I bet every electronic artist has received criticism from other musicians about the quality of the sound or the techniques used to create it.
Comments usually state
“this is general midi” or “invest in some decent synths, I would recommend…” and it really is upsetting. Before I sell blood to buy the latest electronics and software I realize that the song this person is talking about has been downloaded thousands of times and has been played on the radio.
When I write a review at GOM I listen to the music on streaming audio just to hear the general content and structure of the piece. Then if it is interesting, I download the piece and listen to it on the PC and burn it to a CD and listen to it on a good stereo system before I would make any judgment on the quality of the sound or production.
Streaming Audio is a wonderful feature of the internet but it has its flaws and even with a high speed connection fidelity is compromised. Sound cards and PC speaker systems vary quite a bit. So the best way to determine the production quality of the piece is to download, burn and listen to it on the same stereo that you use to listen to other music , NOT your computer.
This is especially true for the musicians that think they can tell exactly what process(synthesizer,software) the composer used to create the music after hearing it on a stream. I am sure every electronic artist has heard the mantra of “it would sound better if you used…” and then they proceed to tell you exactly how you created the song. It is amazing how wrong these people can be. I recently received comments about my piano piece’s use of just a general midi piano which after using a Gigasampler made me wonder what are these people using to listen to music? Of course the answer is streaming audio, if the listener would have downloaded the file and burned it, the audio would be very distinct. Equipment and production quality is very important but it is eclipsed by a good composition and will be forever.
