Not to make this too wordy, but critiquing is helping. Any one thing you hear that the artist didn’t is a big deal.
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I get what you are saying. I think if you have a group of individuals who all are into the same genre of music, say heavy metal or classic rock, and you post a song for feedback to that group, you are probably going to get the group to suggest ways to alter the song in the direction of their genre, or what there tastes are. So if I post a post-rock song, the group is most likely going to think that its a off the mark version of the classic rock and they may try to steer you back to the classic direction, not knowing that post-rock is very deliberate in how it is NOT classic rock. It is almost anit-classic rock. But to one who is not familiar, or even aware of post-rock, they might just think you suck at rock and your drum is way to deep and heavy, not knowing that it is the thing in post-rock. So you are stuck either trying to explain to everyone what you are trying to achieve (your sound goal) or just saying, “okay, great, thanks for the input on bringing the drums way back and killing the lows on it.” On Jonathan’s side, I can see where you just want feedback, what ever it is, so you can maybe see something that you don’t see. And you don’t want to have to read up on post-rock and listen to the top 10 post-rock songs to prep for your feedback. I think in the general bash part, if maybe a person posts a song and then describes what it is they are looking for in terms of specifics, as mentioned, then others have an idea of what you are looking for feedback.
This is an excellent point that that it really is a relationship when you ask someone to give you feedback. There is a level of commitment and a degree of depth to the feedback given. It can be simple as “too much bass drum” or it can be very detailed and explained why the bass drum is too much.
Does this dress make me look fat?
I think the over arching factor in all of music being posted is that we all secretly or not so secretly post our work, not just for feedback, but for kudos. We are hoping that someone will say that the song is the best song they every heard, we don’t really want that much feedback. So when someone says “yes, you do look fat in that dress” they are really taken back. When I give feedback on Reddit Songwriters, I am always bracing myself for the person who gets upset over the feedback. Most of the time, it is well received, even when the feedback is not good at all. It really is all in how the news is delivered.
“I think that is a lovely dress, but with your particular beauty, I think when you don’t show so much in a dress, it is more attractive my dear as it leaves one to wonder more about your hidden beauty”.
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Right, though I think that’s a bit challenging on an internet forum like this. This is kind of like the “speed-dating” of audio. That’s why the “artist development” thing appeals to me, but I’m not sure that’s practical in these circumstances.
Yup. all things tend to work themselves out the the best way OVERall to be done. Not the very best, but the general best. So the internet will automatically work itself out to the natural way for the path of least resistance. So it ends up just a quick, short, simple, feedback on your whatever you post. You can’t legislate people into doing anything much different. No one is going to follow the rules of a forum, they are just going to do what they want and thats it in the end.
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This segment of Warren Huart’s FAQ Friday spoke to me. The last half of the video (I time-stamped it for you 
) he talks about The Role of an Audio Engineer. He talks more about recording than mixing, but I got the sense of “rethinking old habits” along the lines of what inspired this thread. He talks about getting the sound that you want, and mentions “feel” though he doesn’t go into that in great depth.
It’s about a 7-minute listen.
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