Damp Feet (Clouds Were Touching The Ground Reviews)

[Nigel (spOOn) Clements]

Hello
Seeings as everyone is trying different styles of reviewing, I'm gonna give this a go...

Thanks for the Frisbee: 21/42
Professional Sound Rating: 4/7
Addictability: 3/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 4/7
Vocal Performance: 4/7
Instrumentation: 4/7
Originality: 2/7

The Modern Alternatives: 18/42
Professional Sound Rating:4/7
Addictability: 3/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 3/7
Instrumentation: 3/7
Originality: 2/7

Produce ft. Macher: 21/42
Professional Sound Rating: 5/7
Addictability: 4/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 2/7
Vocal Performance: 4/7
Instrumentation: 3/7
Originality:3/7

Eidolon: 13/42
Professional Sound Rating: 2/7
Addictability: 2/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 2/7
Instrumentation: 2/7
Originality: 2/7

The Quesadilla Explosion: 22/42
Professional Sound Rating: 4/7
Addictability: 3/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 4/7
Vocal Performance: 4/7
Instrumentation: 4/7
Originality: 3/7

Freddie Love: 18/42
Professional Sound Rating: 4/7
Addictability: 2/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 3/7
Instrumentation: 4/7
Originality: 2/7

E Equals: 19/42
Professional Sound Rating: 1/7
Addictability: 4/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 4/7
Instrumentation: 2/7
Originality: 5/7

Ken Woodard: 15/42
Professional Sound Rating: 3/7
Addictability: 2/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 3/7
Instrumentation: 2/7
Originality: 2/7

Jordan Seavers: 26/42
Professional Sound Rating: 5/7
Addictability: 4/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 4/7
Vocal Performance: 5/7
Instrumentation: 5/7
Originality: 3/7

Andrew Reist: 17/42
Professional Sound Rating: 3/7
Addictability: 2/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 3/7
Instrumentation: 3/7
Originality: 3/7

Wages: 14/42
Professional Sound Rating: 3/7
Addictability: 2/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 2/7
Instrumentation: 2/7
Originality: 2/7

Kill Me Sarah: 16/42
Professional Sound Rating: 3/7
Addictability: 2/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 2/7
Vocal Performance: 3/7
Instrumentation: 3/7
Originality: 3/7

Phunt! etc... : 23/42
Professional Sound Rating: 3/7
Addictability: 4/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 4/7
Instrumentation: 4/7
Originality: 5/7

Eddie Lance: 15/42
Professional Sound Rating: 2/7
Addictability: 2/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 3/7
Vocal Performance: 2/7
Instrumentation: 3/7
Originality: 3/7

spOOns: 18/42
Professional Sound Rating: 2/7
Addictability: 4/7
Lyrical Connectivity: 4/7
Vocal Performance: 2/7
Instrumentation: 3/7
Originality: 3/7

P.S. I heard the Eels in quite a few of these tracks this week.
P.P.S. Andrew Reist - why do you have your song dated as 1987 ??

[Reist]

P.P.S. Andrew Reist - why do you have your song dated as 1987 ??

I date all my songs as 1987. Don't ask me why, I just do.

[jseavers05]

hey im not really focusing on giving a good review cause im lazy right now. just feel like rating the songs so sorry if the review sucks.

2.5 = average so if your above it, then the song is above average and below 2.5 is below average. so 2.5/5 isnt an F. 2.5= average. the end.

Mr. Andrew - its taking a long time for the singing to start but the long intro is still cool. lyrics are kinda crazy. 2.5/5

Spoons - this song is much better than the last entry i heard from ya. its unique and reminds me of some of the college radio stuff. 2.3/5

Eddie - woah, this is crazy. im not digging the talking. those low notes seem a little hard to hit. haha, this is kinda boring but the story keeps me listening. 1.8/5

eequals - this is creepy. i feel bad saying that but its like a lulliby. are you playing with a furrby in the background? or did you record this while watching some kids? i hope your not the one playing with the baby toys... anyways, its creepy at times. i dont know what your exactly singing about but i dont think i wanna know... 0.6/5

eidolon - the guitar part is cool. the song is written well. it would be cool if you had some more instruments and stuff. 2.9/5

freddie - this is really cool sounding. its a repetitive and dragggggggssssssss oooooooonnnnnnnn it seems like this could work well for background music or for a movie or something. 1:54 is cool. not digging the talking part. if you mixed up your song some more it would be a lot cooler but its the same measure over and over. still cool though 3/5

jordan - i think this song turned out alright. i like the changed version much better. its on http://www.myspace.com/jordanseavers if anybody wants to listen to it or download it. thats bout it

