Doom Maps And Music

[Monsieur E]

Music plays a pretty obvious role in reinforcing a map's atmosphere so to speak

It can compliment a map's melancholy (think Grove, Elysion, Sunlust 08), its horror aspect (alot of episode 2 and the backhalf of e1 do this, think e1m5, e2m4, e2m6), establish a slower pace (Zzul Bases map02), the action of doom (Sunder map05, Dimensions map01); to list a few examples I can think of.

So I'm curious, what are your favorite combinations of map and music in Doom? Keep in mind they don't need to be purely complimentary, they can even be absurd and have that work in its favor. Anything goes

[bofu]

The only general "rule" I have is that the weirder the level, ideally, the weirder the music (though I also have no issue with weird music accompanying normal levels; the reverse, I feel, is a little bit of a wasted opportunity).

 

Maybe I'm biased as this is what I do, but I like when a larger project has varying types of music. Not everything needs to be the same genre.

 

That being said, there are some level/music I'm very fond of:

 

- Gothic cathedral/library/castle levels with classical music/organ (optional: the genre of the music switches between the two)

- Cavern or swamp levels with pitched percussion sounds (xylophone, marimba, etc)

 

I'm also the sort of guy who will drop a peppy ska or Latin track between moody string or synth tracks in a megawad, though.

Edited February 23, 2024 by bofu

[Sneezy McGlassFace]

My mind immediately went to the Mucus Flow and Jade Earth. Without the music, the maps would not have nearly the emotional impact they have.

Also the entire Snax's Abscission has a incredible tailor-made soundtrack that I can't find on youtube atm, so I link the wad instead.

[stephyesterday]

oh, where to start. Maps and their music have a very intimate connection to me, as Doom wads and music albums share a similar feel and vibe in my eyes. A couple specific cases that come to mind:

- Her Prospering little BSP Tree (MAP02) from Goodwad. Making a somber texture-gore HOM mess the second map in the wad, right after a blistering scrolling floor platformer, is already brilliant, but the track elevates it. There's something sad about the state of the world you enter, especially after you clear out the monsters; all you hear is the rhythmic chunking of the raising and lowering lift, as the dismal, grim flutes echo through the visual disaster.

 

- Sad Bastard (MAP06) from 10x10's midi is literally Evacuate the Dancefloor by Cascada, and it's perfect. Having a silly midi rendition of a pop song in your map isn't what most people think of when they think of good map and music combinations, but with the opening shot of the fireblu and metal dungeon with the leather daddy cyberdemon standing right in front of you, it fits flawlessly. It's like he's challenging you to a dance-off by throwing high-grade explosives at you

 

- Get Hopping (MAP03) from Frog and Toad. This is perfect weird gimmick platforming nonsense music. Maybe I just have a thing for flutes.

[LadyMistDragon]

Brutal Schism from Map 19 Dehydrated of Eviternity. So enthralling, and with enough force to last for the hour and twenty minutes it'll probably take to complete it.

 

Donna to the Rescue from E3M2 but mostly E4M2 of Doom. Energetic and dangerous this one is, but it also helps it's one of the few midis whose tune i could pick out from the crappy sound card my computer had in 1997.

 

Otherwise, there's "Serenade of the Demons" from the Nectar Flow in Ancient Aliens. Such a lovely midi from what's visually at least a very pleasing map. They really go flawlessly together.

 

Then there's "Sanctum of the Wastes" from Ancient Aliens' "The Incessant Flow of Time" Really, there are many excellent map and musical pairings in Ancient Aliens but I'm just highlighting this one because of how it sets out the themes of the later episodes.

 

Then the midi of Symphony X's "Absence of Light" has to rank among the all-time great musical pairings. In your face, non-stop action and an undoubted sense of danger, this (like Dimensions' Map 01), there's no denying the impact of this track.
 

[Enzo Carozza]

"I Sought Wisdom in the Chalice But There Was None" by Vandalorian and @Cyb's Freedoom MAP25 pair together so well. I don't really know how to describe it.
 

[Maribo]

I Wish I Was Where I Was When I Wished I Was Here has been on my mind a lot lately, both the song itself and the map that it's paired with, and it is one of those cases where all of the puzzle pieces fit just right in a way that so rarely happens. The tongue-twister of a title is a perfect encapsulation of the feeling of stepping into that map and the feeling you'll have however many hours later. Men often wish for adventure, to be a part of something greater than them, only to find that they've been thrust something horrific and far beyond anything that they thought they could handle. Wonderful job, Dragonfly and ukiro.

[Kinetic]

Event Horizon's midi and beginning always really holds me. The beginning is genuinely anxiety inducing...the first notes literally sound like something just hit the building you're in or you heard something thumped against, or a door shutting, and then the midi sounds like a "realization moment" in a horror film that something has infiltrated whatever building/area/room you're in. It's so still, yet so tense, paralyzing I guess. The midi just feels like you're about to see or are seeing something otherworldly, ghostly, paranormal I don't know. The actual environment of the map is excellent too a dank dark cavern with some abstract human-built structures but no clear purpose.

 

The midi also feels very nostalgic, it often evokes auditory and visual memories of when I was a child playing COD BO1 zombies, and the new round sfx sounds like the midi a bit in my ears.

 

This is what the midi is called btw:

 

[Maximum Matt]

E2M2

[Orii]

SF2012 Map29... Can't hear that midi without associating it with 2 shotting 18 cyberdemons an hour into the level. They also compliment eachother very well, both being incredibly chaotic and harsh throughout whilst remaining memorable. I think my favourite thing about the combination is that they're both incredibly divisive, its hard to find a middle ground of "This midi is just alright." and "This level is ok.", they just work together in tandem and you either love the experience of you absolutely hate it. A perfect pairing of map and midi in my opinion.

[MFG38]

Some relatively recent favorites that come to my mind are Morior Invictus MAP11 and the Egypt maps in Scythe 2. If I want to go slightly further back in time, the intermission maps in BTSX E1 are definitely ones that tickle my particular soft spot for atmosphere. In fact, they sort of inspired MAP01 of ColdWire, with that being a monsterless intro map to set the atmosphere for the adventure ahead. ^{(Speaking of ColdWire, I should get back to working on that.)}

[yakfak]

Talosian map 02. so low key and stark. always underrated and underappreciated imo. early ALT maps have the same feel... subdued monster activity and a crushingly sad feel

 

 

 

the musical pairing i tried hardest with for my own maps was Northern Powerhouse - bouncing the theme of the level around for months without the soundtrack, I realized I HAD to remake a particular piece of music from X-Com which I knew'd fit the atmosphere perfectly!

[Phoenyx]

I've got quite a few so prepare for a Macbeth-length post here lol

'Ocean Flute' by Stuart Rynn - in Sunlust Map 21: 'Entering Aquatic Desert'

After diving deep into the darkness and coming out bloodied and bruised from Inverti in Darkness, hearing the first few notes of Ocean Flute is feels like the deep sigh you take after a really, REALLY hard day at work. Combined with the relatively low-key nature of Entering Aquatic Desert, it makes for a genuinely cathartic and blissful experience after the thick fog of oppression you just had to wade through. Even hearing it on its own is instant stress relief for me. This remains my favourite Stuart Rynn track even after 3 years and I will never forget the first time I heard it and how it made me feel after Inverti absolutely battered me. 

