Help me like my music again.

Well, it's pretty awesome, but it seems like it doesn't really change up all that much till after the 2min mark. The noi channel generally lacks expressiveness, but that could partially be a mix thing. Maybe just a different snare/hit thing going on would do the trick. (I'm trying to step up my noi game right now too.) It's not exactly repetitive, but the passages lack definition from one another. A solid "B melody" or bridge passage would be very welcome. Your sound design is solid and the song feels whole, but maybe more instruments with more diverse table usage would bring out parts you want to highlight. For a long time in LSDJ I struggled with dynamics, and I don't have total fluency with them yet by any stretch of the imagination, but selective use of volume changes can really make a chain come alive. Play around with some odd envelopes and see what happens. (Roboctopus is the daddy of this trick imho, Jelly is available around in .sav format, check it out if you haven't yet.)

I really like your high energy/dancy style. Every time I hear it, it reminds me of the early Unicorn Kid jams. (I love that shit.) It's easy to get too critical of your own stuff and get super burnt out on music in general, so taking some time off can be the best thing sometimes. I'm totally in a rut right now as far as songwriting goes, and I really want to branch out, because I'm on a roll with tracking itself, but I just can't write a melody or catchy bass pattern to save my life. I think a lot of it is looking at previous material and seeing what you've already done, and trying not to get stuck in a rut, but not having the writing ability to express what you're looking to get across. It's a double edged sword sometimes. A fun idea would maybe be to cover a song. That's what I've been doing lately, and it's not super satisfying for scratching the "artistic need" itch, but it'll keep you busy and advancing your skills for when that genius song idea does finally hit.

Anyway, it's obvious that you've put in the time so far and you don't actually hate your music, you're just feeling unsure and anxious about where you're at. Don't be. Just keep working. You're getting there.

Last edited by Imaginary (Aug 5, 2015 3:33 am)

Imaginary hit all the points of what I would've said.

Your music is fucking awesome, don't give up, and keep rocking at it!

I actually really needed this too

I've had to deal with anxiety and depression for the past year now and it really sucks, and having hardware and software failures has really added to that. But stepping back, trying something new, or going onto something else for a while has really helped.

I find that it's easy to get stuck trying to polish and rework tracks and that can get really unmotivating after a while. It can also be easy to get stuck in a rut trying to make songs that mesh with other songs I've already written. It's important to me that I start new things without the strong expectation that they'll turn out a certain way. Often new stuff turns out better than I expect it to, and it's a lot more fun than circling around the same old ideas. It may help you just to put on some finishing touches, release what you have, and make a clean start. YMMV of course.

Your track seems well-done, but I don't really like dance music generally so I'm not qualified to give you much input. I hope things get better for you!

This is a really great track.  I wish I was as musically talented as you.  Honestly, I loved everything about the track except the percussion.  If I were you, I'd redo the entire percussion and go for a less-is-more approach.  I thought the hi-hat was overdone and I also didn't like the timbre of the kick drum at all.  I didn't like the snare either; maybe it was the envelopes used which didn't have a sharp enough attack.  I really like to hear that harsh chiptune sound of a noise-based snare.  I think that harsh noise-based snare sound requires a very short attack.  Thanks for sharing and keep up the good work!

Over all a pretty solid tune. It IS repetitive, but that's not always a bad thing. Most people actually like music that a bit more repetitive. And it's more appropriate for a dance track like this. But I think your song has a definite intense quality that could be improved with better timbre with the snare drums as others have already stated.

I would say to acheive this, just lower the pitch a little bit to get more of a lower "pop" sound, and split your envelope decay to get a fake echo-reverb effect for it. There's a sweet spot, so just play around with it a little.

ALSO...

Lower the volume a few points for everything except for the noise channel. Then your snares and hi hats will stand out more, and you can have some parts of the melody be notably louder than other parts. Adds a more human touch to everything.

I'm assuming this is done in LSDJ, or some Gameboy tracker, right? Yeah, sounds like it. You know, with the noise sweep effects, you could transition from a higher pitch to a lower pitch gradually and vice versa on different areas. I think that would increase the thickness and intensity of those sections.

But yeah, just having the same pitch for noise is a little dull. Mix is up with some of that 96 bit shortwave noise as well.

Other than that, I don't have anything else I can think of.

Firstly, thank you for all the responses everyone. I really appreciate it

As for the noise channel being weak as some of you pointed out, in earlier versions of this song the noise channel was stronger. Somewhere along the way I changed this for whatever reason and I see I made a huge mistake. I will fix this before it appears on any sort of album and speaking of which I have decided to (as Brother Android said) throw on some finishing touches on the old tunes and work on new stuff without trying to think of it from the perspective of making an album. Right now I'm just writing remixes and working on soundtrack stuff though.

Also the comparison to Fighter X is very welcome as he is the artist that got me into chiptune so thanks Feryl.

Not all my tunes are 4/4 dance tracks like this and I'm beginning to move further away from it this track just happened to be that way, but I may change up the mid section to break this trend.

Again, thanks everyone for helping me out, I'm open to collabs if anyone wants to.