Finally have a decent setup, apologies for not critiquing others' work, I'll try to be better about that. I feel like this track is my absolute favorite of mine right now.
https://soundcloud.com/spokenwolf/descending-into-darkness
"apologies for not critiquing others' work, I'll try to be better about that"
Or you could just do it. Looking through your posts, I see you haven't done it a single time but you're still self-promoting in here.
Right off the bat its got a pretty unique vibe which I can definitely get behind, smooth and chunky both. The chipmunk vocals are a little goofy imo, but I suppose they fit the genre. The drop was really good and the bass riff too, I'm a big Drum n Bass sucker and this certainly satisfies. I would say that the mix is a little mushy at parts in my opinion with everything being similar levels and kind of mixing together, its good, but I felt like some of the synth melodic stuff could probably be differentiated a bit more. The part that starts at 2:40 was a nice change and really like the drum beat here, very driving. I think the track could use a little bit of simplification in some ways, a LOT going on at certain points, but to be honest I really dig it anyways.
Ooo, the transition at ~4:05 was meaty. Nice.
Second listen my opinions stayed essentially the same. I really like the overall atmosphere of the song, but I still think it could be simplified a bit.
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Here is something I whipped together today. Fairly happy with it, but I could use some advice on the bass. I have really good speakers and headphones so I can hear it great when I'm producing it, but then often when I listen to it somewhere else or on phone or tv, the bass is completely lost. I've been told to saturate it in the past, but to be honest I don't really understand how, I've tried a few things and they don't seem to help.
Any assistance with allowing the bass to be heard would be greatly appreciated as its pretty crucial to the grooviness of this track. I use Reaper, but I imagine principals are fairly similar between DAW's.
https://soundcloud.com/user-229460575/floating-on
I'm not here to fight, I just couldn't sit down and listen to a track earlier.
I really like a lot a lot of this song. Have you tried putting some compression on the bass? Maybe add another layer with some subtle fuzz/distortion. You've definitely got a good thing going here dude.
It ain't a matter of fighting, as you say.
It is of respect for other people's work. Doing some C&C previous to dropping your own work is literally the only rule on this thread.
so bass is obvs a bit of a shit thing because the vast majority of devices you're gonna consume music on are shit at replicating bass; this can lead to sometimes overcompensating for that and causing bass to be borderline horrifying when played on something that can reproduce it faithfully.
in my opinion bass should be heavily compressed nearly all the time (pre-filter) and brought back up; unless you want it, you aren't gonna benefit too much from dynamic range in bass - you want your less resonant bass from like 100hz up to be louder to compensate for how bassy lower notes are. One thing to get your bass noticed more in shittier devices is to make your harmonics more present, some saturation will do this (and occasionally layering a separate instrument on top doing the harmonics will help too. You won't notice this on big speakers, but on devices that have a natural high pass because they're so small, will stand out much more and will make your bassline audible. unless you're mental, soft hi-pass (not a straight cut) from like 40/50 can clear up boominess as well and make your bass more pronounced where it needs to be. IMO.
if i'm doing nasty saturation softube's free saturation knob is pretty good
posting more pick up shit, i'm getting the feeling the main section just goes on for a tad too long, might cut 4 / 8 bars out of it. might need to pronounce the highs a bit more on the claps and 909;
https://soundcloud.com/instantmix/pick-it-up-draft-3
Might as well do some input of my own, since I've created some more-or-less decent music(if retracing does count as "creating").
Brightstar Depths - sorry, the local media player failed to support it as a media file thrice(as MIDI, WAV & mp3), so you have to download this to listen to it. Big apologies. Then again, it's measly Kilobytes of space.
Yes, it's a MIDI, as you've noticed. I specialize on MIDI. Sorry for uploading it as a downloadable file, and not through Soundcloud. I don't have a Soundcloud account, and no, I'm not planning on creating one. Maybe sometime later, when I finally pull out my little game from Development Hell, and finish it, and then create a few more projects, and then make a Twitter account, maybe after that I will create a Soundcloud account. But not now and not before it.
Now for the MIDI itself. Personally, I still don't like it. Something in in seems off to me (Hint: It's where the drums stop.). I could edit that part, but I have no idea what instrument and what notes to use instead.
I'm no expert in music. I'm just an amateur. As such, I can't give a critique on other's music, because I don't have a good Music Appraisal. Except I do, but only for Game OSTs, that is.
By the way, here's Brightstar Depths fruity loops file. You all are free to pick it apart, analyze it, and even edit it to use more fitting instruments, and to sound more like Professional MIDI.
Welcome to the thread mate!
Please, take a few minutes listening to other people's music around here. Do some C&C, even if you don't feel capable. Try to hear other music with a critic ear, and that way not only your ability to perceive errors on other people's work will get better, but also your own.
It's literally the only rule in this thread. If you want feedback, give some!
Guys, anyone has any repository on free acapellas, from a large selection of songs? I want to make a deep house song, maybe some progressive, and I haven't found reliable sites or techniques to extract them that don't involve frequency cancellation.
As a side note, is it recommended to get in touch with the original artist to get a section of the acapella? It can be difficult, sometimes, especially with musicians that are well known.
There's a torrent floating around somewhere with all the multitrack recordings used in Rock Band. I don't have the link anymore but you can probably find it with some googling.
