Perfect peice! can i use in geometry dash level? i have a good idea for it...

I like the pensive mood at the beginning and the spacious atmosphere. I think the piano sounds a bit square and artificial, though. I’d recommend some more humanization and shape to that instrument early on, especially for the first 40 seconds or so while the texture is relatively bare. I also think the block chords in the piano at :21 sound a bit clunky. The waltzy meter and syncopations at :42 are really nice, though, and the melodic phrases in this piece have a great, elegant flair about them. The violin sample sounds pretty inauthentic in the upper range (e.x., 1:14), and I would’ve liked to see some section of this piece have more legato elements to contrast the crisp articulation present in just about every instrument in the piece. Nice job with the variation in the melodies at 2:06 - that was a pleasant surprise. Despite my criticisms on some of the compositional and sound design details here, I’ll also say that the production quality is just about perfect. Very clean, well-balanced and full-sounding mix throughout. The arrangement of the piece, while not entirely original, channels the energy effectively and flows quite smoothly. Overall, strong work here, Dag0! Keep it up. ^_^

Mixing, mastering, and balance
2/2
Structure, transitions, phrasing, and variety
1.25/1.5
Melody, tonality, harmony, and texture
2/2
Instrumentation and sound design
.75/1
Emotion, atmosphere, and catchiness
1.5/1.5
Originality and uniqueness
.75/1
Overall (how do the elements above interact?)
1/1
Composite score
9.25/10

score: 6/10

what I liked:

• I love the new piano sound at 1:24
• interesting to hear a piece based in triple meter!
• I definitely hear the storm you're trying to convey, good job translating a story into music

what I think could be improved:

• the piano is too robotic for me, try adding more humanity into the keys!
• the tambourines at 0:21 are a bit distracting, try putting it further away in the background
• if I'm not mistaken, I hear some clipping in the 0:41 section
• I prefer my pianos to have more reverb, I think it would make it sound a little more lively (and also mimic the "raindrop" theme you're going for)

good job still, and congrats on making it to the finals!

In your intro, that piano probably could use some more velocity in the right channel. The string impact almost becomes a percussion instrument itself.

By 0:54 compression or lack of a limiter is causing a lot of distortion in the low end.

I agree with Mutty99, despite lots of technical issues, the underlying melody and composition itself were an interesting listen, even if fraught with so much reverb. I would take it down probably by more than half the current value, change the decay to a faster rate, and low cut up to 250 hz.

To fix your distortion issue, you can take your master channel, mix in 32 point float, and pull it down until the levels are no longer in the red or orange. I personally prefer yellow to green. Then I master in a third party service or using a different host of plugins. Alternatively, you can mix the entire track so that without touching master volume or fx, your track never hits those nasty red levels.

For your percussion instruments, it sounds like the transients could use shaping. There are two free plugins for that dominion and KSHMR Essentials Kick. I recommend both highly. I use them on literally everything.

Thanks for coming out to NGUAC!

-Official NGUAC 2020 Final Round Review-

I like the variety of the instruments you chose. The piano in the first 20 seconds is a nice touch, with an original transition in the end; later on, it becomes really compressed on the lower band, covering too much the other instruments and making the mix a bit unbalanced. The rest of the mix sounds compressed on medium-low frequences as well, like putting a fliter in the master channel of the project; maybe if you sidechained the strings a little, the drums could have been a little more impactful, making the mix feel less compressed as a whole. While this track is not that technical strong, the composition is pretty solid and the melody is interesting and original; nice job!

Originality: 1.65/2
Composition: 2/2
Structure: 1.5/2
Tecnicity: 1.25/2
Impact: 1.6/2
Total: 8/10