MJTTOMB's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Marche au Château in G minor 2]

Hmph.

Damnit.

You and your music have been causing me much grief. this song was in my sleep last night, which is the prime time for my musical ideas to come out. :(

Very good man.

Not quite what I saw coming. the theme was presented first with woodwinds. not bad, but after the twirling strings, I think it would have let the built-up energy out faster if you'd gone to a brass mini-crescendo thingy.

I can't tell what the little chimes things are. is that a glockenspiel? Seems a little high, idk. Cute nonetheless.

A masterwork.

But I can't listen to it anymore. it's getting stuck again.

Loops perfectly too.

Regards,
MJTTOMB

Winterwind-NS responds:

haha i just realized u gave me a 0/10
so we're both even now lol

-winter

[_-={Vengeful Mind Break}=-_]

Voted 5.

Voted 5, wrote a massive review, lost it. To hell with this.

Good work.

Meh, not having a good day, my friend. Not a good day at all.

MaestroRage responds:

Hey MJTTOMB!

Thats perfectly fine. I know how it is to lose a large review... hurts you real deep. I appreciate you leaving something though, lets me know you were here to listen to it :). I'm glad you liked the piece, thank you for the review!

Better days will come your way, hold out. Misery may like company, but rarely does it like to commit.

[Fttd Cc Edit]

Heh.

Pretty nice, my man.
And to answer your question, yes, I'd like to collab with you.

As for the review:

Man, the dissection's gonna be hard, but I'll go for a shot at it.

Harp- Quaint, good for the beginning. In the orchestral parts, you should put it on minor sevenths for major chords, and possibly 4ths (? may sound weird, but it sounds like a good idea to me) for minor chords.
Viola- Good.
VIBES! YAYSES!- I love the vibes. yayses. Glad to see someone else saw their potential.
Staccato and pizzicato strings- Pizz. is my favorite effect for strings. It did its job quite nicely.
Trombones-Kinda in the background, maybe it was a french horn or tuba, but i heard a trumpet.
Trumpets-Could have been a french horn. Idk. Good melody instrument, though.
French Horns- My fave instrument. Implemented perfectly.
Drums- Kinda cut through the mix, not very pleasing.

Instruments I would add-
Flute
and that's about it.

The form was very nice, and it all flowed quite well.

Good job.

[i2 - Sweet Agony]

Woops.

I suppose the promised review is in order.

To start, a dissection.

Violin- A good little simple-yet-pleasing line that adds the kind of edge-of-the-seat flavor. Well written.
Violoncello- Worked with the violin quite nicely.
Viola- Almost unheard. it was one of the less obvious instruments to my ear.
Piano- A good accompaniment.
Timpani- Thinly placed, and not quite pleasing when used. Not bad, but the tremendous timpani roll followed by a minuscule cymbal crash lacks flavor.
Cymbals- bigger. Bigger. BIGGER. Make it loud, it should cut through the rest of the song like a steak knife through butter, not a like bread stick through rock.
Muted Trumpet (I can't tell for sure what it is, sounds a little like a clarinet too, but the nature of the line is that of a horn, so I'll stick with the assumption that it's a trumpet.)- Should be in the foreground, as it's a lone brass instrument, it's presumably carrying the melody.
Other Drums- Sufficient.

Good job with that. I'd advise French Horns and Trombones as well.

The mix was pretty good. Keep up the good work.

i2abbitz responds:

Taking notes as I'm reading. Louder cymbals, louder horns. After I had gotten home, the whole piece seemed too quiet to me also.

I need louder lows, and heightened highs.

Thank you for your review mjttomb.

[Evil-Dog - The Journey]

Great.

I'll have to listen to some of your earlier stuff to see how you've progressed.

Anyway, this here is a great song. Don't be modest, I'm being quite serious. I'm modest about my songs, but you really shouldn't be about yours. you've got a gift here, and you've done what great musicians do. They make great music. XD.

Great music is not about "hey, this song has hot lyrics" or "ohmigod their lead singer is so hot". It's truly about making you think. Making you feel. This song really connected with me, or I with it, I'm still unsure which, but somehow I find myself in love with this thing. Keep up the good work, and the good fight.

Evil-Dog responds:

I like your perspective on music :) thanks for the review :)

[-(WB)-Symphony of Tears]

A pat on the back.

Not really classical. Not even a symphony.

BUT

Musically speaking, fthis has to be one of the best pieces I';ve heard in a while that's composed almost completely out of changing ostinatios.

I believe this piece fits well under the genre of minimalism. Following the example of my favorite minimalistic piece, could you remix this with 2 vibraphones, a flute, a piano, and maybe a few strings and other woodwinds? I think that would sound fantastic.

