Creepy Atmospheric Music suggestions?

[Hob Marshmallowfoot]

A few suggestions:

Kronos Quartet,: the Dracula and Requiem for a Dream soundtracks
Dead Can Dance: Towards The Within; Cantara; Orbis de Ignis (and many others)
Tin Hat Trio: Foreign Legion; Width of the World (they also have quite a few other creepy tracks)
The Red Violin Soundtrack

 

[Argyle King]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ftld7Ohojg&feature=related]YouTube - carol of the old ones[/ame]

 

[thedungeondelver]

The players will be going to a haunted mansion in game in a few sessions, so I wanted some ideas of some creepy atmospheric music songs I can play to help set the mood.

Tubular Bells from The Exorcist
Nightmare of Elm Street theme

Jaws was pretty creepy music-wise, but it's also at sea.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

Richard Elkind and Wendy Carlos' terribly, terribly frightening treatment of "Dies Irae" for the original soundtrack of THE SHINING cannot be overlooked (as it were).

On the topic of Kubrick films, consider also Abagail Mead's electronic ambient score to FULL METAL JACKET (there's a handful of "period" pop music, nothing your dinosaur golden oldies station hasn't beaten into the ground).

Trent Reznor's score for QUAKE has some good spots in it.

 

[Ariosto]

Old computer-game soundtracks using the SID chip (in the Commodore 64):
"The Eidolon" by Charlie Kellner & David Levine
"Forbidden Forest" and "Beyond The Forbidden Forest" by Paul Norman

The Norman pieces tend to the high tension kind of creepy.

If you have .sid files, then SIDPLAY can export them as MP3.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

[ame=http://www.amazon.com/99-Essential-Chants/dp/B002C1ZYVA/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&s=dmusic&qid=1293608508&sr=1-12]99 Essential Chants[/ame] - another one from the '99' series on Amazon, $5.99.

The Auld Grump

 

[NewJeffCT]

Old computer-game soundtracks using the SID chip (in the Commodore 64):
"The Eidolon" by Charlie Kellner & David Levine
"Forbidden Forest" and "Beyond The Forbidden Forest" by Paul Norman

The Norman pieces tend to the high tension kind of creepy.

If you have .sid files, then SIDPLAY can export them as MP3.

thanks - will have to look it up...

 

[Nadaka]

Not really music, but you can get the background audio files off an old copy of one of the fallout video games, I can't recall which one at the moment, very good for natural ambiance. Also one or two of the pieces off the X3: Terran Conflict sound track are creepy, but most of them would not be appropriate.

 

[Ariosto]

Rimsky-Korsakov, Tchaikovsky, Borodin and Mussorgsky produced dramatic pieces in all the various moods. Some may be overly familiar, but those are just portions of larger works.

The same is true of other classical composers, of course, but those Russians come to my mind first. (I am afraid I cannot recommend any particularly suitable pieces off the top of my head).

If you have access to a public or school library, then you should be able to browse through, and borrow, many such recordings.

Among movie soundtracks, I seem to recall The Killing Fields having some good creepy pieces.

Another SID tune: "Driller" by Matt Gray. This is actually a long one, developing through different (but mostly not upbeat) moods over about 8:40.

 

[Knightfall]

I suggest you look up the band Midnight Syndicate. You will immediately recognize them since their cds are often used for the sound track at various Holloween Attractions.

That was going to be my suggestion.

 

[Vicar In A Tutu]

Try using Lustmord. He was the driving force behind "dark ambient" in the 80s and 90s. I have used it in my game to great effect, it really unnerved my group while still "staying in the background".

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCLa6drPdjg"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCLa6drPdjg[/ame]