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T4COBELL's Music

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Hey, thanks for peeking in here. I've just starting making pieces that don't suck. I'm using virtual instruments until I get decent recording equipment. I'll post what I've made here for your enjoyment, so if you don't mind, listen, enjoy, and soak up the vibes of me. Feel free to critique and point out areas to improve, in fact I highly encourage it.
 

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  • The Bells In My Mind.mp3
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  • Secret of Solemn Cave.mp3
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  • Project Polaris.mp3
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  • Electro.mp3
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  • To Walk Without Legs.mp3
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Hmm I don't really know what to say, the piece ranges from really good in some areas to kinda meh in other areas - the dissonant chord around 26 seconds could be changed to something more musical, it is possible to get a really harsh sounding dissonant sound in a chord that makes more sense.

I kinda like the vibe you have here, reminds me of the Ice Mansion music from TLoZ: Twilight Princess.

I would like to see some percussion in it though, there's some areas where some Timpani could improve the piece - maybe some Xylophones in a few areas to get that awkward sound feeling that you have here.
 
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First, of course, thanks for responding so quickly. I love quick responses. :)
I spent about 3 hours, so I didn't have time to play with percussion too much. I wanted that note, to be a G diminished chord, but i couldn't remember how they're constructed. Is it 1st, 3rd-half, 5th-half?
 
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I've made the chord at 25' much more subtle and I feel it fits better. I also added timpani to certain sections. Hope you like. :)

3/08/10 - I now have a second piece i'm working on (WIP5). I wanted a bass-driven, faster piece. This would be the result. Its not great yet, or even finished, but I have the basic rhythm and all I'm really brainstorming ATM is a nice distortion lead to close it up. Not a ton of secondary parts either. Really need suggestions. :)

Also 3/08/10 - I've written "The Bells In My Mind" which was named because I got the idea to make a piece with bells. 35 seconds, very simple, yet enlightening.
 
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Some comments from me...
- The Secret of Solemn Cave
Interesting piece of music, not the standard melody with accompaniment or just piano improvisation. I like it. :thumbs_up:
Anyways, if you still want to work on it, I'd take a look on the dissonant chords through the whole piece. For me, they often sound a little weird, just not completely right; I hope you understand what I mean. Maybe you are able to take a look at each single one of them and just ask yourself what kind of chord this should be and which job each note has. If you can't find an answer to these questions, it might be better to change some of them or even drop them out completely.
Oh and what should the sound at the complete end (1:53) be? I can't understand it, don't see any connection to the piece before.

- WIP5
Again sounds some kind of bitonal. Is this intended? Well, of course this is interesting in it's own character, but it always takes some of the "headbanging-potential" of the bass line if it never gets anything which sounds like a fundamental tone in connection with the guitar part. On the other hand it's interesting, because both parts (bass and guitar) are always struggling to find out which one's the most important. Maybe you can point out this struggle between the two a bit more.
I'm looking forward to what this is developing to. :wink:

- The Bells in My Mind
Sounds very fitting to it's title, again nothing very tonal, this seems to be your style. :grin:
Short but interesting especially because of the strange sounds. The Glockenspiel in the beginning fits nicely, but there is one thing in it... is it vibraphone or Marimbaphone or something like that (at about 0:25 it plays some notes)? It sounds much softer. This does not mean it's bad at all, but here again you have a counterpart to your quite hard bell sound and therefore a combination which you could develop a longer piece from.
Do you want to make more out of this?
 
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Some comments from me...
- The Secret of Solemn Cave
Interesting piece of music, not the standard melody with accompaniment or just piano improvisation. I like it. :thumbs_up:
Anyways, if you still want to work on it, I'd take a look on the dissonant chords through the whole piece. For me, they often sound a little weird, just not completely right; I hope you understand what I mean. Maybe you are able to take a look at each single one of them and just ask yourself what kind of chord this should be and which job each note has. If you can't find an answer to these questions, it might be better to change some of them or even drop them out completely.
Oh and what should the sound at the complete end (1:53) be? I can't understand it, don't see any connection to the piece before.
The goal was to keep it mysterious and veiled throughout. The trumpet at the end is to wrap up the piece and realease the tension.

- WIP5
Again sounds some kind of bitonal. Is this intended? Well, of course this is interesting in it's own character, but it always takes some of the "headbanging-potential" of the bass line if it never gets anything which sounds like a fundamental tone in connection with the guitar part. On the other hand it's interesting, because both parts (bass and guitar) are always struggling to find out which one's the most important. Maybe you can point out this struggle between the two a bit more.
I'm looking forward to what this is developing to. :wink:
What exactly do you mean 'bitonal'? I didn't really want a headbangable bass line, more of a bass groove to enjoy. What would you suggest I change to struggle more or allow the bass line to blow your mind?

- The Bells in My Mind
Sounds very fitting to it's title, again nothing very tonal, this seems to be your style. :grin:
Short but interesting especially because of the strange sounds. The Glockenspiel in the beginning fits nicely, but there is one thing in it... is it vibraphone or Marimbaphone or something like that (at about 0:25 it plays some notes)? It sounds much softer. This does not mean it's bad at all, but here again you have a counterpart to your quite hard bell sound and therefore a combination which you could develop a longer piece from.
Do you want to make more out of this?
There is a grand marimba and a vibraphone. i wasn't planning on making this longer, but I'd probly need to change it a lot. It would be repetetive otherwise. I made it in 10 minutes.