I just can't get over how good blues sounds and feels
I made this dnb track, any crits appreciated
https://youtu.be/-nRoLoESSWQ
Please standby, will post edit with my own crits
I really enjoy the major 7th chord you are using near the end of this one. Overall, it is very pretty and reminds me a bit of the HL2 soundtrack at points. The sustained ending is interesting too and feels like it'd be appropriate for the end of an album or a transition to something slower. Personally, I'd have stuck some rich chordal samples in from the 3 minute onwards mark, but it's cool and had me tapping along feverishly.
There's some pros and cons to this one for me. Some of the samples, especially the vocal one, are really nice, but I'm not sure it really gels with the piano sound. I think it could be worth working on the samples for a bit longer to find something that works better. There are also some chords at about :35 that have dissonance (which I generally like), but I think it would be a good idea to play around with that section to make it a bit less dissonant.
I've finally recorded a version of a song today that I wrote ages ago. My singing is really bad as usual, but I'm keen to hear what people think of it in totality regardless. I've never enjoyed singing, so hope to get this version sung by a good female singer I know at some point soon. Keen to hear any feedback. Cheers.
https://soundcloud.com/mikehawkbiscuit/malignant-revery2
It can be hard if you don't want to tell people negatives, or if their songs just don't line up with your tastes though. I kinda stopped posting in here because its hard to criticize people, especially when you're in a glass house.
Lils - Temporal Anomaly: It really nails the outer space sound. I think the intro is nicer than the drum part, but also it would get old to have 5 minutes of space noises so, maybe just shorter in general?
BoobiesTheMan - Malignant Revery: Towards the middle there's a buildup in intensity, and then shortly after it tones back down to the same level, maybe intentional but it was sorta blue-bally. The vocals work, but I feel like the piano steals your spot somewhat when you aren't in the higher register. It seems like it would fit well in an anime betrayal scene.
I agree with you on the intensity increase not being too fluid in the middle. I've debated changing that but I really liked the harmonies so wanted to stick 'em somewhere. In terms of my singing, I just generally don't have a good voice at all, but I wanted to record what I had finally. The piano is my main instrument so it does tend to drown out other aspects of what I write. I'm fairly limited usually by the fact I try to create my music for solo so I can play and sing, although I did add some strings on a keyboard on the 2nd chorus.
Thanks for the feedback.
I think it could just be a volume/eq thing, when the vocals are in the higher range I don't notice it blurring as much.
How do you guys put music out where people will actually see it? I don't think I make the greatest songs of all time but it seems like anywhere I post (except here) it just sits with no views except maybe a couple totally real people with orange "buy soundcloud followers" avatars liking it.
I don't have a whole lot of friends to guilt into listening either, and wouldn't want to bother them if I did anyway.
Post it here and I'm happy to listen to it. Getting a larger audience is not really possible though, as far as I know, at least not unless you're famous. I mostly write songs for fun.
You need an audience to be famous
You need to be famous to have an audience
Good to know it's a very much exclusive club for the ones who have a way to carve themselves a piece of the pie
I mean, a lot of artists get started when they meet somebody who can put their stuff 'out there', as it were, but your best bet is just putting your music on YouTube or a similar platform and keeping your fingers crossed. You shouldn't make music purely to get famous because it's unlikely to happen. Write music because you enjoy doing it and treat any exposure you get as a bonus.
I do make music for fun
Only, if music doesn't save me (give me some form of income) I will be stuck doing meaningless jobs to get by
My mum does gigs in pubs to supplement her income from her daily job but it's just covers. Still, that's a good way to earn a lot of money tax free and get some performing experience.
I'm not trying to get money, and if I were I wouldn't expect to in the 2 months I've been uploading stuff. Its just really shitty posting a song and it sits with 0 plays and 2 likes but the likes are from obvious bots.
I tend to get a few people listening to mine on FB and even if I don't, I normally accrue about 100 views over the months from randoms. Are you putting your music in genre categories and stuff to help?
Try and get your music used in something, like a youtuber's opening sequence, an ad or a game.
Say something witty on twitter and then plug your soundcloud when the tweet blows up. (Not sure on the conversion rate on this one)
Become friends with more successful artists who will promote you. (Example: Most top 100 artists)
Offer a few (not all) of your tracks for free to gain exposure. This could be on the youtube free audio library, or making an r/gamedev post offering royalty-free tracks. (Example: Kevin Macleod)
Pay an animator to make a sick music video to accompany one of your better songs, and hope it blows up on youtube. (Example: Siames - The Wolf, Stuck in the Sound - Let's Go, Mystery Skulls - Ghost)
Note that I've never done these myself, or gained any musical popularity, but they're things I've seen work for other people.
Maybe that songs not the best showcase, I made it with a modified guitar and those aren't any sort of drum lol
Well, if you post something else here I'm happy to give you feedback on that as well. I just wasn't really sure what the structure was and the guitar sounded incredibly distorted. I imagine that was the point but it was quite difficult to figure out what you were trying to do. It also ends pretty abruptly.
https://soundcloud.com/user-567376538/attack
Don't want to spam the thread up too much but its a really slow thread anyway so
I'm not trying to be an arse here but I think you probably need to go back to the basics, because this doesn't really have any structure, is basically just two chords and then ends with a fairly random melody. It's also really short and doesn't develop at all. How long have you been playing guitar?
Just to state again, I don't want to put anyone off writing music so I am not saying that to be mean, just saying it because I have to be honest if you're going to improve.
Not gonna sugarcoat it, man. You need to practice, and you need to get used to recording take after take after take after take. There are clear cut-offs in the middle of a measure, half-hit notes, it's just everywhere.
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