Setu-Firestorm's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Epic Logic]

Impressive

I really love the feel that this piece conveyed. It was certainly something different within a conventional genre.

The mixing of the piece was damn near flawless. Well compressed and EQ'd, while still slightly heavy on the bass which is what the dance music genre calls for.

Awesome job with this piece.

kilvertm responds:

Thanks alot,
I'm glad you thought the mastering was good, took ages!

[Sun Still Shine]

Superb!

Sunshine was a very well-crafted film, and your theme here captures its epic mood perfectly. Everything is flawlessly composed (using Edirol Orchestral, methinks) and instrument ensembles are utilized to give the fullest expression that carries this piece.

Very cinematic quality, and that is indeed something to be very proud of. Great work!

[Aerith's Theme [FFVII]]

In need of dynamics

As a fellow Edirol user, I can tell you that if you can get the piano patch note-velocity to be -20, you get a much softer sound out of the piano and not that hard, tinny sound.

The piece you have here is well done and well put together. It's just that the note velocity needs to come down to give it a softer sound that this piece needs.

CelestOrion responds:

Thanks for the input! I'll be sure to do that, and I'll re-upload it when it's fixed!

[To The Unhallowed Ground]

Very good

I use Edirol Orchestral as my main VSTi as well, but I could never get the damn thing to work in FL Studio, which is fine. I use Nuendo 4 instead.

This piece is very well layered and composed. The only thing I would say is that it could use some dynamics variation, but I'm not one to talk. That's one of my pitfalls in composing as well, for the most part, and I know that FL Studio makes note velocities a bit more difficult to work with.

Great job on the piece.

CelestOrion responds:

For Edirol Orchestral on FL Studio, import it into the VSTi folder, and add a channel. Select More, then scroll down to Orchestral. From there, you want to select what instrument will be what, and track away. ^_^ Thanks for the great review!

[{Vic} Son of Sun (rmstrd)]

Interesting piece

I really like how you've used synths to musically paint the picture that the title of the piece implies. It shows quite a bit of creative talent in you.

The piece is elaborate and well mixed/compressed.

Great job!

ZOMGBIE responds:

Thanks man. It was tough trying to expand this song and there are still some things I'm not too happy with, but I'm glad the result was satisfactory. Thanks for the review.

[-Something New- [MAC8]]

Nice composition

Very nice and well-orchestrated composition. You should, however, look into some VSTi plugins with more realistic orchestral samples (like Edirol Orchestral or EastWest Symphonic Orchestra), because while your composing talent is phenominal, the instruments sound very "tinny" and synthed, which is okay, but could sound more real and genuine.

Keep up the good work.

[Icarus - Dream of Flight]

As a fellow composer...

...I can say I greatly appreciate the work you've done here.

Your piece is full, not leaving anything to be desired in its composition. Although if I had to guess, I speculate you're natively a guitar player or have at least given some effort into playing guitar, only because I haven't known many piano players who were concerned much with modal scales.

I can hear the John Williams influence in here as much of the thematic layer of this piece sounds as though it was inspired by Williams' "Hook" score which would only be appropriate for a piece dealing with the atmosphere of flying. When you mix the jazz elements in, the piece takes more of a Noriyuki Iwadare sound (the composer to the "Grandia" games).

The mix of the piece is flawless. While I place most of my focus on the composition of my pieces, I still have much to learn in the realm of mixing to perfect my mixes. But hey, music composition/mixing in general is an ever-growing and ever-learning process.

Congratulations for creating a wonderful work of art.

sorohanro responds:

Hey, one of my favorite musician writing a review ...
I'm also a guitar player but when i started this I had trumpets in mind (intro) and the rest came by playing keys.
Thanx for the very nice review

[[solitude] (flcorecomp)]

Now this is great!

You don't know how many electronic songs I've heard, and I would have to say, in my honest opinion as a fellow composer, that this piece is worthy to be called Trance.

The piece is cleverly composed with no clashing synths and all layes of the musical spectrum filled, and the mixing is professionally flawless. The piece itself has a feeling to it that makes one want to dance, which makes it perfect for its genre.

Keep up the awesome work.

[An Awaited Change]

An interesting piece

You guys are skilled players (although the keeping-on-tempo thing is not as polished, but I'm nowhere near perfect myself when it comes to playing a live instrument in realtime), and the song has a catchiness to it that is required of music of this genre.

I will say, though, that I'm curious what studio recorded you, because the mixing on the drumset really lacks in output quality and sounds very raw; it was not compressed or EQed, and I would even guess that it wasn't even mic'd well, because it had a very tinny sound that sounded like it was just recorded and not really "mixed", which if this is a studio that charges money for sessions, they should at least do their recording engineering homework.

But, besides that point, the composition of the piece is very standard for a rock band, and would fit in easily with other bands of the like.

Keep up the good work.

[Dreamland]

Nice ambience

Aside from a difference in mixing style (like I would have layered reverb on the piano), this song was very well composed and executed. You guys sound good together.

therookie responds:

Thank you for those kind words ^^
I didnt have any part in the mixing though.