Gravey's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Brando - Pure & Tainted]

Nice...

...but not exactly great either. ;-)

I like this a lot. The melody line is dark and beautiful, and has a mystical quality to it. I think the atmosphere you created really enhances this quality, especially the reverb you used. Very tasteful reverb.

The piano is very well written, and has a very bouncy sort of light to it. Even though this song as a whole is very rich in dark texture, it keeps an air of innocence. That is not an easy thing to do, so I commend you on that.

I have two issues with this song though:

1. Length. Jesus this is to short. Lengthen this my friend, because it could be so much more if you added another chorus bridge along the way. As it is it is simply to short.

2. Where is the percussion? You need some epic concert bass drums and crashes going on in this song. It would greatly enhance this piece. Right now, there is simply a lack of any real quality percussion. And that is not a good thing at all my friend.

4/5 and 8/10 overall. This has great potential, and is very nice as it is. But it has the possibility of being something great if you just put a little more work into it.

Hope this helps somehow.

-Gravey-

Dj-Brand0 responds:

Hey sorry for the late reply.

I agree this isn't all that great but the main focus I was getting to here was the notes of the melodies. The percussion and instruments I didn't go into a great detail. The reason was I made this is about 6 hours and what I made it for only required a mood to be set so i met the criteria. For newgrounds criteria i know i didn't meet it but I should meet it when it's finished.

I'm glad you liked the piano I'm glad it came out this good.

Okay..
1. Yeah it is really short, I need to add more to it but I'm not sure really how to do so. I need to find someone who I can get tips from in classical. I would like to eventually make 2 versions, the classical and hardstyle.

2. The percussion.. yeah. I don't know what to use, I tried some percussion but I don't really know what to use because I really only have dance song sample packs. That's something I've really needed to find for a while. I put some faint crashes in the background and epic kicks but the crashes weren't quite ones you would hear in an orchestra so that's why I rathered them to be faint than noticeable.

Thanks for the really honest review. And yes, of course it helped. It makes me think about the song and how to improve it. Reviews like this are great :D

10/10 for the review lol.

-Cheers Brando

[The Bongo Wars (Europe)]

Eh...

Well, you asked me to review this song, and here I am. In all honesty, I hate trance, and especially whistles in trance. That being said, I'll try to be objective in this review.

For the style you are going for, this is pretty decent. I do love that reverb rich percussion you have going on. It is very thick and tasty, which is a good thing.

The synths are pretty straightforward and typical of trance music. Nothing really new or all that creative with them. I really think you could have done a lot more with the synths personally, but that is just me.

The beauty in this song really lies in the percussion. Really good job on the rhythms you created.

4/5 and 8/10 overall. Not bad, but not really my style.

-Gravey-

Airprogressive responds:

Thanks Gravey!!

I really appreciate your comment. You're right! the percusion is the main thing of this track. I choose this synth because I think that it suits very well with the percusion and the style of this track

:)

[-={DJ-PHX}=- Fiery Apocalypse]

Not Bad...

I'm not a trance or dance kinda guy. So in all honesty, this music does nothing for me. But I could so see this in some sort of side scrolling shooter game. Not a space shooter, but rather one where you are playing some mega-man type guy.

I love the piano break. Very nice there. I always love piano stuff, being a pianist myself it always warms my heart to hear such break in songs for piano solos. Although, I think the piano sounds a little too tinny for my taste.

The beats kinda annoy me, but that is a big reason why I'm not into this type of music. For the style you are going for though, you are right on.

4/5 and 9/10 overall. Nicely done here.

-Gravey-

unrealdark responds:

Oh Yeah I forgot sorry! :O
I think I can manage to make the piano fuller and richer of sound, I'll do my best on it. The beat is quite fast so probably annoyable for all people who don't like that, it's oke you don't like it everyone got their own prefrences.
Thank you for the review, it's apreciated. ;)

[[DX4]Lagne 10]

Okey Dokey...

First off, I'm not a fan of trance or dance music. But I will try to be objective in this review, because I know that constructive criticism is so important and helpful.

The synths are cool sounding, but stand still too much. You need to add some more effects to them. They are pretty bland right now, and just simply go from note to note. With this style of music they need to do more than just hit notes in nifty melody lines. You need delays, and other things to add some color to the song.

Also, it is lacking in the low end for me. You need a real strong bass to tie everything together. The mid and high ends are well represented, but the low end of the song is simply lacking. Add some thick, mean bass to this and it will go a long way in improving the sound.

This is so happy sounding by the way. It really seems like it could be an intro for a Ducktales type cartoon. Really, I could see this being the intro for some daily Disney cartoon madness. :-)

Not bad, just not my favorite style really.

