Arelem - "Apathetic"
Instant Moby vibes! I bet the author has been at least partly inspired by Moby here
The track does leave me wanting for more interest, variety and adventure in terms of musical form and chord progressions though. Mix engineering is good on this.
canese - "Untitled"
Makes me feel light as a feather. Like sipping margaritas on some tropical island paradise! I would have included this track as part of my 5 votes, however, as the staff had raised the question of “how much of this was done by LARS software and how much by the author”, and this question was never addressed by the participant, I’m reserving this vote for other tracks.
madmax - "Quadrophenias Dreams"
Occasionally I get some 60’s and 70’s experimental fusion vibe from this, yet at other times I’m not sure what I’m getting. Difficult to find words to describe the track further. Perhaps that was the intent of the author
Mellow Browne - "DeLorean"
Definite Depeche Mode feel, especially once the chords start progressing more adventurously. Makes me really wish for a lead vocal part to be added! The mix engineering job is excellent.
OrpheusXL - "The Day When My Heart Broke"
Reminds me of the Monkey Island theme song (a PC adventure game from the 90’s). The note velocities seem to be all the same, which gives the track a robotic feel. Unless this was intentional, it might benefit from velocity variations. Also, at times the arrangement gets way too busy, just too much going on all at once, everything at equal level and equal note velocities, so much so that there’s nothing for my attention to lock on to. From the perspective of counterpoint, there is again too much similarity between different parts, e.g., multiple parts walking around at exactly the same pace at the same time. In other words - the track needs more contrast between parts! There are many ways to create contrast: if one part moves mostly upwards, make another part move mostly downwards at the same time; if one part moves fast, make another part move slower at the same time; make only one part at a time come across as the main solo instrument and put other parts into a supportive role at that time.
JeroenZuiderwijk - "RockChord"
The Rock feel is absolutely there and it’s super catchy! When the FM Synth chords kicked in I was instantly teleported back to my childhood, playing original Doom for DOS on a 90’s PC! I have only one complaint: the boomy ringing of the Kick drum. Other than that, an excellent track!
KukoBass - "Wonders"
The composition immediately catches attention in a good way. Stylistically speaking, it’s not far off from being easily transformable into a Progressive Rock version, should the author want to go there. There are a few issues with the performance aspect as well as the mixing aspect though. Timing and velocities of the drum hits are just a tiny bit inconsistent enough to distract the listener occasionally. The high-pitched bells / chimes have super-sharp transients poking through the mix. The lead vocals have build-up in lower-mids and bass frequencies, also the lead vocal level jumps up at one point in the song and stays up there till the end of the track in a slightly distracting way. Finally, the song ends a bit short and abruptly, which comes across as if the author ran out of time to finish the entire musical form. Those issues with performance and mixing aside, the composition is interesting and compelling and I would very much love to listen to a finished and polished version of this song some day!
EsteveCorbera - "AI - Clickedu"
First thing I noticed was lack of variation in note velocities on the acoustic piano patch. I think adding velocity variations to the piano would already go a long way for this track! Next thing I noticed was that everything was swimming in a cathedral filled with reverb. Heavy and long reverb can be a viable artistic choice of course, but in this instance it started clouding the actual instruments, so perhaps try EQ-ing the FX return bus and also experiment with different pre-delay times on the reverb tail in order to make it sit behind the mix in a supportive role so it doesn’t overpower the actual music. Might also want to reduce reverb tail length, or try different reverbs altogether. I trust you were using reverb(s) as Aux Send FX, not on each individual track as inserts? Because if you did use reverbs as inserts, this might have been a contributing factor to the issue. As for the drums, I would actually reduce velocity variations on the Kick and Snare a bit in order to make the beat more consistent. I think all those changes together would improve the overall impression at least 10X, as there is a good track hiding behind those few issues.
Jorgeelalto - "NotQuite"
This track comes across as an absolutely complete and finished product composition-wise. Also, it is almost complete and finished mixing-wise, I could identify only 2 things for improvement: 1) perhaps the acoustic piano chords need some EQ to reduce build-up in lower-mids, and 2) the bass wobble contains excessive stereo information in bass frequencies that becomes distractive when listening on headphones, so perhaps mono-ing the bass frequencies might help (this is not a problem when listening on speakers though). Overall, excellent production!
becsei_gyorgy - "Something To Happen"
No idea why the author describes it as “a very unmixed, unbalanced song (song skeleton)” because it sounds pretty good and almost “there” to me, only a few places where I can actually notice that a couple of EQ / dynamics / balance adjustments would be beneficial. I would describe the mix as “almost complete”. The song behind the mix comes across clearly.
A Future in Noise - "TaDigSamman-1"
The intro section immediately transported me into the Star Trek universe, as it came across as nothing less than Klingon opera! Next, the illusion dissipated as soon as the drums started playing in the following section, because the stylistic change was too abrupt and from a different, more Earthly / common / familiar universe. Now, had that main section been done in some style of Melodic Metal, I bet the illusion would have been reinforced even further! As the intro material repeated, the Klingon illusion returned. The electric guitar added during that repeat sounded out-of-tune a bit though. I would really like to hear a finished version of this song some day with improvements applied!
How do we go from there?
additionally, try positioning each fretting finger as close to the fret as possible, just ever so slightly behind the fret, that'll help tremendously!