One-Synth-Challenge 35: Diva - Voting and Results

[pocvecem]

Hi,
have been 'out of order' for a week. Can't remember when i ever felt so sick. But everything is ok now.
The worst thing is that i'm now lacking a whole week that i wanted to do the votings. And this time the votings are the toughest ever! So many great tracks.
Well, i have my top ten. But i can't get it down to five.

@ Aiyn:
I'm really overwhelmed by your comment on my track. These are the most expressive words i've ever heard about my music and i really don't know how i can return your favour as i'm not that skilled with words as you are. As for me, if only one single person likes my song it's enough reward for me. Thanks!

Ok, must back to listening and voting.

Cheers,
Gerald

[3ee]

My short list has 8...

Only 8? Lucky you.. Seriously, and I know I probably say this every time, but this vote is the hardest so far with a lot of top drawer tracks. Cointossing might be a real possibility to get any kind of top 5 list here..

Still 8
I did my best to get few tracks within my short list but it's actually harder to pick my top 5 now... ow well, I guess listening them over and over will help a bit.

EDIT... actually I'm holding back on the special mentions just yet!

[JoeCat]

JoeCat - Diva Rides Alone ...Lots of energy above 10KHz makes the mix sound a bit thin and splashy overall.
2 points:

Typical KVR post: "Trust your ears...". HA. When you're my age and having played in too many bands before learning the value of hearing protection, I say "trust your spectrum analyzer". Lesson learned - TY for the feedback and points

[benaben]

Hello,

here is my vote, and little words about each of my choices.
It was very difficult to choose and the process is really slow, but there has to be a winner. I vote for the songs that I like, that I find to be originals, and that sounds good to my ears.
It was a pleasure to be part of this competition (and one day, someday, someone will vote for me, ah ah ah!!)

Chacka - Diving With A Diva: 5 points
A really good song with a fantastic groove à la justice. It changes from the "polished" music that we hear a lot in these kind of competitions (I don't want to hurt anybody but that's my point of view). We can hear little creative moments all along the song and I like that. The sounds are really good, everything works fine.

Flumba - Distant Galaxy Checkpoint Race: 4 points
I like the "wipe out" style of this song (I mean the video game), its title do influence this maybe... Very funky, with a good bass. Works very well and I like it.

Bumtu - Rumpus: 3 points
Again a very raw song, I do not like music that's too smooth. A very good intro, great sounds and an awesome bass with lot of bends. The drums are very good too and that beautiful brass adds a 'something' of orchestral that make this song very original.

Chacka - After The War: 2 points
Chacka again because I like his musical ideas and because he realizes them with a lot of taste. The middle part of the song is really beautiful with all theses sounds that grow and blend together.

ebow - A Diva's Winter Daydream: 1 point
Good feelings in this song. A sweet electric piano and some good drums. A nice lead part too. Different parts of the song are well sequenced and with clean transitions.

Voilà. Sorry for these poor reviews, but I miss some vocabulary to perfectly express myself!

May the best win, good luck to all.

[Doc Jon]

Ok, here we go, finally decided on my choices, yesterday was different, tomorrow I'm sure they will change too, but have decided to go with:

Aiyn - Beautiful Winter - 5 points
Don't like trance, rarely interested in anything over 6 mins long - but this just blew me away!! Enjoyed every last second of it, hugely impressed by the choice of sounds and extremely well produced. The technical aspects really stood out for me, very very well mixed and constructed. Well done!!

PocVecem - panta rhei - The Eternal Flow - 4 points
Nice to see you back Gerald, sorry to hear you've been ill, the Doc is here to make you feel better - 4 points to you my friend! I loved the way the whole track was one long gradual build with new elements being introduced to create a subtle developing soundscape from start to finish, excellent work!

Galastra - APZX - 3 points
I so wanted to make this my top choice, from the 'Save a Prayer' style opening patch to the brilliant percussion, to the great analog sounds, to the catchy melody and authentic retro vibe - but let down by the very odd break at 2:30, really not sure what was going on there. A big shame because it then picks up again with some more great sounds, my favourite percussion of the month and those beautifully wierd vibrato sounds before reintroducing the simple but catchy theme once more. So number 3 spot to you, but still a great track, really enjoyed it!

Mawa - Dance of the Goblin - 2 points
Great melody, great percussion, all put together so well. Really well constructed piece, loved the choice of sounds and chord progressions. Fantastic 'electric' lead sound at 2:00. Epic clap sound!!!