4/5 and 7/10 overall. Really needs that bass that I was talking about. Then it goes up in score to about a 9/10 overall.

-Gravey-

Doox4 responds:

Thanks Mate. Very Helpful Review. :)

[Hi lo]

Nifty...

It's got a cool intro. I want more bass though! :-P It has a fat, rich sound, and I love that. Or wait, is that a synth? It seems like it is a synth, nevermind then! Lol!

This is pretty cool, although not really my style. It has a nifty groove, and has some cool sounding synths which is nice. I like the back and forth between the "hi" and "lo" sounds. I'm not so sure it qualifies as a call and response theme really, but it does have that sort of aspect to it.

Overall this is pretty nifty. 4/5 and 8/10 overall.

-Gravey-

Coda9 responds:

lol yeah its a moog synth and sometimes i use it for basses(but dont tell anyone lol) thanks for the review!

[Party All Night[Dj-S]]

Well...

...I'm not a real fan of trance. So this isn't exactly my style. But that being said, it is a decent song for what you were going for.

I like the piano a lot. It has a nice melody line throughout the entire song, and really forms a sort of glue to hold this song together.

The synths really fit well together in my opinion. And the effects do add some color throughout. So overall, for the style you are going for this is pretty well done. But it really isn't my sort of thing personally.

4/5 and 8/10 overall. Nice work here bud.

-Gravey-

Sacrafan responds:

Awesome.

[Eater of Gods - Eternalreich]

Not Bad...

It seems that some of the picking is slightly off. Like you get behind the beat ever so slightly in areas, but maybe I'm just hearing things.

I like the whole concept of the song. Pretty cool guitar sounds, but the flow just isn't quite there yet. It needs to mesh much better horizontally. There are definitely areas where it sounds like the sound gets clipped from one take into another.

I could be wrong, but it does sound like this. So you should check that out a bit.

I really like the section starting around the 2:00 mark. That has old school black metal written all over it. Almost old school Dimmu in a way, which is a compliment coming from me.

I liked this a lot, but didn't really love it. It just doesn't flow well.

4/5 and 8/10 overall.

-Gravey-

Eternalreich responds:

true. its clipped like a mo fo, and i plan on loading another version with vox.

[[DJZ] Universal]

Interesting...

As with all trance music, the beats bore the fuck outta me. Lol! But it had a nice piano moment which I really liked. Nice job there. I'm not sure I'm too crazy about those vocals, more trance-ish style stuff I'm not crazy about.

The different synths you used were pretty straightforward and cool sounding. Nothing really all that original or ground breaking, but with this genre nothing ever really is. Overall, for the style you are going for it is great. Just not my thing is all.

4/5 and 8/10 overall. Nice job here bud.

-Gravey-

DJ-Zoysa responds:

yeh thanks man and i can appreciate where you are coming from, and thank you for not being lik other jerks who just vote 0 cause they dont like hard trance. thanks for actually thinking about the genre and what it is i was aiming for instead of being a mindless anti-hardtrance person lol

-DJ Zoysa

[[DJZ] Underwater (Remix)]

Hmmm...

I'm typically not a fan of trance. But! I shall try to be as objective as possible.

This has a lot of cool sounds and synths in it. But it really lacks direction. It seems to be a lot of single minded sections that really do not build on top of one another. There needs to be something that holds all of these sections together. You have the bricks, just not the mortar at the moment.

Maybe adding some transition measures in between sections would create some stability. Right now it just seems like it is seperate sections smashed back to back.

The synths are good choices, and you writing is not shabby at all. You just have to take the next step in your writing. Make the sections fit more of an overall concept, rather than individual concepts within the song.

4/5 and 8/10 overall.

-Gravey-

DJ-Zoysa responds:

thanks a lot that's the first review in a while that has given me sometihng to make my music better

this was kind of one of those tracks where you don't really try, you just make some sounds and make em fit - not much effort was put into this to be honest. but yeh ur right, and thanks for the review :D

maybe pelase check out my newest song - universal?
thx again

-DJ Zoysa

[Trancify!-[Dj-S]]

Cool...

I'm not a fan of trance for the most part. But I shall try to be objective in my review.

The rhythms in the percussion are pretty straightforward, and get the job done nicely. They have a nice quality to them as well. There really fit this style well.

I like the different synths you used. They fit pretty well together throughout the song. And you created some really cool sounding melody lines for them as well.

I think a more dominant bass line would catch my interest a little bit more. But good and complex bass lines are not typical for this style, so I won't hold it against you.

5/5 and 9/10 overall. Nice work here.

-Gravey-

Sacrafan responds:

=D Thank you also for your "Pm Review" on Dancing in the Rain!!