LucidShadowDreamer's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Fly Away]

This is incredibly beautiful!
In every way o.O

I didn't expect such a heavily melodic track from you! Reminds me a bit of Danny Elfman's work. Everything from the synths (arps), the claps (such a simple yet effective beat, btw), the dynamics, strings to the singer harmonise perfectly.

The loop is quite perfect too!

However, I think the render missed something at 2:36. You might want to look into that!

This is, as I said, an incredibly beautiful piece. So if there's a possibility to rerender it, you could make it even more amazing. Wonderful job with this. Really. You're always reaching new heights!
In that sense, I guess you might already be flying.

zybor responds:

Thank you for your thoughtful review! I noticed the cut off but did not have time to record it again. I will fix it sometime this week. :)

[Catharsis]

Really catchy! I like what you did halfway. Anything new which is not exceptionally bad or nonfunctional, is good :)
In fact, I'd say I like the second part, after the breakdown, even more than the first :D

Geoplex responds:

Thanks dude :D I too liked the second part more in the end, I just wasn't sure if the first would end up feeling a bid redundant - especially if people really preferred one over the other.

[What I Couldn't Say]

I love stuff like this. Thus, I love this.

larrynachos responds:

Thanks lsd :)

[Ground Zero]

Congratulations on finishing the album!
There is so much going on here, I don't even know exactly what to say!

The first thing I noticed, are the avant-garde rhythmic elements, that roll on, yet vary throughout the track!
All the atmospheric sounds included are amazing, and you did a good job of blending them all together. It's very pleasant to listen to the track, even if it keeps taking me by surprise. I don't know hom you even manage to come up with all this xD
And an even tougher question, is how you managed to mix and render this? That's quite a feat!

There are lots of interesting transitions too.

All in all, I found the track very enjoyable!
I'd like to ask, what would you describe to be your main inspiration for the track, and the album?

Thanks for sharing!

zybor responds:

Most of the mixes happened in post production so it was quite easy. The synths weren't hard to master and mix, what difficult were the organic instruments, guitars and percussion. The percussions were especially difficult because most of them in low ranges. It was hard to keep everything in place without one drowning another. I recorded this instead of rendering, because my machine could never handle this much data. Took a dozen of different records to get it right.

Mixing was never a problem. Post production like FXs was the hardest part. Had to get the reverb and convolution right for most of them. LFO, distort, lofi, flanger, chorus, stereo, vocoder, delay, phaser... these were what given each sound their own voices. I went lazy with the guitars and applied Guitar Rig on all of them. The arps were auto FX with Movement, Replika XT, Form and Flesh. Form and Flesh are fucking amazing, because you could turn samples into magic. Movement did the rest justice on rhythmic glitches.

The main inspirations came from favorite artists. But also on the high of whatever going on around me, and in this world. The world has come to the end of human civilization. The height of total collapse on both survival and resource. We are not far from extinction. It was always a conscious hunch for it (as you said I'm a master of hunches). But this time it's real.

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-04/new-research-tracks-40-year-old-prediction-world-economy-will-collapse-2030

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/looking-back-on-the-limits-of-growth-125269840/#

We are on the end of the ride, and it's beginning to happen. Ground Zero symbolizes everything that we have. If you listened throughout the track, it represents a lot of thing happened in our world. If you wish, I could explain more over Skype.

[Wakey Wakey]

Catchy stuff :O

Satyre responds:

Thanks :D

[Anytown, RPG]

Haha, I definitely know about those towns, and these kinds of tracks xD
As you might remember, Mattashi and I actually composed a similarly themed piece last year, around the same time (not a pixel, aka 8-bit etc. inspired track though).

The style is very true to what an actual piece in a game would sound like! I'd love it if this was used in one (with your permission, ofc). The loop is super smooth, btw.

Well, what more to say. You know I love it ^ ^
A very worthy Pixel Day submission <3

ChronoNomad responds:

I knew you'd know! Gotta love those happy little townspeople and their upbeat homesteads. I had to pop over to your submissions and refresh my memory, but it only took me a few seconds to find the track due to its rather appropriate name. Of course I had to give it a listen, you know...for nostalgia's sake. :D

I certainly wouldn't mind hearing this in someone's game. All they'd have to do is ask! And I'm also pretty jazzed that the loop is nice and smooth. Thanks for saying so!

Really happy to know that you enjoy the track, my friend. High fives all around. Happy Pixel Day!

[Rind]

This is a pretty cool WIP! I am eager to see what you'll make of it :)

backwardecho responds:

Thanks so much!

[Watching Waterfalls]

Oh wow, this sounds lovely :O
The fact that you've been meditating on this for so long, probably explains why you managed to turn it into something so great. I still can''t quite comprehend how you managed to blend so many awesome and experimental sounds (was that a shotgun being loaded?) into this, so seamlessly! Everything you added complements the track perfectly.

That's an interesting story you've got there, as well!

P.S. I thought this track was on loop, since I heard it playing anew, but turns out I had just subconsciously pressed play again, without realizing! So if that's not indicative of how much I enjoy this track, I don't know what is <3

Quarl responds:

The shotgun was a place holder. I was going to toss a camera shutter sample there eventually but I'm like... super lazy. Didn't even bother looking for the sample.

lol, it's a fun melody to play. I loop the riff much in the same way when I force myself on my keyboard because it feels really natural. Since you also use youtube and play piano, I'd be willing to post a private video when I get home tonight. The hand motions are super fluid, makes for a rewarding rudiment :)

[BO & TL - Titular]

Looks like a forgot to review this earlier!

It's cool to see a new collab between you, after quite a while. There's a lot of neat things going on here, and I recognize both of your styles in this! The production sounds quite good :O

The thing that stands out to me on this track, is the movement. There's a lot of rhythmic elements going on, and the progression catches the listener of guard in a good way. An example of a surprising spot is the transition at 1:18, which leads to 1:26, which is aslo a really interesting part. I love that alongside the melodies, there are a lot of other things happening too, on the sides or even in the background.

Percussion is also used in quite a liberal way, which is seen at 1:40 and on.
Still, despite everything, there is some nice repetition too. The sounds are really good for you having used only native fl plugins, btw :O
I love the lead after 2:30, personally.

Another great thing, is how TL's interesting rhythmic style, and unique melodies, are fit into this track. I'd almost call it a melodic track as well, even if there's a lot of rhythmic elements going on, and despite the melodies being a bit avant-garde. Though not the first thing one thinks of upon hearing "harmonic", it all sounds pleasing to the ear.

I think the ending fits the purposes of the track perfectly, as well. I don't really have anything to critique here!
One thing I didn't directly mention is that I love the atmosphere this track gives off, since it's a bit hard to place. Great job, to the both of you! I'm hoping to hear more fruitful collabs in the future :)