4/5.

WritersBlock responds:

I started out with a piano and a cello, they sounded horrible so I ditched them, it was going to be classical, but it changed...

Wow, thanks for the compliment! I could try to remake this, although I doubt I have samples that would fit what you're looking for. One time I tried writing a concerto, the notation was alright, just the samples were terrible.
If I manage to get a decent sound from it I'll probably take afliXion's advice and add a keychange somewhere.

Cheers for the review.

[Rig - Introduction]

Okay.

Not really that original. I'm not aware if this was intentional or not, but the piano line was almost the same as the melody of one of my pieces, so I can't really give you much for originality. Anyway,

Suggestions:
1. Instrumentation-
Like stated before, the piano thing with the solo in the beginning was a little bland.

Instruments you used:
Piano- A pianist could play that in their grave. In fact, they'd probably be dying from boredom playing that. Try making it a little more interesting.
Violin- The violin could have used a little more action, something like sixteenth note arpeggios that make a really fast kind of "running from the bad guy" sound.
Viola- No complaints. It had a good texture.
Cello- Too light. I'd love to hear it, but it just gets hidden in between the rest of the viol family.
Voices- A pretty good effect. I'd love to know how you did that.
Reversed piano- Sweet effect.

Instruments that would work well-
Tubular bells- Amazing at creepy stuff like this.
French Horn- My personal favorite instrument. Great for Crescendos.
Staccato Contrabass- Great for sending chills up your spine.

2. Structure:

Couldn't help but feel disappointeds with this song. It needs a crescendo or some form of closure.

Review:

Originality- 6
Diversity- 7, the piano line's too repetitive and easily playable.
Clarity- Turn the cello up a little bit.
Effort- 10

Keep it up.

Rig responds:

Thanks for the thoughtful review!
Yeah, the piano's really simple. But that's the one they wanted. Customer's always right. And the levels ARE kinda iffy, but I mixed this with my headphones.
Considering I whipped this up in 45 minutes while they were recording in the studio, I think it came out pretty well. Thanks again!

[_-={Solemn Stone}=-_]

Reviewing as I listen.

Very good.

>-Suggestions-<

-Instumentation-
The viola was a nice effect. I believe a clarinet would've also made a nice instrument for "hopelessness".

All of the percussion other than cymbals was more or less unhearable during the beginning.

I think some percussion would've mad for a good sound during the second part. Just snare drums. Like military drums, none of the bass stuff.

The singers could've been a little more forward, right now they're as loud as people going out caroling on christmas eve and realizing halfway through the song that they're singing to an atheist.

-Modulation-

Good. I couldn't keep track of the key, so you pass. XD.

>-Review-<
-Originality-
10, duh.
-Diversity-
I have no idea what diversity is, so 10. YAY!
-Clarity-
Just the few problems I mentioned in the suggestions. 8.
-Effort-
10. Self-explanatory.
-Overall-
10.

Great job man, keep 'em coming.

MaestroRage responds:

ah MJTTOMB, nice to read from you :).

The choir is supposed to be really soft here my good sir. I did not intend them to do anything more then hum, and gently sway their support into the mix. The bass drum I used in hopes of emphasizing the deep fear within the hero. Selfless, courageous, but even hero's know when to be scared.

The second part of this song will be fully military, fully battle, where as this is fully the calm before the storm.

Clarinet eh? I've just recently found my love for the clarinet, and i'll upload the piece which convinced me to love it sometime soon. I did not even consider it at this point, and if I had considered a wood wind, my first reaction would have been oboe, as I feel the oboes sound is both sorrow filled, and hopeless playing the right countermelody to this piece!

Thank you for the review, i'm glad you liked it ^^.

[Winter Has Left Me]

Great.

The only thing I suggest is adding trills to the strings.

Keep on doing stuff like this.

Heh, and try using some sus chords. Fun, fun.

[March on Home]

Pretty good.

Definitely not your best. A few things:

The drums were looped and really sounded pretty crappy, no offense. That cymbal crash makes me twitch every measure. Maybe make the cymbals more sparse.

Also, the ending wasn't really a typical thing for the era. Fadeouts came in the later part of the 1900's. Classical usually either has an open-ended or definitive ending (ex. difinitive: man gets head chopped off for rape, 1 really short chord played by every piece in the orchestra, then two descending notes with strings and woodwinds to symbolize the head bouncing into the basket). or an open-ended ending, say a B minor chord to end something in G minor. (this is the same ending as I used in one of my pieces, so it's just an example).

Everything else flowed well. nothing too weird.

I've seen much better from you, though.