Say 'hi' to St. Peter (Never Felt Less Alive reviews)

[Pigfarmer Jr]

In case I had off in a different direction.

[Pigfarmer Jr]

Lyrics: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=12496

[Lunkhead]

Songs posted!

[Pigfarmer Jr]

Elektromöose: Cool groove with that bass line. I like the vocal phrasing but there's something about it that took a bit to get used to. Maybe how it's sitting in the mix? Regardless, the melody and the groove, the hook are all stellar. Okay, on second listen, forget all that. The vocal is sitting just fine. Probably just my ears being my ears. Did you know there was 8 seconds of silence at the end of the track?

The Freezing Hands: Tasty bit of garage rock guitar. Okay, all that I said about the vocals above, right? Fits here. Just not sitting properly for me. But it does kind of fit the sound of the track, the mix feels a bit thin to my ears. There are some popping noises in the bass line, I know it's the bass line because I have that problem all. the friggin. time.

Frosty The Showman: The sparse arrangement is kind of cool.. reminds me of an old russian movie, in black and white, but hell if I can think of which one. Is it the fiddle or the vocal that is slightly out of tune? It can be a bit of trick when you double the melody in instrument and voice because little discrepancies can either be beautiful or torture. Doing it for four minutes might be stretching my interest level a bit even if I do appreciate the take on the prompt.

Johnny Cashpoint: Musically, this is pretty cool. I like it more than most of what I've heard from your recently (whatever that means.) The muddy vocal is mixed a bit loud and still isn't clear enough for my taste. Still, I find myself enjoying this more than nitpicking it.

LYNKEN: I enjoyed your last song a lot. And then I hear this and right from the start I'm liking it as well. There's a bounce to the rhythm (and piano) that's hard not to move to. I like the contrast between the almost happy bounce and the lyric. It looks like we both took very, very similar takes on the title although musically we're pretty far apart, I guess. I think I like your lyric more. Maybe your vocal delivery gets a hair stale by the end but it's a cool take on the lyric so I can't really complain.

Pigfarmer Jr: I cut my finger at work a couple of weeks ago and couldn't play guitar. It was really awful in a lot of ways, but I started playing with piano midi and samples and got a couple of different (to me) types of songs out of it, this being one of them. This was the first guitar I played in a while and I had to capo on the second fret in order to play that B minor (as an A minor open chord) because I couldn't (and can barely still) play a barre chord. I mixed this to -13 LUFS and it seems louder than all the other songs. Maybe -14 would be better? Or a couple of you others could actually get yours close to that level and make mine sound more in line, I guess.

Robyn Mackenzie: This displays your melody style, I feel. And it works really well on the chorus. That bass line and the rhythm both work great and that added synth after the chorus is cool but it makes the mix feel a bight right side heavy for a bit, I think. I'm not sure this song stands out of your catalogue much, it's solid but maybe not one of the very best, but it's still one of the highlights of the fight.

I'm leaning twoards: elektramoose, Lynken and Robyn Mack but will probably listen again a time or two before voting.

[private_ale]

Elektromöose:
It was said before, but I really like the bass going on here. It's a great riff and gives me Muse vibes. I love dynamics between the beginning and end of the chorus; it feels really big but I can still hear all the instruments clearly.

The Freezing Hands:
I’m a sucker for a double tracked vocal. The chorus here is pretty catchy and doesn’t overstay its welcome. It makes me think of a rough fight scene in a movie.

Frosty The Showman:
The instrument choices here bring to mind something like a DnD bard. In a good way, of course. It begs people to gather around and listen to this tale. I’m glad for the change in sound around 2:08. It keeps it from dragging on too long like I was worried about at the beginning.

Johnny Cashpoint:
The rising lines of “never felt less alive, than on the day that I died” were so good and a lovely contrast to the crunchy sound leading up to it. The intermittent distorted guitar gives it a good disjointed feeling of what it’s like to feel alone in a big house (if it’s okay that I take it a bit literally). You start to go crazy and it feels like so much is happening all at once in a room with only you.

LYNKEN:
The last 10% is always 90% of the work. Felt like I spent forever trying to balance everything to sound right. I only had one or two shots at the vocals before sending this in, which explains the tired, robotic sound, but I kind of dig it. Definitely was going for a love life after death theme, with a story of a ghost falling in love with the inhabitant of his abandoned home. I tried to evoke those times when someone you want to be close with seems to be like they’re in another world…

Pigfarmer Jr:
I’m sorry to hear about your hand! I love the instruments here though so it seems like your experimentation is paying off. The length of the sections of this song are great. Just when you settle in, you get whisked away to the chorus and the lyrics pay tribute to that. Great job.

Robyn Mackenzie:
The harmonies here are great. I like how the song’s instrumental builds over time with more and more sounds being added. Such a different sound from the rest of the entries. Your lyrics really paint a picture here and are well structured. I always felt like the pre-chorus was going to lead into the line “Never Felt Less Alone” because of the sound of “soul” and “bones”. But that’s more of a me problem than anything!

[Lunkhead]

Pigfarmer Jr wins!

[Pigfarmer Jr]

Wow. Mental note to self: hurt hand more often.

[Lunkhead]

Ah, I didn't realize the reason for the switch to mostly piano, just reading up in your self-review now. Sorry to hear about your finger! Hope it's better soon. You did a good job switching to piano though. It sounded natural even though it was a change up from your usual style. Good singing on that one too!

This was a good crop of songs all around. My favorites were Robyn and Elektromöose but I enjoyed them all. Nice work everybody!

[Future Boy]

I finally managed to get my song recorded for this title: