... And They're All On These Boards!! (Half a Million Nerds)

[Lunkhead]

OK, did someone submit some cover art?

[Spud]

ASCII art, anyone? Otherwise, it should be done in the GIMP.

[Spud]

Ah, I see Rabid is in already. Good enough.

[Chadderandom]

Strike what I said about unnecessarily loud things because sometimes they can be awesome I absolutely love the Manatee Matinee song and it really doesn't need to be that loud. Of course, its not done yet, so I could change my mind.... nope, finished and I love it.

Also: I wanted to listen to Teplins song first, just to see what his kazoo song sounded like but it must be under an entirely different name because I don't see it, so I guess I'll be surprised by it when I finally find it.

[Teplin]

Arrr, yeah, it's more "rock" and didn't seem to fit under any of my other project names so it's under a new one, Trick Soup. I'm kinda particular about that sort of thing, and I can never just settle on one project name that I can put everything under.

[jast]

Some of the reviews are shorter than I would have liked but I don't have much time in the next couple of days and I really need to sleep now. Give me a shout if you require more details.

Abominominous -- Mmm, that's some nice trashiness there. The part at ~1:00 is pretty cool. This is one fast movement song. Several likeable things here.

Andrew Reist -- The lo-fi bell synth is almost a bit painful in headphones. Generally there seem to be unusually many mid-highs to highs here. Slight clipping? Or maybe an offset problem in some sample loop. This one has a nice feel to it but I'm not so excited about it as a song. It drags on and on, too. Perhaps I feel that way because I find it hard to appreciate spoken music.

Berkeley Social Scene -- Cool drums sound. Lead vox is somewhat hidden behind guitars. I like the chord progressions. The solo is pretty awesome (yay, triplet cascades). I can't decide if I find the arpeggio'd guitar great or slightly annoying. Nice build. Not the sort of song I love but the sort of song I occasionally like.

cattle bat -- This is missing the highs that Andrew has too many, I think. Perhaps you can arrange a collaboration or something. For some reason I find it hard to take this one seriously, perhaps I feel reminded of the title song of some cartoon series, I don't know. That's absolutely my fault, though. The mood works and this is actually quite fun.

The Chadderandom Abyss -- That's quite a bit of effect stuff here. Neat. I still don't understand your vision, I guess, but you keep doing different things with it and I that's great. Doesn't mean I have to like the song, but it's perhaps my favourite of your songs I have listened to so far.

coder_lyte() -- Yes, the Nintendo style is back! Or can we call this demostyle? Anyway, awesome! Your vocals are better too, and mixed into the song better. The voice still sounds a bit weak in places, perhaps mix a bit more chest into that. Promise you'll write more songs. I'll assume you will and give you a vote in return.

Heine -- Great melody. The first two or three notes of the bit with backup vocals (chorus, I assume) sound a bit weird. The second time around it's better. Nice little story, comparably awesome sound, good job doing a quiet song. Vote.

Jan Krueger -- Inspired by experience, backed by cursory research and el-cheapo statistical estimation. Musically it's mainly an experiment with vocal tone (therefore no instruments, and also because it's always a special kind of fun to do songs without instruments). And it's a rushed job again; recorded and mixed in eight consecutive hours. To make it to the deadline large parts of the bass had to be studio-mangled; I only get those low notes right in the early morning and there wasn't any morning left. For fun, spot the typo in the filename.

Jk Chrvt -- The vocals are all too buried in the mix. It's hard to make out most of the lyrics. Drums feel a bit mechanic, rhythm guitar could maybe use a bit variation. Generally more punchiness would be cool (that's a mixing thing, not really performance-related). If I ignore all of that (and it's not really that hard to do), I quite like the song.

Manatee Matinee -- Wow, evil beginning. This song screams energy! Fantastic stuff. Unusual in many small ways, masterfully executed and tied together. Personally I wouldn't have minded the solo (pre 1:30) going missing but oh well. The vocals need a bit more training on the high notes (mainly on what I think is the word "PvP"). This one absolutely must get a vote.

MC Milk-Plus -- Done quite well for the genre I guess. Sound is great. As I said I'm not a big fan of spoken music but the chorus is cool. And the instruments/synths.

Mr. Beany, you said you had a band -- This is not what I tend to call music, really. It doesn't fit anywhere else, though, so why not. The sonic composition does have something interesting about it, anway, so even if I don't exactly love this it has its merits and I have something to look forward to in your future submissions.

Paco del Stinko -- By now I can recognize your songs by the first couple of seconds. I always find it difficult to write a lot about songs like this one because it doesn't musically appeal to me at all. I can appreciate everything else about it, at least.

PositiveNegative -- This reminds me of something. I often don't have the patience for songs like this one though I can enjoy them if I do. Anyway, in short it's good but not great.

Rabid Garfunkel -- Fun but not phenomenal. Minus points for no lyrics.

R. Mosquito -- I think the synths sound a tad too ringmodulated. Not even nerds are that nerdy. Does that make sense? Backup vocals from 2:10 onwards are wonderful.

Slats -- Wah wah! Occasional timing issues. Like last time you had them, I don't get the harmonies in the backup vocals. Don't feel right. Shame.

Steve Durand -- Have I heard this song before? Mmm, no. Great singing nearly all the time! A joy to listen to, not least because this songs practically oozes light feelings. Vote! Definitely!

the tee -- The delay-o-rama near the end ruins it for me. Otherwise a nice little song with no complaints from my side.

Trick Soup -- Rock-solid performance and mix with resulting great sound. The chorus convinces me least, feels out of place and unbalanced. Layered kazoo tracks are surprisingly cool.

The Weakest Suit -- Nice warm guitar. Nice backup vocals. I'm not a fan of chorus effects, though. Mmm, dynamics. I like. Enjoyable song but not vote-great.

So:

Code: Select all

for (struct entry *e = fight->entries; *e; e = e->next) switch (e->artist_id) {
case CODER_LYTE:
case HEINE:
case JAN_KRUEGER:
case MANATEE_MATINEE:
case STEVE_DURAND:
    e->votes++;
}
fight_update(fight);

[Steve Durand]

Melvin, where have you gone?

[mrbeany]

For the curious, I've always liked nerds. I could have been one. I was smart enough and I was certainly socially awkward enough. I always hated sports and jocks... But I was too lazy to be a nerd. Almost by definition nerds can not be underachievers.

Abominominous --
I like the tempo. It is a little heavy for my tastes. I don't know that I understood any of the lyrics. I thought I heard "nerd" once or twice. I may have heard something about half a million nerds sucking your brain.

Andrew Reist --
Perhaps I'm an old fart, but whatever genre this is, I've never liked it.

Berkeley Social Scene --
I liked it... up until about 2:18. The solo seemed incohesive, forced and out of place. Was that the sound of someone gargling under the sea towards the end of it? I think it would have been a fine song if it didn't have the solo and gargling.

cattle bat --
Any time there was more than voice at a time, I couldn't make out the words at all. All I heard was a mumble for most of the song. The tune wasn't enough to hold me without being able to understand the words.

The Chadderandom Abyss --
After listening to this, I'm thinking Rone may not be my only big competition.

coder_lyte() --
In truth, I think my opinions of this were pretty much on par with my opinions of The Weakest Suit's contribution this week, however I heard it right after hearing MC Milk+. It was such a relief, I voted for it.

Heine --
I agree with jast that the story is nice. However, I thought the chorus still sounded sort of weird even on the second time through. I just wasn't feeling it.

Jan Krueger --
If I didn't suck so much this week, I would have sounded more like this. Nicely done. Inspirational, even.

Jk Chrvt --
Now is this the "close relative" that Slats mentions in his ID3 tag? I'm glad that someone else said that the lyrics were buried. I thought it was just me. Oh! It really is a march. Without making that lyric out, it just seemed repetitious, but now I get it. I didn't understand that it was supposed to be a march until the third time I listened to it.

Manatee Matinee --
This really does have some interesting parts to it. I wasn't a big fan of the spoken word parts, and I actually thought it looped before it got to the end the first time. In the end, though, it wasn't working for me.

MC Milk-Plus --
This looks like example of geekcore. At last! There's a song I actually sound better than! Something about it reminds me of the character Michael Bolton from Office Space.

