Hi!
My name's Marek Smagala, a budding composer looking to make a small name for myself in the game scene, particularly with an emphasis on the Indie/Mobile areas.
I've recently made a short 9-track playlist of looped electronic music, written in the style of games such as FEZ, Celeste etc.
It would be great if you might be able to spare a moment to check out some of the tracks and let me know what you think!
Startup - Very pretty. Felt mystical. The melody could be a bit more prominent.
Field of Flowers - Felt like science fiction. The melody could be a bit more prominent.
The Cave - If you're trying to invoke the feeling of a cave then the electronic rhythm felt out of place. Otherwise I liked it
In the Name of Science - The name is perfect for this one. Nothing to add, I liked it.
Encounter - I felt like this one didn't quite have enough energy. Maybe you could try putting the melody on the up-beat instead of the down-beat
Village Store - This one is nice. I did feel like the rhythm track was a little "busy," but that's a nit pick.
The Lair - This one starts strong. Very nice.
Confronting Demons - Very good, nothing to add.
Endgame - I feel like the bridge was missing. Nice chill song.
Great work!
Hi Marek! Great work on the songs. I feel the creativity in the pieces.
In "Startup", you should try and dynamically move the flow of the music. What I mean by this is to create automation curves that adjust things such as volume, filters, panning to create a living and breathing mix. Automating volume is especially important, as it really is what separates the professionals from the amateurs.
A number of your tunes are aligned too much on the low-end I feel. I know you might not want too much high-end frequencies in your songs, but maybe a slight boost in some instruments can help fill out the sound spectrum. "In the Name of Science" is good example of a song that needs some high-end.
Lastly, I recommend tuning the velocity of your instruments to replicate a human performance. You do record yourself playing, which is always great, but there are some instruments that are a bit too stale (percussion in "Encounter" for example).
Other than those points, I enjoyed the sit-back-and-relax nature of your tunes. Loved taking the time to listen to your creative works!
On 3/8/2019 at 6:52 PM, jbarrios said:
Startup - Very pretty. Felt mystical. The melody could be a bit more prominent.Field of Flowers - Felt like science fiction. The melody could be a bit more prominent.
The Cave - If you're trying to invoke the feeling of a cave then the electronic rhythm felt out of place. Otherwise I liked it
In the Name of Science - The name is perfect for this one. Nothing to add, I liked it.
Encounter - I felt like this one didn't quite have enough energy. Maybe you could try putting the melody on the up-beat instead of the down-beat
Village Store - This one is nice. I did feel like the rhythm track was a little "busy," but that's a nit pick.
The Lair - This one starts strong. Very nice.
Confronting Demons - Very good, nothing to add.
Endgame - I feel like the bridge was missing. Nice chill song.
Great work!
Thanks very much for your feedback! I really appreciate you taking the time to listen to each track - I'm glad you enjoyed them overall and I'll definitely take onboard your comments about some energy/melodies you felt were missing - thanks again
20 hours ago, Alec Weesner said:Hi Marek! Great work on the songs. I feel the creativity in the pieces.
In "Startup", you should try and dynamically move the flow of the music. What I mean by this is to create automation curves that adjust things such as volume, filters, panning to create a living and breathing mix. Automating volume is especially important, as it really is what separates the professionals from the amateurs.
A number of your tunes are aligned too much on the low-end I feel. I know you might not want too much high-end frequencies in your songs, but maybe a slight boost in some instruments can help fill out the sound spectrum. "In the Name of Science" is good example of a song that needs some high-end.
Lastly, I recommend tuning the velocity of your instruments to replicate a human performance. You do record yourself playing, which is always great, but there are some instruments that are a bit too stale (percussion in "Encounter" for example).
Other than those points, I enjoyed the sit-back-and-relax nature of your tunes. Loved taking the time to listen to your creative works!
Cheers Alec! First of all thanks for having a listen through. It's interesting what you say about the relationships with low-high end frequencies, and the 'human' element of velocities in performances is an area I often overlook and will take onboard in any new music I create! I guess it's the finer, small details I'm perhaps lacking which as you say can be the difference between pro and amateur.
I know it might not be your style, but listen to any of Jeremy Soule's music. Pay attention to how he dynamically moves instruments in and out and specifically where he automates. Most of his work is library-based, so this is something that can be attained through use of only VSTs and automation work.
Very cool songs! I love all of the arpeggiations. That is an excellent technique to have a good control over. If you listen to newer Deamau5, the Stranger Things soundtrack, and other retro or sci-fi soundtracks.. Arpeggiators are everywhere. As I listened through all of your songs, I completely agreed with jbarrios. Especially when it comes to slightly retro or mobile game soundtracks, you usually listen for a melody that you could whistle. If you had a more predominant melody that would also get stuck in my head (in a good way..) then it would add a lot to each of these songs. On the other hand, if you were aiming for just an atmospheric background song, perfect! Those songs are needed too.
Startup is great for a game menu. Village Store reminds me of a Zora location in an old Zelda game. The Cave, In The Name of Science, and Confronting Demons are actually my 3 favorites I think.. I like dark music with a lot of low-end, so it's all up to personal taste. Confronting Demons reminded me a lot of a save station in Resident Evil which is awesome. I agree that maybe The Cave didn't exactly make me think of being in a cave, but it could easily be simplified to sound more slow and bleak, or just change the name to give a different connotation if you want.
Overall great job, I really enjoyed listening through.
Ada
On 4/2/2019 at 9:29 PM, Ada Maskil said:Overall great job, I really enjoyed listening through.
Ada
Hi Ada - Thanks for the thorough feedback! I'm really glad you enjoyed listening to the tracks and thanks for taking the time out of your day to give it all a listen!
The Melody part is something I definitely need to look into more - it's interesting because I sometimes suffer the problem of having TOO many melodies/counter melodies within one piece which end up cluttering the overall space!
I guess I may have gone too far in the opposite direction - but now I've been to both ends of the melodic spectrum hopefully I can start landing somewhere in the middle haha
Thanks again!