JoeCat - Diva Rides Alone - 1 point
Another epic JoeCat production! I just love the way you come up with something so unique, as with your last piece you just take the synth of the month and come up with the most unexpected results!! Really impressed how you got such an amazing selection of sounds from Diva

Honorable mentions have to go in no particular order to Stonail, Orville, Solidtrax, evo2slo, bzur, Nimrod7, and Irion who were all on my shortlist - sorry guys

Jon

[IrionDaRonin]

Hey don't worry for that, Jon. Anyway i know how do you feel, last months happened to me when i ran out of points.
It is always difficult and sometimes we even feel bad when we leave out a mate or a good composer. So, by my part, don't be worried
Anyway i'm glad you liked the track, that's enough for me, thanks.

Note to newcomers who have voted (actually 1 forist)
Please, read the rules before posting your votes.

You must have 20 prior posts in KVR before we set your votes as valids. (Or being part as participant of the actual month contest)
Even if you boost now your messages to 20, they still won't count as valid, sorry.
If you get 20 prior messages now and you come the next month to vote for any other track, they will be valid.
But not this month, sorry for being the bad cop this time and thanks for your attention and your time for listening all the tracks and cast your votes, even if they were not valid.

Oh, shit! Now there will be irionish haters...

lol

I will set my votes before the deadline, i have passed a great flu's holidays...

Have a good day

[JoeCat]

JoeCat - Diva Rides Alone...I just love the way you come up with something so unique, as with your last piece you just take the synth of the month and come up with the most unexpected results!!...

TY

Here's a funny anecdote. My 16 year-old son (I've three kidlins) is my biggest fan, and is often hanging around when I'm "producing". He asked me what some of the other tracks were like, so I played the ones that were up.

He really liked them, but commented that, like last time, mine sounded "different" (not necessarily better or worse - just different). I asked "not synthy, maybe?" He said "yeah, that's it. Can you do something normal." So I whipped this up in about 15 minutes (not bragging here - Diva makes it easy, and I used presets with no processing except a limiter on the master). He said "yeah - that's it! Bet you'd have a better chance of winning with something like that."

http://soundcloud.com/joe-cat/diva-not

He's probably right, but I can't seem to do "normal". Good thing I'm not "in it to win it" (though it's always nice to get some points and kudos from this talented group.)

[Aiynzahev]

Note to newcomers who have voted (actually 1 forist)
Please, read the rules before posting your votes.

You must have 20 prior posts in KVR before we set your votes as valids. (Or being part as participant of the actual month contest)
Even if you boost now your messages to 20, they still won't count as valid, sorry.
If you get 20 prior messages now and you come the next month to vote for any other track, they will be valid.
But not this month, sorry for being the bad cop this time and thanks for your attention and your time for listening all the tracks and cast your votes, even if they were not valid.


Have a good day

Too bad. Does this mean we cannot vote for Chacka?

[bzur]

Too bad. Does this mean we cannot vote for Chacka?

Don't worry: you can vote, because you take part as a participant

[Aiynzahev]

OK I get it now.

[IrionDaRonin]

Note to newcomers who have voted (actually 1 forist)
Please, read the rules before posting your votes.

You must have 20 prior posts in KVR before we set your votes as valids. (Or being part as participant of the actual month contest)
Even if you boost now your messages to 20, they still won't count as valid, sorry.
If you get 20 prior messages now and you come the next month to vote for any other track, they will be valid.
But not this month, sorry for being the bad cop this time and thanks for your attention and your time for listening all the tracks and cast your votes, even if they were not valid.


Have a good day

Too bad. Does this mean we cannot vote for Chacka?

Lol, that would give to veterans a nice advantage over newcomers

But don't worry, of course you can vote for Chacka or any other. You are a participant of this month, you can vote for anyone, despite your number of KVR posts.
The rule means that there are newcomers who appears suddently from a foggy cloud and vote here. There are some of them who only have for example 5 KVR posts in the forum, but they come and vote for someone. That's not bad at all, they can come and vote freely, listening all tracks, etc, but these votes won't be valid. This is a measure for avoid friendship votes, double accounts votes, etc.
I hope the guy who voted with low amount of KVR posts doesn't feel bad about it. (Those for whom he voted is another story...)

You always can vote for a contestant, newcomer or not if you have enough KVR posts or you participated with a track.
But i meant newcomers-voters. Newcomers-participants are allowed to get votes and vote because they participated on that month.

As sometimes i explain myself like an ass, i will make a little scheme.

·Participant of this month: Have the maximum privilege to vote, and to be voted. Newcomer or veteran in OSC or KVR.

·Non participant of this month with more than 20 KVR posts: Have the privilege to vote for anyone, always that these KVR posts are 20 (or more) when the voting thread have been created by V'ger.

·Non participant of this month with less than 20 KVR posts: He can vote freely, but the votes won't be valid. This is a forum, and it's nice to see people who download all tracks and vote for them with some nice comments. So people can vote freely in my opinion. But even if this voter boosts his messages to more than 20, the votes still won't be valid. But he can vote for the next month and we will make these new votes as valid. (The old ones still don't count)

Your vote is safe and valid, don't worry Aiyn.
If you have some other doubt, just ask

Have a good day

PD: Last days of flu, woooot!