Mr. Beany, you said you had a band --
I actually liked the fact that my voice sounded like a girl when I said "shunned by girls!". I did pitch shift it up but not by much. I need to find a throaty alto voiced compatriot then we could do vocal cross-dressing on a duet, I did warn folks (that had a chance to see my posts before the songs were up) that it would have been better if I had a tune. The middle shouts would have sounded better had I they actually been shouted. (I was worried about waking people.) I tried to do a thing where it sounded like multiple people were shouting, but I decided that version sucked too much. The reversed echo thing almost turned out the way I wanted it, though I would have liked to stretch the start of it so it started as a dull hum during the middle shouts. The best things about it: At least it was short and not geekcore.

Paco del Stinko --
You know, I couldn't tell if this was pro-nerd or anti-nerd. It seemed sort of anti-nerd. I got a sort of kill the nerds before they kill us sort of vibe.

PositiveNegative --
Airy and atmospheric. (Though I think my brain was only correctly parsing every other word.) Very mellow. Overall, it seemed well done for the genre. Unfortunately, it is a genre that just doesn't do much for me.

Rabid Garfunkel --
Your cat did much better with the vocals than I did with mine. I don't normally vote for instrumentals (out of principle) unless the general theme that week left me with no better choices. However, fortunately for you, I like cats. This doesn't go on my list of songs I can listen to all day, but it does go in my list of songs that I would enjoy listening to on a slightly more intermittent basis. Who am I kidding, your cat carries more of a tune than I did in my song this week. As I listen to it over and over, it is slowly growing on me. Before you know it, I'll be making room for it on my portable Songfight device.

R. Mosquito --
Did I mention I was pro-nerd? This seemed exaggerated in the nerdiness to a point of purposeful insult. But perhaps that was just the way I took it.

Slats --
I saw the lyrics before the song was available, and I was actually looking forward to it. Unfortunately, the implementation left something to be desired. I don't know much about music, but something seemed out of tune. Also, the tune just didn't really carry me anywhere I wanted to be.

Steve Durand --
Fun lyrics, with a very old timey feel to it. This sounds like music my grandmother would have liked. When my daughter is old enough to have an opinion even she may like it. Unfortunately I am neither that old nor that young. While I can safely say I wouldn't mind if my daughter listened to it over-and-over, it just isn't my thing.

the tee --
I thought it was an interesting arrangement. It starts out sounding all folksy, and you think you know what you're getting, then wham the accompaniment kicks in. I thought the accent really helped with the whole outsider feel. It made it distinctly clear that you were your own accompaniment, which is very nerdy. I liked the subtle use of echo towards the end, too. I listened to it multiple times, and I wished I could understand all the lyrics at the beginning of the song. (My wife thinks I may have hearing problems.) Overall, I liked it. My only problem was while I heard a lot about nerds, I don't remember actually hearing about half a million nerds.

Trick Soup --
I really liked the kazoos. While I did almost like the chorus, it sounded over-processed. It sometimes sounded like a tune was trying to come out in places... which only made me more aware that it wasn't there.

The Weakest Suit --
Overall, I like the song. However, I don't quite like it enough to put it in regular rotation, though I can't quite say why.

My votes this week were: The Tee, Jan Kreuger, Rabid Garfunkel, and coder_lyte().

[slats]

Jk Chrvt --
Now is this the "close relative" that Slats mentions in his ID3 tag? I'm glad that someone else said that the lyrics were buried. I thought it was just me. Oh! It really is a march. Without making that lyric out, it just seemed repetitious, but now I get it. I didn't understand that it was supposed to be a march until the third time I listened to it.

Yes, Jk's my 13 year-old son. And also yes, he was really trying to get the idea of a march across. He was lamenting to me last night on the phone about the lack of march drums amongst our drum loops. As for his vocals, I know he was having some difficulty balancing out a couple different effects he wanted in there. He had so many vocal tracks, he may've overcompensated on the low side.

As for me, I have no excuse.

[coder_lyte()]

coder_lyte() -- Yes, the Nintendo style is back! Or can we call this demostyle? Anyway, awesome! Your vocals are better too, and mixed into the song better. The voice still sounds a bit weak in places, perhaps mix a bit more chest into that. Promise you'll write more songs. I'll assume you will and give you a vote in return.

I've always like video game and demoscene music. I want to have old vg style music elements with rock and mellow metal. Kind of Capcom meets Judas Priest. What's really awesome is the new version of LMMS has a plugin to emulate the gameboy's sound chip, so expect to hear that in the future. I'm definitely going to be making more songs. Thanks man.

[mrbeany]

Yes, Jk's my 13 year-old son. And also yes, he was really trying to get the idea of a march across. He was lamenting to me last night on the phone about the lack of march drums amongst our drum loops. As for his vocals, I know he was having some difficulty balancing out a couple different effects he wanted in there. He had so many vocal tracks, he may've overcompensated on the low side.

As for me, I have no excuse.

It has been a while, but I remember some of the things I was doing when I was 13. I got really good at some of them. (Good enough that it influenced the first job I had.) Someone that young and determined has a lot of potential. Practice really does make perfect.

I expect many more fights with him continuing to wipe the floor with me.

[coder_lyte()]

Abominominous – I like the composition here. The syth part at the end of the intro is cool. The recording quality does leave something to be desired though. The vocals are pretty welld one, bit too goofy in places. I’d say it’s one that’s worthy of a remix.

Andrew Reist – Dude, is this anti-nerdcore? It’s pretty well executed rap, but I’m not a big fan of the genre; Kind of repetitive. I think it’d be cool to have a part after the chorus with some high notes on a guitar instead of vocals.

Berkley Social Scene – I’m really digging on the lyrics. Nerd succession! Any song with Hydrophone in it is good in my book. Science! I wish the vocals were a little louder and maybe had some more of the higher frequencies.

Cattle Bat – I must be dyslexic, because I thought your name was Cat Battle for a second, which is also kind of awesome. I like the flow of this, and vocals are pretty cool. The quality is just too low and it sounds murky.

The Chadderandom Abyss – All of those instruments could be awesome in certain contexts, and I’m all for them, but I’m not a fan of music without cord progressions or harmony. If you’d used more of whatever that was at the beginning I think it would have been a lot better. It’s all just a lot of the same thing, and that thing’s not very good.

coder_lyte() – This one turned out pretty well I think. I think I finally got my guitar timing workable. Sound quality improved. I have some rhythm guitar in the main part, but I think I mixed it too low. I think I need to keep my vocals in a little bit lower range.

Heine – This has some great guitar playing, and a very interesting chord progression. I really like how the vocal doubling is done too. I just always think guitar only music could use something else. Very good though.

Jan Krueger – I think the experiment was a success, and there’s nothing more nerdy than that. The harmonies here are awesome, and the pitches sound almost perfect. This gets a vote. Stop saying beatbox!

JKChrvt – The main vocals are filtered too much, but I really like the vocals on the titular line. It’s got a good melody, and I like how the solo goes along with it. It seems like the biggest thing your music is lacking is transitional percussions. Some symbol crashes and extra snare hits at the end of parts would sound good. It gets a vote.

Manatee Matinee – Aww dude, Dude! This is more video game than mine, you bitch! Tetris, Final Fantasy, and SMB underground tributes are much appreciated, and the arpeggios rule. The high pitch distorted guitar sounding like a square wave is cool. Awesome lyrics, and so very true. I think this is my favorite.

MC Milk-Plus – The nerdcore antithesis to Andrew Reist’s anti-nerdcore; There can be only none! It’s pretty well executed, but like a lot of other nercore songs, there’s not a thing unique or astounding about it.

Mr. Beany – If this was Beat Poetry Fight you might have something, but there’s really no song there.

Paco Del Stinko – As usually it has an awesome rhythm, solo, and percussions. A little too much distortion I think.

Positive Negative – Not a bad mellow track. I like all the things you have there, but it could use some more. I don’t think you have enough panning and EQ modulation for this kind of music, so things don’t really pop out like they should. I think some filtered, slow percussions in the middle parts would help give it some rhythm.

Rabid Garfunkel – I think it had the makings of something good, but it’s too repetitive. Having some annoying screeching in place of vocals didn’t help either.

R Mosquito – After last week, I feared for my hearing before listening to this. But I was pleasantly surprised. I love the lyrics; you get points for singing about prime factoring. Great vocals doubling in the chorus. I would really like to hear this remastered with some compression and fx, some additional accompaniment in the main parts, and lengthened to have a solo and another instance of the chorus, cause it rocks. I think you’ve got something here, and I’m voting for it.

