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Reviews for "timeslip"

Flow me over sax man!

I tell ya what.. I quite enjoyed this for what it is. As a package, it's very well put together, and sounds totally natural. Everything was well played, I didn't hear any fret noise, slipped notes or off time phrasing, and I applaud you for this, as I always have trouble recording acoustic without at least a little bit of fret noise, be it sliding or buzzing. And the sax gave me a great sense of nostalgia, seeing as I used to play sax myself... It was also very well played, and flowed very natural with the rest of the song.
I also really, really liked the outro... it just... felt right.

For what I didn't like... Drums... They sounded horribly fake and over processed, too much reverb, too... floaty... It really sounded like the drums were recorded live in a large room while the rest was recorded in a studio... the contrast is unsettling. I also didn't really agree with the rhythm used on this track, it sounded very slapped together, like not much thought had gone into it, and sounded pretty inappropriate given the style of the song.
Only other thing that bugged me was that aside from the slight lift in the music around 1:07, there's not really a whole lot of variation... While the theme of this was great, I do think it could have benefited from progressing a little more into a different feel.

Regardless... this was very relaxing to listen to when I managed to ignore the terrible drums, I gave this a 7.5/10.

acmeDyne responds:

You hit the nail on the head with the drums. I spent about fifteen minutes total on them because I ran out of time. I probably should have left them out completely and spent that time polishing something else. Thanks for the review!

Here is your personal review for your round 1 submission! Remember that the score might be a little lower than I would normally give, I'm being a tad harsher than I'd normally be for the NGADM.

The Good:
-That is a nice guitar, that's a nice bass, and that's a nice drumkit.
-I'm putting the saxophone separate because it's awesome. That has a really natural sound.
-The composition is pretty cool, some jazzy influences and other awesome ideas in it.
-Mixing is pretty good.

The Not-So-Good:
-The drumkit, while sounding natural, also doesn't sound overly good with the snare hits at 0:23-0:34 (and similar places), as if it were recorded in a room with pretty crappy acoustics. Another problem with the drumkit is that the kick is really hard to hear initially, it's so far in the background that it's almost invisible. Eventually it does get better, fortunately.
-There's no change in feel, it could use a bit more variation in the type of ideas.

Overall: I really enjoyed this. It has a very nice, calm, groovy feel. Also, the instruments are played pretty darn well, I feel like you actually played them yourself. If you did, then you're talented at playing instruments. If you didn't, then you're talented at making instruments realistic. I'll give this an 8/10, one of my top 6 scores this round (two were tied for 8, so).

acmeDyne responds:

I definitlely would like to redo the whole drum part, compositionally and mixing-wise.
Honestly, it was thrown on haphazardly in the last minutes before the deadline.
Thanks for reviewing!

This is an NGADM Round 1 Review.

--

Fantastic, man. It's not often I hear this kind of jazz, but when I do I'm almost always amazed by it and this is no exception. It's incredibly soothing, has some impressive composition, and the fact that nearly everything's recorded makes it have a lot more feeling and authenticity in it that makes for a very solid track. Brilliant work.

The overall composition is what got me the most. It's very mellow and can relax the most hyped-up person, I swear. Lovely guitar melodies, and the sax work is amazing. I also love how the track starts up softly, builds up, gets busier at around 1:07, and then dies down to a satisfying ending note on the sax and strum on the guitar. It's a good structure that doesn't try too hard to sound good and works well for a fairly short track such as this. Perfect transitions and lovely chord changes too, can't really fault them. You've got a good firm grasp on composition, man.

Instrumentation and mixing-wise are two things this track shines in. Everything sounds great. The instruments all fit together wonderfully, especially that guitar whose sound I think is phenomenal. The mixing overall is very good, and you make full use of the frequency spectrum. I especially like the mixing on those drums. They sound clear, and yet that kick especially has a bassy thump to it that makes the drum line highly enjoyable. I would've personally added more reverb to the drums, the snare and cymbals in particular, but I wouldn't worry about it much. I think I'm hearing a bit of a background hum from your mike or something, but my ears are crap at noticing this kind of stuff so it may well be my imagination, and again, I wouldn't worry about that either.

My main issue with the track is that it gets a bit dull. I can hear that you did make an effort to keep it sounding interesting and varied throughout the whole thing with such a varied usage of chords and new melodies on the sax, but unfortunately everything is in a slow tempo and you don't really move away from your current instrument set, limiting your sax as the main instrument for the track for pretty much the whole 2-minutes of the track, so it's inevitable for it to get a bit dull. I'd suggest introducing more elements to the track, and perhaps introducing some compositional elements that you had already used earlier in the track, to catch the listener's attention.

That's really just a minor nitpick. This is otherwise an amazing track. Fantastic work.

--

SCORE:
9/10

acmeDyne responds:

Thanks for the nice review!
You do an excellent job running this contest. I had a lot of fun and I hope to be back next year...

You've got a great gasp on melodic writing. Beautiful progressions too. :)

I would love to hear this with the bass and keys you mentioned in response to Kor-Rune.

acmeDyne responds:

Thank you!
As soon as I get a chance, I plan to listen to everybody's submissions and leave some reviews myself.
From what I've heard so far, there's some awesome talent in this contest.

Wow, this is great, I love the subtle chorus that comes in on the guitar, and the chord changes everywhere are absolutely beautiful. The soft and warm melodies from the sax really speak to the listener.

Peaceful track, and a worthy competitor! Good luck on the 19th man!

acmeDyne responds:

Thanks K-R!
-- When I heard how awesome your submission was this morning, I almost didn't bother working on this anymore.

I wish I could have put the bass and keyboard parts on this...
Alas, I ran out of time.