- Joined
- Apr 4, 2014
- Messages
- 3,750
That's it, the competition has now come to an end, and we can announce the winner as decided by me and @Manu Forti iiiiiiiisssssssss...............
@Henry Drum & Bass !!!
Well done good chap, let's all congratulate him and at the same time be jealous that he has won. Your prize will be sent to you shortly, we'll iron out details in PM.
And the popular vote, this one was close. Two entrants were constantly against each other, often overtaking each other. The poll has now been closed and it's a draw!!
@d-low & @Henry Drum & Bass are the popular vote winners! Henry's already won the overall competition, so this is extra bragging rights, but d-low, there you go, you get bragging rights too, the forum loves you!
Commiserations to our other entrants @Leniz, @scrTchs, @dj-paranoia, @Birkett beatz, and @Rounder RG. While you did not win anything, I hope this competition taught you new techniques and such which would enhance your production, so in that sense, you're a winner in that regard!
My feedback for everyone is as follows:
Well done everyone!
If anyone wants to hear the entries again, it's in here!
soundcloud.com/dnbforum-competitions/sets/k2t-manu-sample-pack
@Henry Drum & Bass !!!
Well done good chap, let's all congratulate him and at the same time be jealous that he has won. Your prize will be sent to you shortly, we'll iron out details in PM.
And the popular vote, this one was close. Two entrants were constantly against each other, often overtaking each other. The poll has now been closed and it's a draw!!
@d-low & @Henry Drum & Bass are the popular vote winners! Henry's already won the overall competition, so this is extra bragging rights, but d-low, there you go, you get bragging rights too, the forum loves you!
Commiserations to our other entrants @Leniz, @scrTchs, @dj-paranoia, @Birkett beatz, and @Rounder RG. While you did not win anything, I hope this competition taught you new techniques and such which would enhance your production, so in that sense, you're a winner in that regard!
My feedback for everyone is as follows:
The melody while nice and quirky, I think could do with more depth, a chorus on that maybe? Very clever use of Kyuss barking throughout the track there, did make me laugh to hear him be used like that. Your drop lacks impact and the bassline is not very interesting in my opinion. Although midway through the first section, you change the bassline, using the electric sound and stopping the drums around there was clever, added a bit of interest and you regained my attention. Very glad your second drop has a switch in the melody, personally I would like more of a change, but the fact you thought about a change in melody to progress the track is something I approve. Also a well polished track, everything sounds nice and sharp. Advice to you would be to look on how to add more impact to drops.
Interesting intro with the filters on the drums, immediately caught my attention once I hit play. I'm glad that you had a stop in the beats in your intro to build up to the drop, the way you brought that along was nice. The constant filtering you're doing with your drums is really good, I like that attention to detail you had there, it keeps me interested. Bassline could do with more variety, I felt it was going through the pattern again and again a bit too long for my liking, a second bass sound from the pack may have worked to switch things. Breakdown is really nice though, my favourite bit of this. The second drop could have done with more variety I think: Yes you did slightly change the bass, but for me, it's not enough. Mixdown probably not as clean as the above entries, but still nicely done.
Solid structure, arrangement seems fine. Bit of an underwhelming track if I'm honest. While I see the aim for minimalistic vibes. The chord you have running through the track I think could have worked better if you changed the note here and there, like a chord progression. It just would give the track more variety and more direction, instead it can come off as flat. Nice use of that little melody through the track though. Personal taste, I always think that a track should have a variation in the second drop, when a track has the same first and second drop, while not awful, it's just something I think could have been improved. That goes with my earlier point of how the track needs more direction. Mixdown is well done though, track is nicely balanced. Advice to you would be to see how more minimal tracks use atmospherics to feel a bit more full.
For me personally, this one has the best use of atmospherics and ambience, from the onset you get the vibe of what you're trying to aim for very well, I definitely can't fault it in that regard. Bassline loses my interest though, it's a bit quiet and dull. I see you had a drum fill before the breakdown but I think your main section just needed more drum edits, it just felt like it kept going and I was really losing interest. It's a shame because the atmospherics are really good on this track, and in fact, the extra emphasis on them in the second track carries them forward, but it's just let down by the bass, more could have been done with that in my opinion.
This was the one that had the most interesting concept to me, this could have made a really good Jungle/Oldschool inspired track, but there were a number of things that could have been done better. You chose my personal favourite drums in the pack, and yes while they were already heavily processed and chopped breaks, I think you could have done more with them than pitch them and copy them. The lack of bassline on this track (apart from the slight sound every once in a while) is something that should have been looked into, I think using the sub to do a proper oldschool jungle sound would have really put this up there as a winner, but the lack of direction lets this down. Good use of the second break and the flutes to sort of bring the energy back down slightly before letting loose again. Kudos for the very different approach though, I'd advise just looking further in how to arrange tracks.
The little melody playing against the cymbals is clever, gives it a bit of quirkiness there, I like that intro arrangement. You seem to be using a lot of the sounds in the pack in different sequences which is good, it keeps me interested cause there's more things to look out for. However, I feel there is a lack of a solid structure, the sounds are there, but the track doesn't feel like it's evolving or progressing? The second drop tries to be more varied, which as I've said for previous entries is something I legitimately enjoy, and in fact, the attempt to switch things for a second drop is something that I can tell you were really trying to get across. However, the production of this lets you down, I'd advise that as your next step to improve.
First off, this is nice and loud, mixdown is good here. Very nice with the piano, I like the atmospherics that accompany it, it's not too overpowering. However the drums are overpowering in my opinion, could have done with softer drum sounds. I realise the pack is limited with drums, but maybe toning down your drums, particularly that snare would have helped. Bassline seems fine to me, works well with this sort of track. As said with previous entries, I would like to see more interest on drums, some edits here and there rather than just letting it keep going, otherwise for me it gets a bit monotone. I think your breakdown and moment of calm could have been longer, you could have used maybe another 16 to really flesh out your atmospherics and evolve the track more. Glad you took the piano out on second drop, just makes things keep going smoothly. Track deconstructing at the end is a nice touch as well, nice way to end things. I'd just look into ways to make drums more interesting if I were you.
Well done everyone!
If anyone wants to hear the entries again, it's in here!
soundcloud.com/dnbforum-competitions/sets/k2t-manu-sample-pack
