50Steaks's audio Reviews on Newgrounds

[Variations on a Theme by 50Steaks]

That transition at 1:29 was pure musical genius. And of course the faint but present chime right after is truly glorious as well. The way the percussion fades in is awesome. Your experience in electronic music seems to have influenced 4:25 quite a bit, creating a form of the delay effect manually using an echoing technique. Makes for quite a unique sound on a familiar theme at this point. Was that a rush e reference at 6:30? Quite spicy chords at 9:13, though I get the impression that the dynamics differences were there only to jumpscare you with the percussion and brass at times. The textures at 11:40 are certainly quite interesting and feel very fleshed out. That chord change at 14:13 is very satisfying to the ears indeed. And then we get the big bad 17:04, the craziest section of the piece so far. I do notice a distinct lack of kick drum which is interesting, given that it was a core part of the percussion in the original. But you made it work by replacing the kick with bass drum and covering the hole left behind with enough wind runs to knock out a flock of birds. The section that follows reminds me deeply of Kevin Macleod followed by Matty Gunby for some reason, probably because that’s exactly what you were referencing. But it’s Matty Gunby if he took his ideas to the places he should’ve. A glorious return to the intro motif brings us back to a Mozart-esque variation at 20:08 with a contemporary twist. Due to being on a trip as I write this, I’m unable to listen and follow along with the score, so I’m not exactly sure where the variations are. The following few minutes up to 27:30 have to be my favorite so far. The grooviness of the piano meshes very well with the many alto saxophones you enlisted. The waltz afterwards is also cool, though not quite as energetic or interesting as the previous part. And then we enter the final fugue with an entirely misplaced vibraslap which is truly glorious. I was about to complain how it was missing from this piece because of the waveform not showing it at the end, but it’s actually just before the final variation. You mentioned how the finale had two pieces I would be familiar with. After listening, I could of course identify the incredibly well placed happy birthday theme and the despicable me 4 theme as well, probably alluding to our watching of the original minions movie last year. And that is how you chose to end off arguably your magnum opus. No other piece of yours even revels in the grandeur of this gargantuan composition.

[Midnight RAVEn]

This is honestly pretty good especially for your age. When I was 13 I was making stuff like this awful garbage.
https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/835122
The main thing I’d do is just take that whole lead synth and drop it an octave at 1:25. That’s kind of it.

Damn 3:23 is super dramatic and cool sounding. You’re honestly so underrated the audio portal is a different beast this year lmao. You have a lot of potential so keep it up!

RottingTob responds:

damn this was made in only like 2 days and is one of my lazier beats outside of the drumming. thanks though.

[TOO SEE SUNRISE]

Sounds very mashuppable on tiktok. You’ve earned a follow.

[Cute Waltz]

Last I checked, Halloween wasn’t in mid July. Definitely needs some attention as I have zero complaints. I’m a sucker for scary violin pizzicato and music box. Everything here is pretty tropey tbh but it still sounds great so I guess that’s all that matters.

[choose]

Super cool, spacey soundtrack. Definitely leaning toward short and sweet, although I do wish there was a little more going on as the track continues.

[Ice Shards]

Holy crap you’re so underrated! This is freaking amazing and you only have 30 fans?! BRB gonna go do smth real quick with this one.

[Joystick Jam]

Damnnnn 1:30 is so catchy! Wish you kept that theme a little longer and built off of it more at 3:16 while combining it with the bass more somehow. But yeah this is very solid all around.

[Return]

This sounds super cool at parts! Especially when there’s a new section. But it feels very drawn out and it feels like this could’ve been 3 minutes with a very similar effect by cutting down on the repeated measures. You start to do this around 3:19 but by then a lot of listeners probably already got bored :(. And then the rest of the song doesn’t really change or add anything from what we’ve already heard too much. I too had a bad habit of making super long intros which bored listeners before they even got into my song. The way to mitigate that is to add enough to keep them interested while calling back to the new elements you introduced in the previously empty sounding intro later in the song. Or at least that’s how I did it. Regardless, this is a very solid start.

DaveJMusic responds:

Alright, thanks for your advice!

[Final Farewell]

You gave me a heart attack with that title lmao. And yes, I am feeling deja vu (albeit for entirely separate reasons than what you implied. A final farewell? Also known as… a last goodbye?

Congrats on what I believe is over your ninth frontpage in a row (11th if you don’t count the brawhalla theme remix). Keep this up and you’ll finally beat trevor in ruling the audio portal. #roadtobeattrevor (and he has a 13 year advantage on you!)

Ok enough of that, the song. Your grandpa would be proud of you for making not one, but two popular songs in honor of him. And this is a huge improvement over the last version of course. Gotta love the intro here, which in a lot of your more recent works often tends to be my favorite part. You have a thing with intros and I don’t know what it is. It’s often the part I struggle with most lol.

