Free2Play's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Pesky Bats]

Yet again I really love your composition!

Hearing all these really makes me hope somebody will use your music in some flash game or something, they have a really cool feel and sound to them.

If I were to try and name a negative, in my personal opinion I'm starting to notice that your instruments might be weak where the drums are pretty forward. It's like maybe if it was mixed where the instruments feel as heavy as the drums it'd have a bit more energy to it.

Keep making music man!

[Gerudo Valley Zelda (remix)]

I don't know dude, I mean you did transpose this well but this is litterally Gerudo's Valley. Like you didn't really remix it, it's just the song. If I went and got on youtube and looked up the track from Ocarina of Time I would basically get the same thing but a little bit better.

A remix should really something new where you take a new spin on it in some way. I almost thought you stole a midi version of the song and just put it up there.

I hate using myself as an example because I suck a lot, but if you listen to my final fantasy remix it is the same notes (like yours), but I did it in a weird dance/violin type thing. It obviously wasn't the original, it was a remix in some form. I even added a 2nd melody to it for like a verse so it had something totally of my own.

Sorry dude, it's always fun getting to put together one of your favorite songs, but this litterally is the song.

It's not like terrible though, you did pick decent (although super fake, faker than the original) instruments, and its not badly mixed. Most of the parts come out pretty clean.

But keep making music dude!

masterno responds:

well i looked into the music of gerudo valley and i changed few parts that i liked better. I think the instruments are cleaner and easier on the ear, the distance on the instruments in the original, it feels like they are far away, i love gerudo valley as u can see and that is why i only changed few parts, but everyone got their own taste i suppose. But listening with my earphones i think mine is clearer. I could have changed it entirely, but i liked the original so good that i didn't want to change too much and ruin the song and also make everything on my ear, like the trumpet is orgasm to my ears. but thanks for the comment anyway :)

im probably gonna make a new one later that is more remixed, it will be more alien space like. When i get time.

[Jazz Tech]

Oh man it makes me so happy to click on a random new song and hear something super sweet! Dude great job with your composition here, I hardly ever hear any jazzy writing and rhythms anymore.

I think the only thing that is keeping this from being a 5 to me is the very little things. Like maybe tighter mastering, more instrumentation, a little bit better mixing like on that bass at :28, and in general what to bring out and what to put down.

I think you're probably better than me at many things so I can't help much in achieving that, but this is really good and you're super close to being front page material!

jawalker213 responds:

InfernoZN thanks for your input and support! Yeah I guess it's true that sometimes I post things completely unmixed.. sometimes I think that that way ppl can listen to what I was getting at originally, but maybe it throws a lot of ppl off too.. so glad to see you could look past it! Your stuff is great!

[Overworld Theme]

This really reminds me of my early stuff. I have to admit amongst all the people that have only been playing with writing music for a little while you stand out a bit, it's pretty apparent you have a decent ear for music.

But I'm grading so harshly because I know you can get better. One of the best things that happened to me early on was when someone told me that my stuff wasn't nearly as good as it could be, and he was very right.

If I were you I would check out warbeats.com for different tutorials, but especially on music theory I think it'll help your writing go to the next level (you're actually pretty good at feeling out your music though). And I'd also check out ocremix.com and look at other Fruity loops artists like Madeon, DeadMau5, and Zircon (Andrew Aversa) to see how powerful the program you're using is.

You already have a pretty good start here, but you could be SO MUCH better.

Keep making music dude!

[Goodbye letter]

I'm diggin this. I like the simple beat, and your voice is nice for more relaxed hip hop. I'm not the best lyricist so I don't want to comment on your rhymes too much. I think what bothers me is that the piano should've been on beat a bit more and probably needed more high end or improv movement.

I can't remember perfectly, but I remember the bass feeling a bit random. Its okay to have a groovy bass, but it has to have a root note that it hits *most* of the time.

I think www.warbeats.com is where you should go. There are some super helpful tutorials on there that specifically talk about hip hop.

I really like your song though it reminds me of Nujabes, which is one of my favorite artists of all time. It has a relaxed, but groovy vibe, and that's not easy to pull off without being too repetitive.