Slats – That chorus just doesn’t do a lot for me; it just seems kind of bland. The vocals are a little too quiet. Everything else seems good, but something is just not right with it.

Steve Durand – That is some really good sound quality. The trumpet is excellent; is that real or a sample? The vocals don’t seem to match the quality of the rest of the song, but some good EQing and effects would probably fix that. Vote.

The Tee – It has a good flow, and I like how you did the vocal doubling at the end. There’s just not much that stand out in it.

Trick Soup – Good nerdy lyrics; Bewbs! Rocking Kazoo Solo. This defiantly deserves a remix to improve the quality.

The Weakest Suit – This is a nice smooth song, but there’s just not much that grabs my attention. I think this needs just one little additional part to vary the dynamic a little bit, and it could do with some panning differences.

Votes: Manatee Matinee, R Mosquito, Steve Durand, JK, JKC, Trick Soup

[Rabid Garfunkel]

Rabid Garfunkel – I think it had the makings of something good, but it’s too repetitive. Having some annoying screeching in place of vocals didn’t help either.

Couldn't think of lyrics. And there was a cat in the room. The devil was driving

@mrbeany: Thanks!

[Reist]

Andrew Reist – Dude, is this anti-nerdcore?

Haha, you've officially named my genre!

[Teplin]

Trick Soup -- Rock-solid performance and mix with resulting great sound. The chorus convinces me least, feels out of place and unbalanced.

I really liked the kazoos. While I did almost like the chorus, it sounded over-processed.

Just to be clear, there are reasons the chorus is the way it is. The (sorta goofy) story going on between the lines is: The main character in the verses is recording a song about how he used to be a real nerd, but now that he's a cool musician he's not nerdy at all. Then in the chorus, the nerds (using technology ) beam a message into his track about the fact that people who are into recording do some pretty geeky things, and he's still a nerd at heart. That's why the audio stutters and a new beat fades in. I did pitch shifting and other processing on the vocals so it would give the impression of lots of different singing nerds, rather than just my voice 3 times.

Then they all play kazoos at him, because that's how nerds roll. Except for one nerd who can't get his kazoo to work and delivers the "I thought you just blew into it" line. The main character disagrees and dismisses them, tells them to take their kazoos and get out of his song, and the nerds beam their message in again. The end of the song is the nerd who couldn't get his kazoo to work still trying to explain what happened. Annnnd... curtain!

Anyway, maybe I didn't pull it off successfully, but that was the method to my madness .

This defiantly deserves a remix to improve the quality.

Coder, could you expand on how the quality could be improved? I struggled with mixing and mastering this one, so it would be helpful.

[coder_lyte()]

Coder, could you expand on how the quality could be improved? I struggled with mixing and mastering this one, so it would be helpful.

Maybe some more panning on the percussions, and the different portions of the kazoos. And some extra EQing. I don't think I could do a better job myself, so I'm not really the person to ask. It's definitely not bad, but I'm sure there are ways to improve it.

[Teplin]

Maybe some more panning on the percussions, and the different portions of the kazoos. And some extra EQing. I don't think I could do a better job myself, so I'm not really the person to ask. It's definitely not bad, but I'm sure there are ways to improve it.

Doesn't matter if you could do better or not, it's helpful to have suggestions I can experiment with, so thanks!

[mrbeany]

I really liked the kazoos. While I did almost like the chorus, it sounded over-processed.

This defiantly deserves a remix to improve the quality.

Coder, could you expand on how the quality could be improved? I struggled with mixing and mastering this one, so it would be helpful.

I know you asked of coder_lyte(), but I felt like replying too.

I think if the chorus had a little more experimentation to get the multiple voice effect sounding more like multiple voices and less like technology it would be a great improvement.

You can tell the story from the song, and it is a cute story. I really did almost like the song, but the chorus just reminded me a little bit too much like some of my attempts with my entry.

[Teplin]

Good to know. Thanks for the feedback!

[Steve Durand]

Steve Durand – That is some really good sound quality. The trumpet is excellent; is that real or a sample? The vocals don’t seem to match the quality of the rest of the song, but some good EQing and effects would probably fix that. Vote.

All of the instruments (ukulele, clarinet, trumpet, organ, bass) are the real deal except the drums which are jamstix

Thanks for reviewing!

[Billy's Little Trip]

Some awesome songs, SF'erz. Rabz, yours cracks me up every time I hear it! Cool groove and then the pissed off cat. Classic!
By the way, I read Cattle Bat wrong and I thought it was your entry as Battle Cat.
I'm still listening and enjoying all.

[ElaineDiMasi]

The mellow stuff in this fight was usually better than the stuff that tried to rock, I think.

Weakest Suit - I like the song quite a bit, made me care about the character. Bonus points for fulfilling the title without being all self-referential like everybody else. So the structure is hackneyed, it's still cute and works. There are spots which are mumbled to the point of dropouts though, don't do that.

PositiveNegative - Pretty well put together. Enough repetition for glue. "log in .. log in to see you" sung with such mournful heart is really very funny!

Jan Krueger | Heine - grouped together as paragons of (if I may) teutonic gloominess. I don't want to dismiss all the music that was put into them. I appreciate the elaborate structures especially in jast's and the way each phrase was lovingly attended to when you wrote them. But I can imagine no playlist of mine where I'd want them to live!

Chadderandom Abyss - This is like listening to a graph of square pulses whose heights and lengths keep changing, and each time a change happens, I find something interesting at first but then it's just the same until the next abrupt change. I'm quite ok with the detuned notes and indifferent rhythms but I want to hear a real, audible, voice that doesn't sound like I'm trying to eavesdrop on it. You "trained 'em to kill", haha!

Trick Soup - I like your groove. I wished the opening words to this weren't so literal and easy to understand, 'cause I like cryptic stuff. (Especially if you're going to describe my formative years.) Highlight: "I'm a hipster ... I've got some mixing down to do".

MC Milk-Plus - Ha ha, this is a winner! Great cadence, love the hook, and it builds.

Rabid Garfunkel - Worst entry of the fight.

Manatee Matinee - Frenetic. I'm more in the mood for a compelling vocal today.

the tee - Did you say Phreak? That's cool. The rest of the lyrics are too folk-plain for me to love them. Highlight for me here is the bass line, especially in verses and between-ro's.

coder_lyte() - Quite listenable. I'd say, keep the new wave vibe and use the song with a totally different, more hooky lyric someday.

Paco del Stinko - Hm, don't want to be glib, but this one sounds a little more canned and just-doing-my-metalhead-duty-here than your usual.

R Mosquito - This is a little catchy. More than a little catchy, until the verses come in, then good again at the chorus. Amusing to listen to a few times, but not going to last on my playlist.

Andrew Reist - This isn't bad. But there's not anything in it to really grab me. See teutonic gloominess, above.

Abominominous - In the end I'm not going to really like this, but it did keep getting my attention.

Mr Beany YSYHAB - Well, sounds like you do have something to say! And this way of saying it does have its fans.

cattle bat - Good choices of harmony vocals everywhere!! I'm enjoying the bass line too. What the hell is this song about?

Slats - Not my favorite from you at all. None of the backup vocals are working, and the lead guitar wanking its way around during the verses is an irritant. But I liked wondering the level of autobiography in it. .. After another listen, I'd say the part about whether it's time to "suck up to them" doesn't come through.

Steve Durand - Sounds like you knew what you wanted and executed it fine, but it's not charming me.

Berkeley Social Scene - This is almost riffy enough and almost tuneful enough. Don't know what's missing!

Jk Chrvt - Some nice touches in this, you have a good sense for moving a song along. Maybe there's nothing super-original in the musical layout, but you found a hook and it's not bad! Next time project your voice a little more. Not just with the mixer knob, either. Even in the speak-singing "I'm too cool to really be singing" parts, you should think about bringing your voice out more as if you were really singing your heart out. I didn't notice about the march idea until I read the other reviews. Keep a pair of sticks lying around your Dad's place, play your march rolls on newspaper on tables, then see how far you can push the octave-shift-down and reverb effects and see what you get! Ha ha, you can make some loops with the pots and pans too. I bet the neighbors would dig that.