Mr. Woodward nice country folky song. the mandolin is neat. 2.4/5

Kill Me Sarah fun story. when you were first talking you sorta sounded like the guy from cake. it seems like the tempo is kinda slow. its not bad, but a change in the middle of the song or something to stand out might help the song be a little more fun. 2.1

Modern alternatives - perfect lenth of the song. theres no chorus. instruments and vocals done played well. 2.2

phunt - its kinda random. i dont really like this. the background music seemed tolerable but the talking is kinda overpowering and boring. 1.9/5

Liechty - the background reminds me of sonic and some bad 90s music from those crappy school science videos. 1.3/5

The Quesadilla Explosion good production. all the instruments are played very well. its cool. the song changes around which is good. 3.9/5

thanks for the frisbee the guitar stuff sounds really cool. the vocals are good. it would be cool if you could get a good mix and master on this song. 3.6/5

Wages - sounds like your having problems playing the guitar. i think the song itself is cool. would sound much better if it wasnt just acoustic. 2.9/5

[Kweep]

I obviously ain't in this fight, but i was listenin' to em all anyway and figured i'd review em. Oh, I'm gettin' in on the rating game, too! mine's binary (cause i can only count to 1)... 1=on 0=off.


Andrew Reist - I like the intro guitar riff a lot... I was all geared up for a rocker and then was kinda let down. Once the vox came in I got a little more into it but still missed the rawk! 0/1

e-spoons - not my favorite style of music and yet... somehow... sorta compelling. 0/1

Eddie Lance - 0/1

e= - apparently e=mc high. 0/1

Eidolon - nice guitar tone... and decent vocal delivery... but, i kinda felt like i was sitting in an animated inn in middle earth listening to "frodo of the nine fingers". 0/1

Freddie Love - good production. again, not my favorite style of music but this one is "on". 1/1

Jordan Seavers - well written, well executed, well produced... really nice. 1/1

Ken Woodard - not horrible but not quite "on". 0/1

k_m_s - lovin' the guitar tone and your vocal delivery on the choruses. 1/1

mod alt - good sounds... i felt a decent song strugglin' to break out but it never did. 0/1

p phunt - good production. this one pulls it off better than the stink. 1/1

liechty - square peg, round hole. decent sounds, decent rhymes, feels forced to fit the theme. 0/1

Quesedilla - good rocker! nice production... the vox in the chorus were kinda rough, though. still 1/1

gracias para el frisbee - i like the melody and delivery. good job! 1/1

wages - I, too, dig the way you 'let go' this week! still not quite "on" for me but groovy none the less. 0/1

[a bebop a rebop]

There will be grades in this class.

Andrew Reist - Your sound is really skinny, and I don't care for the faux-drums. Try to at least make them sound vaguely realistic. If the introduction was interesting, I wouldn't mind listening to two minutes of it. Your voice is pretty nice, but you still have the skinny, fake band sound that I really don't care for. Try to simulate a bass maybe, the sound is really top-heavy. This song is pretty boring. C-

Eclectic Spoons - For some reason, this reminds me of Johnny Cashpoint (apologies to all involved), I think it's probably the vocal rhythms and the heavily stressed downbeats. The samply guitar sections are really neat, and I like your voice in this song. Unfortunately, the song is very repetitive. Neat though. B

Eddie Lance - This is pretty ridiculous. Your command over the English language just isn't there yet, see "it was the fog that prevented me to see," and "when we showed up, there were nobody there," and "we had just boughten that car." Maybe it's supposed to be funny, I guess? I didn't laugh, sorry. D

E Equals - I hate to say things like this, but you need to play the guitar or the piano or something. The vocals are sung in a very rhythmic style, but the rhythm is going to pieces all over the place. (I don't feel like I can grade this one.)

Eidolon - I like the sound on that guitar, but this song sounds like it needs a band. Your voice is overpowering the guitar a bit for me. Also, the singing is a bit off-pitch at times. Interesting lyrics, solid song. B-

Freddielove - Good dancefloor music. That solo sound at 1:09, sounds like a super-fuzzed saxophone or something, is really neat. Starting to get dangerously boring though. Thanks for breaking it down here, and for using an oboe patch. Super-dancefloor spoken word vocals. The lyrics seem a little overdone and silly all throughout the song though. B+

Jordan Seavers - The vibe you always have going on is really fun, this song is nice and hazy and jammy. I like the little lead guitar noodling through the song, and of course your singing is as always spot-on. Unfortunately, it's a bit boring. You keep hammering away on that same measure over and over, it feels like. It's a nice one to hammer on though. Nice ending. A

Ken Woodard - I like the percussion touches. Unfortunately, your voice continues to not do very much for me, and I wish I had a copy of the lyrics so I could really tell what you were saying, it sounds like they might be kinda neat. I always like the guitar sounds you have going on, though. C+