The string swells at 0:22 into the chord progression is gorgeous, not much else to say. Then we finally get the familiar farewell melody which is now one of my favorite of yours, just because of this piece.

1:31 THAT SOFT CHORUS Jesus Christ. It hits so hard emotionally at that part. Even though the melody is constantly changing it still flows so well which is something I tried to do but it didn’t work as well as it does here. 3:52 quite the change of pace here. Honestly it’s very reminiscent of the big cinematic choir sound I’ve heard you use in a lot of your songs. Reminds me of brawhalla, a game I only associate with your music lol. As for the ending, I like it, but I feel like it wasn’t really that necessary? Like it could’ve just ended at 4:38, and if you wanted an abrupt ending it could’ve just been left unresolved there? I mean that’s basically exactly how I ended warbird I’m realizing, so I guess it wouldn’t have fit so well here. That soft piano from the beginning could’ve come back for a bit longer though instead of just more strings at the end. Idk there are so many ways to end this and it’s all just personal preference.

But yeah no this is excellent. Honestly I think I might prefer this over sandstorm since the intro to sandstorm is so much more memorable than the rest, but this feels like a complete package. Not sure if this can stack up to adventures of a lost clown though. In fact I’d say it doesn’t even hold a candle.

Tangerine responds:

It's payback for when you did it to me! I'm still super salty that a last goodbye wasn't frontpaged. Gonna send Tom a strongly worded letter over that.

I'm coming for ur ass @trevor8! nah jk, I don't have half the efficiency he has. I'm going to have to put in heaps more work if I ever want to rival him. The way he can create such good songs so quickly, man I'm gonna need 13 years to get there xd

Also side note: I love how the brawlhalla theme, to this day, is still the song that took me the most effort. Even this song took less effort than that one! Of course it's just my luck that the one that took the most hair off my head was the one that wasn't frontpaged xD. But I think it's maybe because I didn't change enough from the original, or because it wasn't my own original work. That may just be a cope tho

After I released the Punkin King song, I was expecting people to comment on the awesome ending that song had. To my surprise, nobody even said a word about it. So I assumed people weren't listening through the whole thing and probably got disinterested somewhere in the beginning.

So I make extra sure to have the intros to my songs be interesting, to hook people in to listen to the rest of it. It's usually a shame because the second half of my songs are often the better parts as I actively improve throughout making the song. So if they've already listened to the first half, they're more likely to listen to the rest as well, sunk cost. Thats why I focus a lot more on the beginnings ;0

I love this melody as well. It's also one of my favourites out of mine. For some reason, the tinkerer's workshop is my favourite one. I have no idea why, it's just always stuck with me. Tinkerer's Workshop 3 coming soon in a theatre near you xD

At 1:31 I realized I actually remade a part of an old jazz song I'd been sitting on for 2 years. I'll actually show you my draft! I don't think I'm going to release it any time soon, maybe you could use it for one of your songs ;). I'm sorta just waiting until I can get a vocalist to sing for it. The thing is, I've never worked with vocals before and I'm far too scared to ask someone on here to do it because I'm fairly certain the end result isn't going to be good xd.

I absolutely get what you mean with the ending. I was always planning to leave it unfinished... just not there xD. The real reason (our little secret) is because my dumbass corrupted and lost the version with that ending part, and working with those specific strings sucks so much, so I just decided to leave it there. I had gotten a recording with it, and didn't feel like recreating it xd.

Thank you! I think this is officially one of the longest songs I've ever made, with the most sections in it.

Oh god don't remind me of that song xD. fucking adventures of a lost clown LMAOO. My magnum opus, nothing has ever come close to rivalling that masterpiece.

[Happy Days!]

This is so cheery despite the minor key at times! It’s rare I get this emanating feeling of pure joy from a piece of music, especially on Newgrounds. There’s no tinge of sadness or reminiscence to be found, just pure unbridled joy. Definitely deserved the FP, this is catchy af. Chromaticisms at times help keep this from being repetitive. Can I just say this is probably the best ending to a song you’ve made yet?! How fitting lol. Triumphant yet still asking a question, looking to the future like no other. Zero complaints here this is awesome.

Edit: oh yeah I knew I recognized this from somewhere!

Tangerine responds:

Thank you SteaksMakesMusic123, I wanted to truly represent the sheer joy and ecstasy I felt reaching the milestone. Not gonna lie, I haven't made something in a true major key in so long. Whenever I do, I usually go to G major and use a borrowed chord at the end to give the feeling of nostalgia/longing. So it's not even true major xD.

But you might actually remember this song. I uploaded it a little while back as a sorta edm type thing but removed it and told you on Discord "I'm probably gonna use it for something else later" (or some quote like that). and uh, here it is!