Official AIM Review!

Really not liking that violin synth. It's a bit sharp and almost out of character in comparison to that beautifully written piano riff. I might even recommend a saw synth instead, since ears seem to be much more forgiving of these.

Now, your percussion isn't mixed perfectly, but it sounds pretty good. I'd recommend chopping that loop instead of running it over and over.

Transition at 1:39 feels like it should have happened much earlier in the piece.

After that point, we've got a catchy chorus. Your string swells sound pretty good. Mix is a bit cluttered though. Feel that brass pulse should have been brought WAY up in the mix. This is the most vibrant part of your piece.

As mentioned, I feel most of this progression relies on the adding and subtracting of elements, rather than progressing the theme. You've got a good range of sounds together, but not a lot of variety.

Note, on your mix, that low end is so muddy, it's starting to distort. I'd recommend checking out johnfn's tutorial. Don't have a link here but you can PM him and he could probably find it for you in his newsposts. Basic idea is cutting low end aggressively in your solo instruments, harmonies, and even basses, not so much that it changes the timbre of the instrument, but so that unchained low frequencies are not interfering with one another in your mix when you have those big, bombastic sections. You would be surprised just how much low end is hiding in your pianos, strings, saws, etc., until you actually look at them on a spectrograph.

Anything else I have to say could probably best be summed up by TL's review.

Thanks for turning out to this year's competition!

---Official AIM review---

I like the soothing riff at the beginning, and the piano riff at :24 complements it very well, especially rhythmically. You’ve clearly shown off your good sense of harmony here. You really start to take the piece in a new direction at 1:12. My main issue with the piece is that most of the overarching progression relies on the addition and subtraction of instruments over time. I think you could stand to add more shape to the piece with volume changes, filtering, and other forms of automation that give the piece a little more humanization and flavor across phrases. You do this well at 1:48 with the string swells, but you don’t use the same technique to lead into new sections of the piece. The result is that there is a patchwork of phrases, often repeated a few times, that feel pretty isolated in the context of the whole piece (1:48 - 2:36, for example). I was also really confused by the transition at 1:36. I thought it was a bit too drawn-out so that the piece lost its momentum going into 1:48. The part at 1:48 was really cool. Somewhat weak and abrupt transitions at 2:36 and 2:59, though. You do a great job of creating these pensive textures, but not so much in connecting them. The atmosphere and mood are really great, though, and the production is also quite strong despite a heavy use of reverb. Overall rather impressive work. I like it the more I listen to it - those melodic piano riffs have begun to sink in. Keep up the good work, DjCrystalux!

9/10