe try lowering the gain on the pulsating bass from 0:38 onward just a liiiiittle bit? It sounds fine at low volume but I felt like it was slightly overpowering when I turned up. Might be my setup but it's probably worth experimenting how your complete mix sounds on different volume levels.
(btw your won't go for more bootleg is godlike, i listen to that regularly haha)
If you've got massive I've got some homemade 808's I'd be willing to dropbox, they're not omg amazeballs but you can mess around with them if you'd want. I'm not going to lie though I rarely use an actual synth for my 808's now though, I tend to just go sampled all the way. If you want samples the ones I currently really really like after ignoring them for a year or more since purchasing are these:
http://www.theproducerschoice.com/products/urban-808-kontakt-library. I recently made
this (for my Danger Diamond urban/future/bass music alter ego which is going to be a thing soon) after re-discovering them and I think it's the most knockin 808 I ever had on a track
. I barely touched it mixing wise too, it just goes hard out of the box.
Thanks for the ups on the synths, and yep I can't unhear it either drives me crazy. My awesome girlfriend has really sharp S's and a thick dutch accent so I have to coach her but I don't want to make it an unpleasant experience for her so I'm just going to work on my de-essing technique when I do the full track. I agree the mix gets a bit overblown in the midrange on that bass when you turn it up, I'm going to have to science the shit out of it but I don't know very much science so it might end up blowing up in my face.
I think that bootleg is funny, I sat on it for 6 months petrified everyone would be like this is shit! You suck asshole. I wanted to do a better mix too but I just sort of tossed it up there on a night where I felt saucy and the responses I've seen have been quite positive. That being said now I'm afraid to post anything that's not private because people might be like man I was wrong about your shit, you suck asshole. I've legit got enough dance bootlegs I'm sitting on at this point to release a full length bootleg album. Thanks for liking and listening though!