[Aiynzahev]

Oh, I did not realise until now that non-participants could vote. I thought it was just between all of us who made the tracks. Well that makes it more interesting actually. But so far only a few non-participants have voted it seems.

[3ee]

OK, here goes...

Was a bit harder to pick places for some tracks than the actual tracks.
Special mentions to PocVecem and Irion Da Ronin, lovely work guys, IMO the best entries with this edition!


PocVecem - panta rhei (The Eternal Flow) - 5 points

pros: Great song! Pleasant to listen to... dreamy pads, tight and punchy sequences (would be also good as an official DIVA demo maybe? ), mix, arrangement except intro. Makes me feel more at home.

cons: Intro a bit boring (+ judging by the name of the track it should much more going on in there ) (in fact the song shouldn't have an intro or outro )

---------------------

Irion Da Ronin - Beyond The Sight - 4 points

pros: mix, arrangement, lovely overall "rainy days" positive vibe. When the lead kicks in it's like.. :deja-vu moment: (like I was there) ... melody change took another "nimbus" turn, interesting none of the less. Another plus for being one of those tracks that you like more and more as you listen to it.

cons: mix feels a bit "unglued" but not sure if that's a real problem, especially if we check with the dsp side of the OSC rules.

---------------------------

Solidtrax - Lady From Jupiter - 3 points

pros: Nostalgic trance feel with a very good execution, mix (+points for not

over-compressing! save the dynamic range ppl! )

cons: arrangement is a bit repetitive and standard.
The overall song "lost" a few points for originality also. Creative name leaves room for more diversity and exploration.

----------------------------

Doc Jon - Eleventh Dimension - 2 points

pros: Lovely atmo, bass sequence. Overall sound is easy to listen to.

cons: That leads give the track a repetitive feel. Seems like a classic pitfall when you try to pull the song together more than you are inspired by it (or at least that's what some of the arrangement vs orchestration is telling me)

--------------------------

bzur - Divagation - 1 point

pros: Some melodies and sounds. Interesting "power outage while within the art museum (closed) on a stormy night" feel.

cons: Unfortunately I was kinda' traumatized by the JMJ atmo growing up and avoided this kind of feeling (not the whole electronic music side). Mix a bit weak. Outro? hmm seems cool this way also.

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sorry no more points to give.. only some more feedback
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chacka - Driving with a Diva

pros: Great Intro + Outro! Some cool sounds. In some parts it sound like the dogs are barking. I like that!

cons: Rest of the track! (by contrast with the intro/outro) Unfocused arrangement, feel more like a jam-mix session rather than a song but wants to be a song.

----------------------

Stonail - Mimosa Tree

pros: Mystical atmo, interesting original feel, the gate seq is a cool touch also.

cons: reverb (or mix in general) , almost everything seems unfocussed.

--------------------------

Orville - Resonant Sea

pros: Captivating intro. Interesting Anjunadeep like atmo.

cons: bass, arrangement isn't necessarily bad but seems like it's going nowhere.
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Well, I hope I didn't get any names wrong. Sorry for my short list being so.. short.. I'm glad I did have time to vote anyways.. and treat myself with some lovely tracks!
Anyway, Good luck!
Cheers,
3ee

[ShamanicRitual]

Listening to music of competitors strengthened my conclusion, that diva is capable to make bass (with good tape saturation). Everything else sound plastic and flat, sometimes fuzzy. There are many talented KVRians

Mawa-MorningMood 5 - music is about melody after all
Pchor-EgyptianWinters 4 points - just very close to my taste
Joecat-DivaRidesAlone 3 points - you damn master of diva, good arrangement
IrionDaRonin-BeyondTheSight 2 points - clean production, nice melodies
Pocvecem-PantaRhei-TheEternalFlow 1 points - this track is ready for release. really good

[Fritze]

Chacka - Diving With A Diva: 5 points
A really good song with a fantastic groove à la justice. It changes from the "polished" music that we hear a lot in these kind of competitions (I don't want to hurt anybody but that's my point of view). We can hear little creative moments all along the song and I like that. The sounds are really good, everything works fine.


Chacka - After The War: 2 points
Chacka again because I like his musical ideas and because he realizes them with a lot of taste. The middle part of the song is really beautiful with all theses sounds that grow and blend together.

Thanx a lot! Nice to see that you think similar to me about my music and that you like it.

May the best win, good luck to all.

Yes, that's the "problem" of such a competition. "Best" is a personal choice here. But nice to see all those great comments on the personal choices which makes it worth a lot to me. Otherwise I didn't see EVER that deep and precise comments about some music posted on KvR.