Tokolos's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Time Passes By]

Time Passes By

Good work on the drums. It's not often you get to hear tempo changes, and you really made it very effective. If you ever work on this more, or extend it, a good way to reinforce that super subtly cool melody would be to use long drawn out brass notes, this can be soprano sax or clarinet etc. And then every bar reinforce it with harmonies until climax, then back to the break down.
I really enjoyed this piece. I personally don't think you need to work for weeks on something, that the amount of time/work spent somehow translates to a better piece. When I enjoy a song, I never think to myself: a lot of work went into that. hehe
Basically, the beat and the melody here has a clear intent and grabs my interest immediatly. I supppose the bass can be more defined, but that's not the end of the world. The only instrument here that I don't like is the pan flute, but that's just personal taste/preference.

"the daily routine ends and the song slows down as one gets to bed, sleeps, and wakes up to find his routine starting all over again."
- going 'round in broken circles...

Anyways, great track. Let me know if you ever update it.
5/5

Step responds:

Wow, thanks for the lengthy review!

"Good work on the drums."

Thanks. I'm pretty decent when it comes to drums actually, just bad at everything else :P.

"It's not often you get to hear tempo changes, and you really made it very effective."

Yeah, I definitely agree that tempo changes are pretty awesome if done correctly. I only added this tempo change to make it fit with the theme of time that this song has though :3.

"If you ever work on this more, or extend it, a good way to reinforce that super subtly cool melody would be to use long drawn out brass notes, this can be soprano sax or clarinet etc. And then every bar reinforce it with harmonies until climax, then back to the break down."

Excellent idea, if I revisit this song, I'm *definitely* considering this.

"I really enjoyed this piece. I personally don't think you need to work for weeks on something, that the amount of time/work spent somehow translates to a better piece. When I enjoy a song, I never think to myself: a lot of work went into that. hehe"

Lol xD. Although I'm actually pretty surprised you liked this, it's probably one of my worst recent submissions :P. Maybe I should take a few hours to finish a song more often, lol.

"Basically, the beat and the melody here has a clear intent and grabs my interest immediatly. I supppose the bass can be more defined, but that's not the end of the world. The only instrument here that I don't like is the pan flute, but that's just personal taste/preference."

Hm, I personally really like the sound of a pan flute. To each his own I suppose. The bass can definitely be more defined, you're not the first to mention it.

""the daily routine ends and the song slows down as one gets to bed, sleeps, and wakes up to find his routine starting all over again."
- going 'round in broken circles..."

:D

"Anyways, great track. Let me know if you ever update it.
5/5"

Sure thing. Thanks a lot for the long review!

[Fair Row]

Fair Row

Kor-Rune, your work is so expressive and always put's me in a good mood, esp. this great track. Would have liked a little bass solo or something after 03:00,
good work / original track.
5/5

Kor-Rune responds:

Thanks a bunch! I'm glad you like it!

There's a bass diddly in the outro, but I agree. This song needs a cooler bassline and a solo or something.

Thanks for reviewing!

[Firecracker Brawl]

Firecracker Brawl

/ cool, quite busy. I don't really mind the plucking stuff, but I loathe fl slayer/
(just my personal pet hate) but you used it pretty well I must say, esp towards the end.
I think if you let all the instruments come in more gradually, you could have a great loop here. That way it can even be a bit longer.
I like the drums, and the background distorted/reverby leads are great.

All in all , a good loop.
5/5
8/10

Hikigane responds:

Thanks! I agree it's a tad busy. I feel like at around 0:38, when the pluck and the slayer are playing together, I could have separated those parts so that the song could have a bit more closure and feel for the slayer solo, then the pluck solo, then have them playing at the end together. Drums are probably my favorite part, I'm glad you like them too :D

[Orchestral Theme 3]

Theme 3

Yeah, this is great. So far, I think this the best of the orchestral themes, dark and brooding. It works exactly as you described. I was hoping you would go a little bit darker, and you didnt dissapoint. This has elements from the other themes but for me, this piece is more focussed in it's intent / the "dante's inferno" influence is there, but it holds it own.
A most deserved 10
5/5

Gravey responds:

I completely agree. It's darker, more brooding, and just has a totally different tone. If you have not heard any of the soundtrack to Dante's Inferno I definitely recommend you checking it out somewhere online. It's phenomenal, and even my piece here pales in comparison.