'UP' by msx2plus - from GOODWAD Map 27: 'Up'
Though similar to Ocean Flute and how it warmly welcomes the player into Sunlust's final episode, UP offers the same feeling of escaping the darkness after coming out one of GOODWAD's darkest maps: Derelict Heart. However, instead of simply bathing the player in the sunlight, UP gives the player the strength to fight back against the darkness itself rather than simply run away. As the map name suggests, in GOODWAD's twenty-seventh map, you are given a BFG and a rocket launcher to ascend up a rocky staircase in the middle of a dark but colourful void against hordes of imps, Hell Knights, Mancubi and Cacodemons. All the while, you are driven by UP's glitchy choir vocals, rapid strings and a wall of sharp pads. The subtle kick drums beat along to the sound of your heart as you begin your ascent out of the dark, through blood and screams.

 

'Orbital Ghost Ox' by Defilus - in I Can't Give You Anything Map 39: Daddy Forgot to Finish Coding Eyeballs

Very late into I Can't Give You Anything comes Dashie's final contribution to the mapset, the only map out of 41 dream-like spaces that I can truly call a nightmare. As a direct contrast to the melodic, floaty sounds in the rest of the WAD, Orbital Ghost Ox is a heavy, dark and droning ambient track with a few barely audible and broken pieces of any kind of melody buried deep within the darkness. The map itself is a fractured, broken mess of nodes and geometry that is hard to navigate. There is a thick darkness surrounding the area and with how mangled the map is and how corrupted the song sounds, it feels like you have gone too far into the dream and have reached the broken, repressed and incredibly dark depths of one's mind. 

'Ionian Isolation' by Tristan Clark - from TNT: Revilution Map 12: Transduction

I have probably shown already that I have an affinity for the darker side of map/music relationships...so here is another
On a dark October night in 2021, I played through Transduction. After the good times I had in the first episode and Tourniquet's 'Pourriture', killing demons and enjoying the amazing music in Revilution, I went into Transduction with a smile on my face...and I was immediately filled with an intense feeling of dread. 
The rock and roll of the last 11 maps has stopped and you are left with the terrifying sounds of deep space. One of the first things that will probably catch your eye is the words 'KILL ME' written in blood by a nearby dead marine on the door just to the right of where you start as you pick up the shotgun. Your first moments in this map are dead quiet until the drones come in from the MIDI, and then the quiet and eerie piano. Even when you do finally find things to kill, that feeling of anxiety does not wash away. Something horrid has happened here, and whilst there are a lot of techbases that show you exactly that, there are very few that make you FEEL it. Truth be told, I had a hard time sleeping that night.

'Undersea' by Esselfortium - from Back to Saturn X: Episode One - Map 25: The Unsinkable Fats Domino

Last one from me because I don't wanna take up the whole bloody page. Back to Saturn X: E1's epilogue map remains my favourite ending to a WAD ever and Undersea is what really sets that in stone for me. It is the perfect soundtrack to the blissful but tragic drowning of the player (I know that they don't actually drown but shush) after fighting like hell to get out of there in Tough Skin River only for the ship to sink and you are left engulfed by the deep, cold ocean below. It is peaceful yet hopeless, holds you whilst you silently and slowly suffocate, holds your hand whilst you fade away. It is such an incredible ending to the mapset and such a beautiful song. 

There's more that I could bring up but some are a bit more personal to me and I also just don't want to take up too much space. Thanks to anyone who reads this <3

Edited February 24, 2024 by Phoenyx

[Somniac]

I could go on for ages about how much I love Toxic Touch from Alien Vendetta with its use of Plasma, and how Plasma is probably my favourite MIDI ever, but suffice to say that pairing is absolutely genius IMO. Plasma is one of those MIDIs that can really elevate the right map, but it hits in AV MAP10 in a way that is really potent and inextricable, much like MAP20 of the same megawad.  

 

Another one I love is E2M7 of Solar Struggle with Gutter Penny. I didn't know that was originally made for a Heretic map, and the first time I heard it was in this map in Solar Struggle. The visuals of the map and the sombre, dense feel of the MIDI go together perfectly (much like the above), and really felt like they were made for eachother despite being totally unrelated, which I guess is the hallmark of great music choices for maps that aren't composed specifically for the map.