One Synth Challenge #193 - Thorn by DS Audio (exponent1 Wins!)

[liqih]

I said hey, happy Easter or happy chocolate, as you like. Here is a tribute to a song I liked this month

https://soundcloud.com/liqih/emikaela-t ... ight-liqih

The emikaela "thursday night" I remixed it taking advantage of a free account for the AI app Fadr, which I used to extract stems and generate a lo-fi drum track, this one I then doubled it with my own sounds, I hope someone like it. Best wishes to everybody.

Would anyone else be treated with a remix by me, just drop me a note, I have fun remixing.

[Double Tap]

Congratulation to exponent1!

I would like to thank to Double Tap and Lopyt - not music genres I am listening, but these two tracks I downloaded in my music player.

Thanks very much - that’s kind of you to say.

[Double Tap]

There’s often a lot of discussion about the rules but very little about how to give feedback. I actually think a large number of people don’t always want critique, and that’s not a criticism since sometimes I don’t really either. It’s not like writing where changing a word is easy.

My thinking is that even just highlighting which bits are good is useful. People picking up on something you didn’t expect is often very revealing.

Likewise we should talk about bit more about how to receive feedback. If several people say the same thing that’s a real indication that unless you’ve made a deliberate choice, it might be something to think about. But since most feedback comes when you can’t fix anything, it can be hard to know what to do with it.

[PeterBPL]

I am trying to not write about technical stuff or not giving any advices. That type of "good advices" looks like someone feels better and give advices to less experienced user. Even if that's true - I would feel bad about giving that type of advices (except when someone ask for something specific). I give advices from time to time, but they're more like encouragement - "make more music", "less laziness, more practice" (when someone says that he very like to making music and then do nothing whole month), "try to use some automation/modulators with effects, it's fun" - that kind of stuff. Interesting hints are ok, but not teaching.

Of course "I like it" / "I don't like it" is ok. That's about personal taste and has nothing to do with giving any unwanted advices. If someone don't like some song - it's ok to say that, but that's all. Anything beyond that is putting yourself in the role of a sage.

[silverpants]

Yes, giving advice is risky to the wrong person. But some people actively want it. I've seen many cases where people get mildly positive comments - but low scores, and they are annoyed that nobody told them why. In these cases I am detailed in my advice going forward - and I believe that has been appreciated and has helped them improve.

But if an experienced musician gets low scores for making an unpopular or difficult sound/experience - then it's best not to be condescending. It's hard to know for sure though.

It's clearly safest to not make any comments at all - but I think that would be a shame. I try to comment on every track. And I try to tailor it to the artist - as best as I can.

The most important to thing to stress is "in my opinion" or "to my taste" etc. I would not want to sound like "what you have done is wrong". There is no right/wrong in art (in my opinion - hahaha).

[empphryio]

As I was thinking last night it's not a good idea to start complaining about what we think are bad comments. As the end result is people feeling even more like the safest thing is to do is just not comment. As we find out that all kinds of people have very different ideas about what they do and don't like.

I'm going to say (AGAIN) that you should put in your description exactly what kind of comments you're OK with receiving and EVERYONE should read the description before commenting. And if you put nothing that means any comments are OK. But I locked my comments this time because at least half the people comment without reading the description. (Twice before I put in the description that I wasn't looking for critical feedback that particular month and it made almost no difference in how much critical feedback I received.) (This time I just in general didn't feel like having words used to describe music at all.)

AND if you pretty much never comment at all on other tracks I really think you should strongly consider locking your comments. It's under edit/permissions. I will avoid going on about that. The reason such people probably should lock their own comments really ought to be obvious. I won't talk about it more.

Other than this I want to say I greatly appreciate the people who do take the time to comment. It can be hard to comment. Considering they took the time when they didn't have to, I think we really should be very nice in return, even if it's not really a comment you love. Provided the person isn't literally trying to pressure you to stop making the music you want to make in the OSC.

[Negoba]

I am one of those who always wants feedback and the more detailed the better because the main reason I'm here is to try to improve my craft. I personally feel more comfortable making suggestions about composition because I have more experience in that realm. I also tend to give feedback on how a song hit me emotionally as I think that's the bottom line for all of us as artists. I will try to be more careful reading the descriptions in the SC to make sure I don't accidentally comment when someone wants no feedback.

Commenting does take a fair bit of time and thought. I keep track of who has commented for me and at least try to return the favor. It really depends on the month how many I get to.

I also agree with emp that I've seen almost no comments that are problematic. There are lot of simple supportive comments, even "Cool 80's track bro" is fine if in good faith. Because there are almost always a couple of really good retro 80's tracks every month. Thankfully not too many.

[IV!]

probably would be nice to have some one big zip archive with all OSC songs ever made.

All OSC tracks are periodically archived and stored on Archive.org. You may not find the last couple of years, but the rest is there:
https://archive.org/search?query=subjec ... allenge%22