Thanks for giving me such solid, specific feedback. Much obliged. :)
 
The only real complaint I can come up with for WIP 5 is that the Guitar distortion gets a bit more distorted then it should be, it starts coming out less then clear (could be from mixing, though I would think the Bass would create more of a problem with this, which yours doesn't seem to have).

I like the bells piece, it reminds me of a Clock - sounds like this could make a good introduction to either more of that unique sound or an Alt Metal song
 
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The goal was to keep it mysterious and veiled throughout. The trumpet at the end is to wrap up the piece and realease the tension.
The trumpet part is very nice, no, I was talking about the last sudden entrance of drums and harp (I think?) on the last two seconds, even after trumpet and piano have already finished the piece.


What exactly do you mean 'bitonal'? I didn't really want a headbangable bass line, more of a bass groove to enjoy. What would you suggest I change to struggle more or allow the bass line to blow your mind?
OK, if I understand you correctly, you want the bass line to come out more. Well there is a simple music theoretical thing with your guitar part until about 0:30: You play in sixths above the bass line. This ruins the bass-feeling in some kind, because we are used to hear everything as a couple of thirds and base the complete chord sound on the tone which is the lowest, if we ignore the real height completely and just use the tonal height (e.g. D and B for you); so in your example we have a D and a B and the D is a third above the B so we consider the B to be the fundamental tone of the chord. Now you play against this listener-instinct because you put the D below the B and our ear is a little confused. Since we heard the D as fundamental tone before, when it played alone, we have no idea where to put the B and that's why I hear the two lines with to different tonal centers, the D and the B, more or less independent from each other. This is what is called bitonality: Two different tonal keys at the same time.
If you want to be your bass line more obvious, you should begin with the guitar part in a third, fifth or octave above it, because this won't shutter the impression that the bass is the boss. For this type of music, probably the fifth might be the best because it sounds like power chords (which are in fact the same: just fifths). From 0:30 on, it sounds right already, because it's just that: you reach an A, which is a (tonal) fifth above D. I'd start with a fifth, too. Maybe you may later change to a sixth, but it should be an increase of suspense, not the beginning.
I just notice the guitar part also ends with H and D with the bass playing the D, the same problem here. 6th intervals are very interesting for middle parts since they often sound more dissonant than they are (because of the phenomenon I tried to describe above), but you should not start and finish with them if you want to have a sure feeling of tonality (a grooving bass line needs that, the listener just needs this feeling that he knows where is).
The overall ending on F is surprising, too; did you already try to simply change the last two note heights, so play a longer F and end on G?
I hope I flatten your music not too much for your feeling. :wink:


There is a grand marimba and a vibraphone. i wasn't planning on making this longer, but I'd probly need to change it a lot. It would be repetetive otherwise. I made it in 10 minutes.
OK, so I won't complain about more here. :grin:
 
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Wow. Thanks for listening multiple times. :)
I had already sliced up the song and I just now read your post, so I'll have to look at that tomorrow. I've changed instruments on Solemn Cave and added a chilled-out middle section to WIP5. Not sure if the bells work. I think its borderline in some parts.

At the end of Solemn Cave i dunno. Just thought it be a cool fade out effect. :/

ends with H and D
That was funny when I first read it.

3/10/10 - I've added a lot to the middle of WIP5 (Polaris Panel) and decided on a name. It feels much more intense now (Personally). I redid some of the bells on Solemn Cave and remove the sounds at the end.
 
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Damn it, Server had again a break of some minutes and my browser killed my text. :thumbs_down:
So, I'll try to rewrite my post:


Hey, the groove really works much better now. Some spontanous suggestions:
0:39 You are repeating the same figure here 3 times; that's not bad at all, because it's an interesting figure, but nevertheless I think it's a little too nice, too much G-major in the guitar part. Maybe you want to begin in G-major and change some single notes to minor mode when repeating to make it a little more rough there.
Ending, 2:08 - Maybe you could add the guitar again (just doubling the bass in fifth or octave) for this last time the pattern is played, to make the ending a bit more powerful. I also suggest playing the last two notes especially with the bass (and guitar, if you want to add it) shorter and clearly separated (muted just in time). This could give the ending a more "you have nothing to complain about"-character.

In the end I want to stress that your development in the piece is now much better with the hard, but easy-to-listen-to beginning and the more weird (but nevertheless good!) middle part. Nice work! :thumbs_up:
 
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I have an idea for the ending. Nothing about the jazz guitar section? At 39" you've mentioned me repeating where it goes "Dun Dun Dun Dun URRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!" Would you prefer it not?
As I wrote, the figure as a whole is definitive worth repeating for me, I'd only vary it in the repititions.
I like the jazz guitar part in the middle, it gives a whole new dimension to the piece with the new sound. And if you want to extend the piece further, you should extend it there I think because the jazz guitar part is only a very short one compared to the length of the complete piece; just a question of proportions.

And Wherewolf is right, I should not become too detailed. It's your piece and it should remain your piece. :thumbs_up:
 
Interesting, though your newest song almost seems like its unfinished, more or less just an idea you wanted to get down but not spend too much time on it.

Well I wouldn't call it Drum and Bass, as there's no Bass - its more so Drum and Melody. Nothing wrong with that, though a bass line may help it.

Really my biggest complaint is that it seems like you never finished it, it seems like you kinda slapped it together to get the idea down. Sounds good nevertheless
 
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