Trying to Read in Between the Feedback Lines

[ReganO]

Hi All,

I've received the following feedback from A&R and am wondering what your thoughts are on the comment, "Production and development needs a lot more work." Going forward I don't want to keep making the same mistakes. Do I just need to correct the compression or is there more to it than that?

Thank you so much for any expertise you're willing to share. The first link is to the feedback. The second to the piece.

https://www.taxi.com/members/G8_ogbwtRu ... R1i1f6lwuQ

https://www.taxi.com/members/G8_ogbwtRu ... -big-tools

ReganO

[cosmicdolphin]

Do I just need to correct the compression or is there more to it than that?

Difficult to give a proper answer without the context of the Listing - I was able to find it in the Forwards Blog, although they don't post the reference there:

It said :

"MODERN, DYNAMIC, PERCUSSIVE INSTRUMENTALS are needed for TV Commercials by a top-notch Production Music Library that’s landed tons of placements in TV Shows, Films, and Commercials."

So if we break that down :

"MODERN" - To my ears your track sounds quite dated, so this is to do with the sounds, performance and production

" DYNAMIC"- As mentioned in the feedback there is a lack of dynamics , no light & shade, just a big slab/wall of sound

"PERCUSSIVE" From listening to it I wouldn't have guessed it was a Percussive brief, the main thing that comes across is synths

" needed for TV Commercials " Ask yourself if you have heard anything like this on an Ad ? Aside form the refreences you can go online and see/hear Ads

" top-notch Production Music Library " This means the bar is high so it may be harder than than a regular listing to get a forward

Now have a listen to what got forwarded over at the Forwards Blog : http://ht.ly/YgYI30073xb

So yes, I feel there is a lot more to it than compression. To me your track sounds like a bunch of loops with a naive synth part played on top - there's very little craft or expertise on display, it just comes across like a beginner playing with a DAW for the first time so we are very far from top notch library terriotory.

There's a lot to unpack here from playing skills & musical taste to brief interpretation, to critical listening skills and production chops. All of these things need to be improved to the point of making licensable music.

It takes time and you can only do it by learning and practicing the requesite skills. Taxi will tell you if you measure up or not but they won't train you so you need to undertake that task yourself in whichever manner best suits your learning style.

Mark

[ReganO]

Graham,

Thank you for your pointers on analysis! I'm very accepting of the feedback on the overall volume and the lack of quiet and/or silent moments and that's easy enough to correct.

I'll have to find out more about buttoned endings as my understanding was it simply meant to have the ending come to a shortened stop. But as I listen to other pieces, I notice an effect that seems to be popular when ending a musical phrase (such as it is) and maybe that's what is really meant by a buttoned ending. I'll read through your replay again AND check the pieces that were forwarded before submitting my next piece.

Onward and Thanks Again!