That being said, I do really like this piece a lot. Probably my best written to date. Nice to see so many people are enjoying it. :-)

Thanks for the review.

-Gravey-

[Restless Flow]

Restless Flow

Wonderfull song, like ripples in time. Or rather, a sense of timelessness.
the 5/4 time sig is just great.
Like one previous reviewer mentioned, this slots perfectly into the genre of "ambient", so in that sense, it's tailor made.

Good Work Mr.Slider
5/5

KKSlider60 responds:

Thanks Tokolos, I'm really glad you liked it ^^
We ambient artists are a few but good, I guess XD
Have a special, nice day,
KKS

[EV -Strength]

Strength

Really enjoyed this, esp the ending/ would be a great track to start an ep with.
5/5

EmpyrealVis responds:

Thankyou for the review ^^ . I love this one aswell .
- EV

[The World On My Shoulders]

The World On My Shoulders

calm / soothing, always going forward ... a perfect circle - ad infintum
great ambient loop.
5/5

EmpyrealVis responds:

Thankyou ^^ . Surely I will present further compositions through time . Thankyou for the review .
- Empyreal Vis -

[fly of spain]

...Fly of Spain...

Absolutely stunning track. What I like the most is the phrasing( drums ). Never a dull moment...
Love everything about it - it's inspiring,/
On the downside, it's way too short, stops just as it's getting started really.
/ the classical guitaring is near perfect for the song. If you expand this, adding some more electric guitar would be awesome. It would be so much fun to play this live!

5/5 10/10

acmeDyne responds:

Now that I have Cubase, I might try a new, longer version. Thanks for the great review Tokolos!

[No Name Music...]

as yet untitled...

Nice track.. just add vocals and you could really have something.
When you add some polish and more filler it should be ready to go.
bassline: very tight and comes out the best of all the instruments (so far.)
guitars: some more layers and it's sorted.
Drums: watch that cymbal and the tom fills, they become a little predictable after a while, but the drums are tight.
Piano: very cool, underlying theme giving it that special sound/feeling.
All in all a good solid track, even though it's not really my type of thing, I'm pretty sure this could be a commercial success. The only real criticism I would give is that it's a little generic. I would like to hear more "pixies" less "kings of leon" if that makes sense. But that is just personal taste.
so objectivly I'd have to say: great work zac
5/5

zac11114 responds:

hey thanks alot man, well as for the vocals i plan on writing my own lyrics, and preforming them as i'm a pretty decent singer now that my throats been fixed up. but the final cut (if there is one outside of my side project) will be preformed and down to the singer of the band i just got into. he has a truley amazing voice, so i hope you check it when that happens, thanks alot for this reveiw, as for the guitars, yeah, i noticed they were a little sloppier than everything else, paticularily the rythmn guitar. and the drums i know what you mean, if i can get my friend to re-do them with a few more different fills ect i will, but if not it'll probably be the same drum track in the final version as i am a crappy drummer haha. But yeah i know what you mean by commercial success... it does have a little more of a corperate song that i would have liked but i guess it just turned out that way... by it makes sense to me, and i've gotta say i agree with you. it's not often i write music this way. but it's nice to see that i can do mainstream music just as well as i can do other things

[Walking Through the Ocean]

Walking Through the Ocean

Really like the music. The only thing that bothers me is the drumkit/samples, esp the hat on the 2 and 4, which is a driving the song forward. Some variation there would be nice. Maybe using some rimshot instead of claps at the start / would be nice / beat at 01:32 is great, very 80's sounding vibe there.
All in all good effort, just the drums section needs something imo.

FenixB-dogg responds:

couldn't agree with you more, I will always be the first to admit that I SUCK at making a drum beat, but I tried the best I could, I'll try use the advice you gave me and we'll see where the song goes from there