Miracle of Sound: Legends of the Frost featuring Malukah

[rickthetrick]

That was pretty dang awesome!
I'd be jealous of your talent if you didn't share it with us like you do.
Keep rocking on!

P.S. Actually still a lil jealous

 

[Nurb]

I think it would sound better without the dude's voice doubling or whatever, but that's just my opinion. When it's just a single voice or a plain duet, it sounds much better.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Will this be on Level 2? There will be a Level 2, right?

Yes and yes More than likely in June/July.

Would be great without so many effects on the voices. It kinda doesn't fit with epic fantasy songs for me. A natural version would be great.

Reverb/echo = bad.

Cool song tho.

I understand, it's a matter of taste really. I used that reverb because to me it implies the feeling of vastness in Skyrim. It also fits with the idea of it being sung in a large Nordic hall. Also I just like the way it sounds

 

[Flukey]

Will this be on Level 2? There will be a Level 2, right?

Yes and yes More than likely in June/July.

Really? I didn't think it would come until the end of the year

So... potentially... Level 3 this year as well? That's probably starting to look too far ahead, right? Although you can be sure that I, for one, will be buying them if you keep making music this good

 

[Ziame]

not jumping on Malukah-love bandwagon. I personally prefer your vocals, Gav. And English

 

[personion]

The voicework was great and fresh and the song itself was very nice but I didn't like how there were the pictures of the people singing in the corners.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

As always, lyrics are simplistic and could be improved. You need a writer.

You seem to be implying that simple lyrics aren't good lyrics. It's a very naive writer who assumes 'more complex' is better.

In fact I would define good writing as writing that uses the simplest and clearest language to communicate one's point.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

I'm just giving you a suggestion of what to try improving, and an opinion on how to go about improving it.

That's where I'm lost - I don't see your suggestion on how to improve it anywhere. Unless you mean the 'hire a writer' comment - which is not exactly helpful and is, quite frankly, rude - and the kind of comment that prevents me taking your following opinions seriously.

Unless you consider your songs perfect, in which case I obviously don't know what I'm talking about and can't appreciate good music. But I don't think that's the case.

No, of course it's not. You'd have a tough time finding any other musician who takes as much fan criticism on board and uses it to shape future songs as much as I do.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Listen, I spoke my mind. I didn't intend to govern your business decisions or whatever you may think I'm implying, but I do get a bit irritated when you reply to subjective feedback with "no, you're logically incorrect, simple writing is objectively good". It smells of hubris, regardless of how much you flatter yourself afterwards.

You're kind of strawmanning here. Self flattery was not present in any of the previous posts.
And yes - simple writing IS objectively better writing in a situation where the primary goal of the piece is to clearly communicate something specific to the audience.

But I did have good intentions. Since you took the time to reply, here's some more in-depth clarification with examples from your latest song:

Raise your mug
To the legends of the frost
Through our songs
They will never be lost

Tales that will never be lost
Kept in the legends of the frost

You're repeating the same thing here. We get it that they'll never be lost, and that they are, in fact, legends of the frost. No need to dull the song by saying it in the verse and again in the chorus.

That's where we differ. To me the slightly varied repetition there does not dull the song, it emphasises the main theme - the bards.

Look at a song like 'Killing In The Name Of' - its the same 2 lines over and over then one line over and over, yet people instantly sing along with it every time they hear it. Would you also call that bad writing?

Once and always
A part of history
Long remembered
Warriors be

Distant thunder
Echoes of the past
Through our voices
Forever to last

You have the opportunity of using words to create a picture here, but squander it on repeating (again) what was known since the second verse. It feels like you're trying to drag a single idea through multiple verses, like you don't have anything else to say and just want to get it over with.
How about, say, briefly recounting the actual tale of some legend in a way that flows with the song (unlike the dragonese keywords that no one would get until they read the lyrics)? Something like:

Spoiler: I suck at poetry, it's just an example

Distant thunder
Clashing of the swords
Of gods begotten
Warrior hordes

Unforgotten
Glory of the horn
Echoes rise
Through ages borne

Crappy, but it helps me paint a picture of ancient battlefields better than the above quote, which pulls me back to the ones who sing it far too much to keep me immersed in the subject at hand (the actual legends). It's like the song is not about the legends as much as it is about the bards' bragging.

The song IS about the bards. Basically your complaint is 'your song is about the bards but it should have been about the ancient battles.'

