Hello! This is a review for the NGUAC competition.

I've gone over one or two general categories of issues specific to your song, and one section of things I think also deserve complimenting. I prefer being very direct with my critique, none of it is meant to offend. Thank you for your understanding!

Constructive Criticism:

- One of the biggest points I think you could improve on is your chord progression and by extension, your melodies. The base chord structure you're using doesn't... quite fit. So, something that would likely help is actually studying some music theory. In general, music based on western music theory follows the principle of Tension and Release. The goal is to build tension up to points of release (typically V-I chord changes at the end of a hypermeasure). Right now, your chord progression doesn't really do this - it just has tension that isn't resolved or really even built up in a way that seems deliberate or coordinated with your sound design, resulting in a sound more like confusion and aimlessness. One way to help this outside of studying music theory in general is to pull up some music you particularly like and trying to recreate the chord progressions in midi yourself, to see what notes they include and which ones you can remove in order to keep the progression from feeling too empty.

- Oh, man. The sound design in this feels really nice, and I think it can be improved. This track reminds me a LOT of one of my favorite music artists, Camellia. The unique percussion you're using also adds to this, and reminds me of this track specifically: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5oDIYG1Ee0 I think you might have some good inspiration for how to use your bass modulation and choose gentler synthesizers for pads and melodies by listening to some of his work. In this specific case, notice how much the melodic instruments are relatively gentle and percussive compared to the bass modulation, which forms the backbone of the track and is used for rhythmic development.

Compliments to the Composer:

- Quite frankly, the fact that this track reminds me of Camellia to begin with is a compliment in itself. I do really love your bass modulation, and I think you can use it a lot more effectively by chopping and resampling it through your track. There's so much atmosphere in this track that I love too. If you continue along this path, you'll be in a wonderful place to make some VERY engaging music.

Final score: 7.3