Kill Me Sarah - Haha, I like the guitar sounds. But those drums are distractingly MIDI. Sounds like it's about to burst into a massive Rage Against the Machine explosion. Damnit, this is not what I wanted at all. That solo is kinda cool, but the whole skinny, not-much-going-on backings ain't doing it for me. And that verse chord structure and singing keeps feeling weird. Those la-la-las are nice and ridiculous, I think I'd love them in a song by the Devendra. B-

Modern Alternatives - Nice little chord progression. I like the lead guitar line. Good thing the song is short, though, it's already starting to get boring by the end. I think I like the singing but I wish I could tell what you're saying. B-

Prime the Phunt, etc. - Ok, I really like these sounds you got here. This is amazing. I love the music so much, and I wish you had done the doubled talking throughout the entire song. The music reminds of a lost Aphex Twin track, what with the insane undertones and the pretty melodies and harmonies going along on top. So much is going on here, love love love. You have polished a lovely and delicious apple for teacher. A+, Jesus Christ, good job.

And experimental, guys? I guess the doubled vocals could be considered thusly, but, um, it's beautiful. Thank you, Phunt. Who put this one together by the way?

Liechty - Nice pretty electro-type noises. You sound like amateur Eminem, I guess that's cool. I like the vocal rhythms you use, lends it an interesting edge. And the hook is kinda neat. I'm not really listening to what you're saying though, some lyrics in the archive would be nice. B-

The Quesadilla Explosion - Nice thick sound. And the structure you have is nice and interesting. It sounds like I've heard this song before, almost. I really like it. The vocalist is off here and there but it's in a nice Cobain-ish sort of way. A

Thanks for the Frisbee - I like the singing. I keep not being able to think of anything to say about this song, it's just pretty nice, and I do really like the singing, and the lyrics. B+

Wages - That guitar playing is pretty buzzy and messy but I shouldn't say anything so I won't. I like your voice though, the oh oh oh's are nice, as is the lowish airy singing at the beginning. Song as a whole isn't doing much for me, though. C+

Voting for The Phunters, definitely. Honorable mentions to The Quesadilla Explosion and The Seavers.

[Kill Me Sarah]

This was a song where i was experimenting with a song that would have broad appeal. From the sounds of most of these reviews, I missed my mark somewhat. Somethings mentioned I can fix fairly easily I think (eg. increase tempo) and other things I can't immediately improve (eg. getting real drums). I'd like advice from all of you as to what things, other than what's already been mentioned would make this more enjoyable. Thoughts?

[a bebop a rebop]

There are ways to make MIDI drums sound more realistic. I don't really know how you could do it, exactly, because I haven't used any of the drum-machine type programs myself, but I do use Fruity Loops some here and there. It helps if you use different samples, different volumes, different pitches, different effects so that the drums don't sound exactly the same all the way through. Because that's really the main problem. The samples would sound fine on their own, one at a time, but if you repeat them over-and-over, perfectly on rhythm and always sounding exactly the same, they have a robotic quality which doesn't jive with the rest of your song.

[Kill Me Sarah]

The samples would sound fine on their own, one at a time, but if you repeat them over-and-over, perfectly on rhythm and always sounding exactly the same, they have a robotic quality which doesn't jive with the rest of your song.

Okay, that makes sense. This was actually my first time creating a drum loop for a song, and as I mentioned earlier, using a loop based software. The drums, btw, are made using Hammerhead, which I think is a pretty groovy piece of freeware if anyone needs drum loops. But I could totally create some fills and whatnot if that helps it sound less artificial.

[a bebop a rebop]

Seems like this discussion ought to be in the help forum, but...

It appears to me that Hammerhead has a pretty limited sound palette (ie, it's only got 29 drum sounds). Seeing as it's designed primarily as a techno drum machine, I think it would be pretty difficult to get any sort of realistic drumming out of it.

I feel like the best option would be to get a freeware audio sequencer (if it supports VST effects, even better), grab a whole lot of drum samples from somewhere, and play with them. Use different snare/kick/ride/crash samples in the same song, whatever. It's going to be very difficult to get away from robo-drums with Hammerhead anyway, because that's exactly what it's designed for.

[Mogosagatai]

Thank you, Phunt. Who put this one together by the way?

Egg wrote all the motifs in the song, and then <a href="http://www.songfight.org/music/left_at_ ... m.mp3">Der Neuen Stenographen</a> and myself wrote the lyrics and turned Egg's madness into the final product. I'm glad you like it!

[jseavers05]

if you dont have a real drumset, try getting something like the FL studio demo. with getting a good drumsound (even with midi) add compresison and a little reverb (in some cases) and hopefully that should do the trick. if you cant get real drums, pound the floor, hit tape cases and tap on the chair with a pensil. thats how i did it back in the day.