Every lyric in the song is there to communicate the idea of the bards being storytellers. Your suggestion would make the song about the battles themselves. 'It's squandered because it's not how I would do it'.

You don't suck at poetry by the way. I actually thought what you wrote was rather good - but just not for this song.

And going back to Clay Carmine, here's an example of a thing that irked me:

Now the cities are laid to ruin
And we fight on through the years
No end in sight no light of hope

Quite a nice picture those words paint. Unfortunately, it's destroyed instantly by the very next line going "Man, don't it just grind your gears". So I'm taken from a gloomy, ruined battlefield and hopeless battle for survival straight to... Family Guy. Yeah.

Please. Context.

That's a reference to 'Gears' Of War. It's light-hearted and tongue in cheek in the face of great tragedy - just like the Carmine brothers' characters in Gears Of War. Most people who have given feedback on that line certainly didn't feel it 'destroyed' the verse but in fact added to it.

Please don't go on and rebute all of these complaints as if they were the only problems I had with your songs. They are just examples of the trend of simplistic writing in your songs that doesn't really go anywhere, in my opinion.

I'm sorry but I can't agree to that. If you bring up specific examples the only logical way to respond to address those. Otherwise you are just saying 'here's my side' and shutting down the possibility of a two sided exchange.

Still, thanks for the feedback. Whether I agree or not I appreciate you taking the time to at least explain what you meant.

 

[Hadrian42]

I thought the entire piece was great. I really liked Gavin's Dova(?) lyrics, and I am curious as to their style and source of inspiration. Where might I find something similiar?

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Then why'd you call it "Legends of the Frost"? You'd think a song called Legends of the Frost would be about, well, legends. Of the frost.

The answer is quite evident in the chorus. 'Legends' has a double meaning. In the chorus it refers to the actual legends: the tales, the stories, the songs.

It does not, as you seem to feel it does, refer specifically to the subject matter of one particular legend or story, which in your proposed hypothetical case was a great battle and the heroes in it. We're getting into very petty semantics here but that is why the song is thus titled. The subject matter of the legends is up to the listener to decide, minus a few vague hints such as 'Long remembered warriors be'.

The very fact that the song put that image of ancient battles into your head tells me it did its job as intended. It fed your imagination!

In other-words, the whole point of the song is to celebrate the bard culture in Skyrim, not to tell any particular story.

 

[Proxivire]

First time commenter. (mostly because I couldn't figure out that you could also comment here, without a Facebook account )

This song came in on Spotify a while ago, so I've heard it a bunch of times already, through a MoS playlist that gets played more than just about anything

I like how it sounds "full", musically, with the highlight where you both start singing, it puts up a really nice wall of melodic sound.

I can't, however, enjoy it
I keep hearing lost-frost-lost-frost over and over, it dominates the lyrics and feels repeated so many times that it wrestles, overpowers and ultimately kills my enjoyment of the song as a whole.

I seem to be in the vast minority though, so it's probably just me

I do want to say, to end off on a positive note, for "Khajiit Like To Sneak" I was desperately trying to find a way of leaving a message or sending an email or whatever to say that it was an absolute eargasm, I love the f-ck (are we allowed to say that here?) out of that one. Guess I didn't look well enough, but there it is.

The above goes for pretty much every song you've put out, but Khajiit made me feel like I just had to comment.

Looking forward to what's next.

 

[Macgyvercas]

Legends of the Frost featuring Malukah

A bonus song featuring Malukah [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114508-Modern-Bard-Performs-Skyrims-The-Dragonborn-Comes] for those who missed it on Youtube.

Watch Video

Gavin. Your singing voice. I want it.

And for the record, your songs would have made me buy Skyrim if I hadn't intended to get it in the first place (over 350 hours logged thus far. Game kicks ass).

 

[Random berk]

Its a struggle not to shiver when you listen to this song. One negative thing I would say about it is that the lyrics are very repetitive compared to other MoS songs, but the combination of the two voices makes for a haunting, beautiful effect. Skyrim has a lot of different tones depending on what you're up to, and this fits perfectly with wandering the far Northern ice sheets at night under the Northern Lights. For some reason it also makes me think of the deep ocean, I suppose because the dragon against the night sky was sort of reminiscent of a large ray or similarly slow moving fish.

No doubt most of this has already been said, but I'll bet I'm the first to talk about fish.