Reviews for The rise of -

[EmperorCharlemagne]

Well done!

Part John Williams, part Gustav Holst is how i see this.

Very cinematic and very film-score-esque (though I guess that was the express intent), and it does everything very well within those parameters whilst at the same time having a distinctive flair and style to it. This is not easy to do, but in this song it is MADE to look easy.

I have no real complaints here; everything is executed with above-average skill and dedication.

Continue with the great work!

Tomppaah responds:

Thank you very much :) Haha, makes me happy to hear that you think this was made to look easy :D

John Williams <3 My hero

[Kaizerwolf]

Oh my.

I am nothing if not a man of my word!

From the starting line, I was initially surprised. It's a very aggressive intro, nice and powerful. After that, it calms down, you're sneaking around the perimeter of a military bunker. It's got a lot of good points throughout the song, so let's get started! :)

1. The intro. God damn I love that intro. It's so powerful and full of energy, and those crazy violin spasms that sound so much like the show Lost. Really nice work!

2. 1:00 and on- Excellent use of... well, everything! It's got a lot of good sounds, and the whole progression is great. Instruments are fading in and out, and it all comes together in a very neat and flowing tone.

3. The song is very crisp and clean. There isn't a string out of place, nothing overpowers the other.

4. Holy crap KEY CHANGE. Desperation in the end, it seems! The percussion gets a bit more intense, the brass really comes out, the strings pull back. You did a nice job with the transition, and that part is really well done.

My one complaint would be the ending. It's somewhat abrupt. While it doesn't deter from the song, it is a bit odd. Though, with that amazing intro that i love so much coming right after it, there are no real complaints from me! :)

I'm glad you reviewed my song and asked me to review this one, otherwise I would have never found this really exceptional piece of work!

9/10
5/5
4.25 / 5.00 (+ 0.021)

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You deserve it man! I'll be checking back on you, good sir!
-Kw

Tomppaah responds:

1. Oh man thanks :D I was suprised myself that I managed to pull of that intro. ;) I was afraid it was going to sound too exaggerated :P

2.I'm particularly fond of all the instruments fading in and out myself ;) When I made this track I had just found out a couple of new things with EWQL, and those fadings are a result of that :P

3. :) Funny thing is, that I only used one plugin to bring out all instruments ;)

4. :DD I assume you're talking about the part at 2:18 ;) That one was also non intentional, but I figured I'd have to come up with something so It could lead into another theme. As I said in the author comments, it's really a cliffhanger for another track, but I haven't started working on that track yet :3

Thank you so very much for listening to this :D I'm very happy you did! I'll try to do some justice to the end of this track, by working on the track that would follow :)

Stay in touch man! :)

[phalties]

your inspiration

sounds like you some definite inspiration from metal gear solid/ dark night?

[Benesh]

Good

I wanna give you my(!) thoughts about this piece.
You will also see, that i dont agree with everything, like others did.
At first i wanna talk about the composition.
You open with a very big and strong beginning, but you just cut the level of tense you have created right afterwards step by step. There was a lot of potential in it.
The following part is pretty flat (i dont know how i can term it otherwise).
I can hear some snares and a synthie bass - but even the snares are disappearing, and it makes me feel like an outro (even after they came back very brave).
Nothing really exciting is happening to be honest.
You have wrote "For the rise of a character still unknown" - so i was expecting something else so far.
You should (in my opinion) use your beginning like it is and build upon it.
Make the following part much more energetic, propulsive to capture the energy (tremolo strings, staccatos, clusters - more dissonance at all and stronger percussion if you want). Oh and dont forget about the woodwinds - let them play flurry and fast glissandi (especially in transitions if you wanna have it chlichee), staccatos - whatever. At last let this flow into your theme, making it much stronger and double it with other instruments.
The thrid part is started by some dissonant strings is nearly the same - if you wanna have tension or suspense, you have to let the instruments be very tense. Strong constant bass, very high tones, strong dissonance, strange rhythms, crossrhytmhs are elements for example making things suspense.
I dont wanna reapeat myself too much, so i come to some other thing what i noticed.
The strings are very flaccid and could have much more high frequencies.
Make them play the staccato like some real staccato with lot more attack or velocity. The brass players seem to have a long breath too :)
Overall there is a very big lack of dynamics, in the strings and in the brass.
If the brass is getting louder, its just getting louder without the typical overtones. There are X-fade samples sometimes, where you can change this by changing the modulationfader in the midis to create some near reality swelling brass.
And missing tempo dynamics.
Let the orchestra breath (thats what my teachers tell me too).
I dont really understand the electrical bass under the whole thing - it reminds me on hans zimmers soundtrack to batman. But i just dont understand its function - please explain it to me :)
At last something about the mixing: Im pretty unsure.
If you wanna maintain a real orchestral sound, you should start by placing the instruments in the room (left, right, middle and front, rear, back).
But its different if it should be some "unreal" orchestra with electronic sounds - its somewhat depening on the situation.... whatever.

I give you a score of 7 and a vote of 4 because i dont wanna be the bad one and i think there is potential in this piece , but there has much to be done.
Work on it :)