[Reist]

Andrew Reist
The intro throws me off a bit. I never like when intros don’t mesh with the rest of the song because I usually only like one or the other, and it ruins the cohesiveness of it for me.

I didn't think people would notice this, but I kind of threw it in for some fun ... that louder intro that doesn't mesh is actually to the tune that I sing later in the song (the sky is falling ... the ocean's filling ... let's go swimming) ... just to clear up why I put that in.

[Kill Me Sarah]

Andrew Reist
The intro throws me off a bit. I never like when intros don’t mesh with the rest of the song because I usually only like one or the other, and it ruins the cohesiveness of it for me.

I didn't think people would notice this, but I kind of threw it in for some fun ... that louder intro that doesn't mesh is actually to the tune that I sing later in the song (the sky is falling ... the ocean's filling ... let's go swimming) ... just to clear up why I put that in.

Yeah, it's a frequent practice and a lot of my favorite bands do it. I'm not saying it's right or wrong to do. I'm just saying, generally speaking, I don't care for it...even when it is being done by my favorite bands.

[furrypedro]

hit tape cases and tap on the chair with a pensil

wise words. I remember being amazed at how well pencils hitting stuff worked as percussion. they seem to resonate in a cool way


...I might do some reviews later if yer lucky

[halen99]

Eddie Lance - This is pretty ridiculous.

Wow, I'm gettin' killed this week. I'd better sit this week out and re-think things.

Anyway it's a true story although Fog had nothing to do with it, and yeah was not supposed to be a serious song.

[Kill Me Sarah]

Eddie Lance - This is pretty ridiculous.

Wow, I'm gettin' killed this week. I'd better sit this week out and re-think things.

Anyway it's a true story although Fog had nothing to do with it, and yeah was not supposed to be a serious song.

Nah...just jump right back on that horse. I got schooled pretty good this week too, when I thought I'd made something pretty decent, but you've just gotta keep trying. Besides, what other people think shouldn't be the ultimate influence in songmaking anyway.

[a bebop a rebop]

Anyway it's a true story although Fog had nothing to do with it, and yeah was not supposed to be a serious song.

So wait... you're offended that I thought it was ridiculous? And then you go on to say that it wasn't a serious story? I don't get it.

A few more in-depth comments... The music is all really nice, I like it, but your voice is William Shatner-fied during the spoken bits, and alright but not great for the sung bits. And then it's not rhythmically with the music during the second chorus.

And the grammatical errors are super-annoying, to me at least. That's why I focused on them in my review.

EDIT: GOD DAMMIT I AM AN AWFUL HUMAN BEING

[Nigel (spOOn) Clements]

And the grammatically errors are super-annoying, to me at least. That's why I focused on them in my review.

grammatically errors?

[halen99]

So wait... you're offended that I thought it was ridiculous? And then you go on to say that it wasn't a serious story? I don't get it.


Hey.. I'm not offended at all. Do me a favor though, go to

http://www.myspace.com/eddielance

and listen to my instrumentals. That is what I really do. The song fight stuff is great because it forces me to complete a song or idea in a few days. Motivation ya know.

Eddie

[jseavers05]

bebop likes to complain and get mad a lot.

[a bebop a rebop]

Hey Eddie, I basically missed last week but your Not Exactly Normal entry is really pretty neat. Emotional Rollercoaster is particularly cool, I wish you had an actual cellist but your soundscape is really cool and more than a little bit fucking creepy, and the fact that you actually play the piano is really nice. Lovely, atmospheric stuff. And the ending of Opening Lines, that's nice. Don't stop submitting to Song Fight just because you got a negative review, man, if people did that most of the major Song Fight players wouldn't be around any more.

[Eidolon]

...Sounds like your reaching up. Try reaching down to the notes. That's kinda what helped me.

Do you mean sing an octave down.. or some kinda state of mind thing?

...it would be cool if you had some more instruments and stuff.

(See next comment:)

I like the sound on that guitar, but this song sounds like it needs a band...

Due to the lyrical content, I was going with just GnG to fit the mood / subject matter better... but yeah- I had some other stuff written / thought out and then cut the idea.

...i kinda felt like i was sitting in an animated inn in middle earth listening to "frodo of the nine fingers".

Haha.. my nose is nowhere large enough to be compared to the bard that plays that song..! Hilarious comment though.. thanks for the laugh! I'd love to hear that song again.. since I think it was about 25 years ago last time I heard it...

---

Anyway, thanks for the reviews so far everyone.. I've been enjoying listening to a lot of these songs (all three fights this week have some really great stuff). I appreciate the feedback i've gotten from you all.. keep up the good work. 8)