Keep making music dude!

TheRef responds:

thanks man

[To The Death]

Okay let me start off with the good.

After :30 there's obviously some talent going on. That bass groove really got me going. But most of the song I wasn't digging too much.

But the beginning did not start off well to me, that first synth was very ugly especially mixed with that really mid heavy kick. It's like that melody is almost a really good dark synth melody but i don't know its too random? I think this guy might help, he made a video specifically about making melodies in a song http://warbeats.com/Tutorials/Music-Theory?topic=7008&name=Making-Musical-Phrases#view (the song itself isn't trying to be good its just an example).

The thing I think that didn't help me was that the mixing was a little muddy. If you had all of this but it was a bit more competently mixed I would've dug it more just for that production value factor, but the bass is way too muddy (although most of the bass parts were written pretty good).

But keep making music man you obviously have talent!

DaveMajor7 responds:

Thanks for the feedback!
ya it was a couple hr experiment I did yesterday mixing diminished 7th chord with an octatonic scale. I can be difficult work with that kind of harmonic language because the nature of the dissonance it to be muddy (especially when dealing with saw waves XD)

Thanks for the video, he does cover some basic music theory principles....I was just stepping outside some of the norms we hear everyday in popular music (I teach music for a living and I get bored of major and minor scales....). The melody is also mix metered, the rhythm stay in 4/4 and the melody goes in and out of 4 and 3 (nothing to crazy). Melody's that are octatonic AND mix metered tend to sound random to a lot of people (except the person who wrote it XD)
Thanks for the comment! Keep them coming
always like to hear opinions!

[-Blues Heroes 2-]

I'm down with this.

This is one of those songs that I would probably go back to because its like SO CLOSE to being really good. I like some of the instruments, but your ability to make the instruments sound convincing is not very good. I would definitely search up some youtube videos on making orchestra and wind instruments sound more real (trust me its shockingly doable with free instruments).

Also I think the actual composition was fine at the beginning (although that fake piano should be given something more than practically no effects, like reverb or delay or something). But that weird drum thing at :25 sort of distracted me. The best part is definitely at the drop at :45 or something. But that's when I was a little dissapointed that there wasn't a change in the chord progression or something. Or at least more than just more energy, it needed more energy in the composition by adding a longer more dramatic segment?

Sorry its really hard to describe how a song is close but not close enough you know?

Still keep making music!

And here I'll put these here

1. Here's a friend of mine who makes free soundfont instruments sound almost real: http://musicbytaylormefford.bandcamp.com/album/an-experiment-with-an-air-pump-original-score

2. Here's a guy who taught me almost everything about composition in songs: http://warbeats.com/Tutorials/Music-Theory

Demonicity responds:

well actually im more into dubstep and dnb :P so that might sound weird im not tryin to get realistic as possible i just like it to sound good :P but thanks anyway ! :3

[Head PainZ. 3.42mins]

Now I really can't tell if you have a lot of music competence but you have a very specific style, or you have a crutch like i do and your style is really just you not being able to make other styles you're happy with.

I want to start off with something good though, I do like the glitchiness and the use of the distortion effects around the 2nd minute, and I like when the Bass actually starts playing chords rather than...

Okay truth be told most of this song actually gave me head pains. See its weird I've heard songs in this dark techno style, and actually listen to them regularly, but I don't think you know enough about music writing to make it interesting throughout.

I tried for like 15 minutes to find this techno song that had vampires in it, but I can't. It was a really dark techno song with a lot of distortion that raped your ears but it was really good and I would listen to it all the time on school trips. So instead of that here's a similar collection of songs with a similar style. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYkGj5MmT3Y

But if you can incorporate more music theory knowledge into your songs you could make them SO GOOD. I like the style you have, but it needs more than just one chord the whole time. It gets mundane quickly and also makes your head hurt lol. Maybe that was intentional I don't know.

Keep making music dude!

SlaughterClub responds:

their is a few chords at the start yes but this was an experimental tune kinda mash up style more about just beats . if you check some of my other stuff you will see its random styles not normally ever the same.
BTW i dont think your aloud to post Youtube links on here
thanks for listening