U.N. Squadron

[AeroZ]

UN Squadron

WIP

http://freijman87.googlepages.com/UNsquadronWIP.mp3

[Thylacine]

I'm not a big music critique person, but I'm glad to see someone covering one of my favorite songs in this soundtrack ("Minks" being my #1). Throwing in the submarine's theme was a nice touch and varies the track well.

The song has a good build, but I have some issues with what you're choosing for your bassline. It sounds incredibly... well, boring. I tried jumping around in the track, and things sound identical near the beginning and end. Even in the middle, the bass line only has minor adjustments to it. I would suggest free-forming it and making it a little less predictable. I'm not sure if you can do that with whatever program you're using, but it would be worth the extra work to take a more creative role in the bass instead of having a pre-fab line in the back. It feels like a car engine: moving things along, but nothing too impressive. Make it sound like an actual human is playing those drums and hi-hats.

The main "techno" instrument entering at 0'23" doesn't strike me as something that'll win over the judges' hearts, but it does the job. I'd add a little more depth to it. Being someone who has no experience in this, I can't give you any more advice than that and would suggest waiting for other commentary to give some more criticism on how to adjust it. I liked the intro's build-up.

This game is my favorite game - not one of, but THE favorite - and part of the problems I'm having with this is that the source material was very deep and multi-faceted. The rock guitar built up to the saxophone, and everything meshed well with the action. I felt like I could close my eyes and still control the game based solely on the music. After 1'14" and until 1'55", there doesn't seem to be a lot of direction to the piece. There may be some other areas, but I feel like I'm rambling at this point.

As far as arrangement goes, I liked it. It needed a little more variation at the end, because it started feeling like a re-tread. Everything up to that point - 3'30", if I'm not mistaken - was really good as far as differentiation from elsewhere. Based on what I've read in Judges' Decisions, this is a great strength of the track.

I'm sorry if I'm being too harsh with the commentary. I will say that this is much better than some other excursions into WIP I've made before. You've got a great start here, and I'm looking forward to seeing it in the judging forum.