Music for C&C

[Hammerite]

I've been experimenting with sample-based music for some time, and I was just wondering if I could have some constructive criticism on these two tracks that I've made.
Thanks! 

Wires - http://www.box.net/shared/68fykycaso
Hurricane - http://www.box.net/shared/9egssh23o4

[Fee]

I really hate the drum beat in Waves.

Ruins it IMO. Otherwise, it kinda makes good background music for an underground or cave situation, perhaps even a spooky one.



Hurricane has a terrible bass track at the start, then it starts to get good, once that bass is gone.
Then the bass comes back a fucks the song up again.
The bass needs to be more in co-ordination with the other music.

Remove the Bass and itd be ok

[skitzo]

I actually liked the drum beats in hurricane, made it sound kind of tribal-ish-techno. In fact I didn't care for the parts that didn't have the beats and I really didn't care for the maraca sound... But then again what do I know. I'm Tone-def 

[eternal_renegade]

I like the overall feeling out of these. But I do think that these could be shorter, I didn't even listen to all of Hurricane  because for what it was, it just felt too long. And least all by itself, if what was being used for something specific then sure!


Now for Wires, it was chaotic, assuming that was the mood you where going for. For some reason everytime the drums kicked in, it reminded me of the JapAnime Movie Metropolis with their chase scenes.

[InCreator]

Hurricane is good, I don't like other one much - sounds like a jazz on drugs, so I concentrate on Hurricane:

* It's a solid base for ambient (trance) you have there. There's some tiny things needing to be fixed yet:
* Ambient is an evolving (progressive) genre.
That means that instruments do NOT simply "kick" in. They should morph, fade in slowly. Everything should be fluid and transforming.

Now, after the first bass-only portion, that spacey pad simply cuts bass and kicks in, making it quite a mess.
You have to find ways to make everything transform from one sound to another more smoothly. Easiest way for this is to reduce slowly volume on one sound and increase on another.

* The bass is too loud. I find nothing wrong with the bassline, it's "slumber-y" and very efficient capturing overall mood, but a bit too dominating over other sounds. Cut bass notes a tad bit shorter, turn volume down, etc

* Don't introduce listener to new sounds too rapidly, don't make quick changes. Play one hithat. Then add another. Then add kicks. Then another pad. And so on. Everything should evolve over time.

* Have more pads and let pad play all the time. In the middle it often stops. Why?

* The beat you've used is nicely muffled, but isn't enough to carry whole song. It's nice for a breakdown-type beat to relax from main beat, but it won't fit as main beat.

* I uploaded a portion (20%) of DanClarke's ambient trance mix (looks like his main link is down and I don't have time to upload whole 90MB thing) for you to listen. Maybe you'll understand more what I mean by my comments and how closely you got with your Hurricane song to that genre. It's here:

http://www.increator.pri.ee/muz/danabletonmix.mp3

Notice that it takes about 20 minutes to even reach full beat!
(Don't let the start of the mix fool you! It's the best thing I've ever seen at AGSForums)