anthonyragus's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Immediate Future]

Heyyy, this slaps, sounds like synthwave instrumentation meets trance form. Super effective acid ostinato line, very psy. Nice use of layering and doubling. That countermelody at the end is superb. I hear so much control and intent in your sound; great work, and best wishes for the round. I hope to see you in the finals.

Basiator responds:

Thanks a lot. ;)

[Dream, Daria]

This is incredibly emotional: nostalgia, melancholia, parental love, there's so much to feel here. The piece flowed effortlessly, slowly building with a compelling progression, all with seemless transitions. The meter is wonderfully obscure, representing the warped perception of time in sleep and memory. Great use of the different triple feels and smeary harmony and phrasing, evoking impressionism as it progressed. I wonder if atmos / stereo conversion had an affect at the end. Anyway, fantastic work as always.

Phonometrologist responds:

What an intelligent review. Your analysis is correct, and even the whole tone scale to mimic dreaming was one of the key points in impressionism. The rhythm in the third section is 5 against 2 which shifted the down beat at different times when a new chord progression is introduced. Thank you for the thoughtful review.

[Interference]

Heck yeah, classic electro house. The form feels like prog/anthem without the track length of prog. Great work.

rajbeatsofficial responds:

I appreciate the feedback 💚 its on all streaming outlets now if you'd like to listen again/elsewhere: https://bit.ly/INTERFERENCE_

[Shoot for the Stars]

Nice, cute little ball of energy. I can imagine this in some game settings, fun and serviceable. Great work

Crashtroid responds:

thank you, i took a lot of inspiration from the cuter stages of super monkey ball!

[BIRTHDAY (EUROBEAT 2022)]

Heck yeah, quintissential Eurobeat, you nailed it. This definitely is fitting for classic Sonic, especially CD and the modern-retro incarnation in contemporary fangames. That quick G pluck sound at :22 and repeating cycles is a bit flat, but I kind of like that. Superb work.

DJ-AfterBurnz responds:

Thank you for taking the time to review my work! Eurobeat has been a genre of interest that I’ve been trying to improve on, and the need to have repeating riffs is indeed one of my crutches. I will strive to improve working on varying patterns. A lot of my stuff is based on for people to actually sing and have lyrics too, but it always helps to not keep the same pattern. Your kind words are much appreciated :)

[This Is Sooo Sad]

Hearing this upon losing my lives would ease the pain. I like how you cycle through the harmony and end up a tritone away from where you started. The glissandi sound a bit out of place to me; I wonder how they would sound twice as slow or with different velocities. Does the lowpass / bandpass filter follow each note position, or do my ears deceive me? Great work. Also holy moly FL Studio is up to version 20 now.

SecretMusician responds:

sorry for late response, how could i miss this??

anyway i wasn't really an experimented musician at that time, but i remember using a preset for Vital, so that might be why it sounds a little odd. Also yeah the harmony is unintended for the reasons mentioned lmao, but glad you like it!

[Tater Salad]

I've heard some phat taters in my life, but this one, THIS one could feed the population of Cork.

I might be in the minority in terms of mixing opinions, but I love this level of "amost-cuts-through" bass that you have. I think it's perfect. There's something about most shrill overdrive tones, that seems popular as of late, that the bass feel overly present in a non-immersive way. I like the guitars and bass to glue together and be perceived as one sound. If I had the honor of attemping to mix this, I would even go so far as to bring down the distortion even lower, and maybe compensate with a mid-high eq boost and more present natural picking sound, in that 2:20 to 2:40 section, because I'm that crazy about blending, even when the bass has a bit of a solo.

But what the gosh darn flipping heck do I know?! I know that this spud slaps severly, starch and cholesterol straight to my heart.

Metaljonus responds:

Oh yeah gotta starch up haha. Yeah, that's the thing with the 5150 the gain was a lil under 3 hahahaha and the mids were scooped to almost 2. It is a superrrr high gain amp with a buttloads of mid range. Thanks for checking it out! <3

[Lonely Town]

You're approaching perfection. I can tell this is exactly what you were going for, and I can imagine this in so many different uses, contexts, etc.

I struggle to think of feedback. If I were the mixing engineer on this, I would sculpt the snare in two ways, tame the high sizzle and bring out the mid-low body. As it is now, the snare sounds high-passed in an unnatural way to me. I would also ever-so-slightly increase the overall bass level and bring out the harmonic distortion in the bass a bit more. But take this suggestion with a grain of salt. This style isn't my forte.

Fantastic work

Casper responds:

Thanks!

[Cloud Caravan (SNES/Genesis)]

Whoa, that is a HARD SWING. All aboard the swang train, The Super Mario World-sounding keys solidified the nostalgia factor for me. Great chromatic passing movement in there too.

In the "verses", one or two of your bassse are panned to the right. Is this this for balancing something on the left? It seemed a bit right-heavy to me.

What is that sound effect at 0:33 and other spots? It's super interesting.

Jojo responds:

According to someone else, a lot of my songs sound more full on the right channel and not enough on the left. Must be a hearing-perception thing. It's something I'm working on fixing.
It was intentional this time however since I use multiple bass instruments throughout this track and it sounds more alive to place them in different positions.

As for the sounds at 0:33, if I remember correctly it's several sounds layered together for the bellish instrument with a snare placed at the right points to make it sound more popping. And the cha-ching sound is from Mother 3. ^w^

[THE CAVE]

Heck yeah, staccato flute adds levity to any situation. What's the foley / ambience in the background? It sounds like a distant construction site paired with a slightly sample crushed forest ambience with crickets and cicadas. HOW WRON WAS I?? Great work, it's a sideways-head-bobber for sure.

Pan01 responds:

thank you!

and yeah it was meant to sound like there was some kind of machine system inside the cave, i did not hear the crickets sounds in the fx i used until after i posted the song so thats actually a mistake lol