Welcome to my music page. This is a place where you can sample some of the songs I've written and love them or hate them just like I do. The songs are presented and numbered in the order they were recorded so you can hopefully see some progress as an artist.

I've taken the liberty of marking my favorite songs with , the aTrain mark of approval. This may give you a chance to see the disconnect between the things I make and the things I like.

For you technophiles, all of the songs were created with Sonic Foundry's Acid 2 and Acid 3. The songs contain a mixture of loops created by other people and ones recorded by me with my keyboards. All of the songs are in a high quality variable bitrate format. Unfortunately, the encoder I use creates files that won't report the proper length of the song so they may cut off early in some players (like the player built into the WindowsXP browser - but it works OK in Media Player and on a Mac).

If you have any questions or comments, please let me know at aaron@aaronhurley.com.

The title says it all. This is the first song I created in Acid after I won the software at NAB in April of 2000. All the loops in the piece are included on the CD that came with the software. (4/2000)

Gee, can you figure it out? Yup, the 2nd song written in Acid. It also uses the included loops. (4/2000)

Growing tired of the included loops that came with Acid I bought a 10 disc set of loops at Best Buy. Some of them were weak but they still form the backbone of my loop library. Here I worked on chopping and tweaking the voice to create a melody where none existed. (4/2000)

Using some rap style vocals out of the loop library I went to town. Not great but at least I broke the 1 minute barrier. The opening bit was me trying to get "analog" in the spirit of Moby's "Play." It didn't work. I had much more success on the next song. (5/2000)

Pray My Name

Finally, a song I like from the early period. Its the first song that is a complete musical thought. These vocal loops were part of the DataBeker library and I was trying to create something that had a more "earthy" feel to it and it worked great. No one else seems to like this as much as I do but what can you do? If you're interested, the name comes from the lyrics being sung. I have no idea what the women really say but the end of one of the main sections sounds like "Pray My Name" so there you go. (5/2000)

Ken and Janet were getting married and I decided to do a remix of the classic wedding march for them. I downloaded the march and chopped it up. Then, I recorded my own voice for the speaking parts and because I didn't have a good microphone I mucked up the sound so that it sounded strange. I'm not sure how I ended up sounding like JFK but I did. People make fun but the Scooby Doo ghost voice at the end makes the whole thing work. (5/2000)

Lay Down

This started out as a joke follow up to number 6. Since I made a song for their wedding I decided to tell them I made a song for the honeymoon and used some moaning sounds found in my main loop library. I like the music quite a bit and it works as a whole. Just don't listen to it with kids around. (6/2000)

I don't remember writing this song too much. I do remember the title is taken from some lyrics I had been working on after some marital difficulties with the Mrs. but that is it. I do know it was the longest song to date. (7/2000)

Somewhere Else

The sounds of people in the background at the beginning of the song is an homage to "Somebody" by Depeche Mode. I had a set of sound effects CDs I wanted to use and it seemed like a good idea. At least I admit when I rip someone off. (7/2000)

Like #8, I really have no real memories of writing this song. I remember sort of rediscovering it lately. It has a cool feel to lots of parts of it including the melody near the end being carried by telephone DTMF tones. It has really grown on me but I have nothing more to say. (Fall 2000)

I thought it would be really cool to remix the Violent Femmes' "Blister in the Sun" and this is the beginning of that. I still think it would be neat to do someday but I've never found the time to revisit what I started here. (Fall 2000)

I wrote this while staying at my father in law's condo somewhere on the west coast of Florida. All I had was my laptop and the loop CDs but they weren't loaded on my system. So, I created the entire song from loops on one CD so I wouldn't have to switch them out. OK, its not much but I needed an anecdote for this one. (Fall 2000)

Another one? OK, the dark period of my career. The song itself isn't HORRIBLE but it's missing something to set it apart. I do like the industrial sound of some of the percussion late but I'm just searching. (Fall 2000)

I know, it doesn't sound like a Christmas song. I've planned on writing a Christmas song for years and I didn't want it to be the same tripe everyone always plays. (12/2000)

This isn't really a composition for its own sake but the background music for a flash project I made for a failed dot com (is there any other kind?). I think it actually stands on its own pretty well. While I was paid for the project as a whole, this would probably be considered the first time I made money composing music. (12/2000)

Like "Pray My Name" the title comes from what I hear being said by the "vocals" in the song. Kind of cool at the beginning but no idea where to take it...which is why it goes schizo towards the end. (1/2001)

Leaving

A brief experiment with classic acoustic instrumentation. It has a nice thing going but I just need more acoustic loops to pull off anything more in the vein I'm thinking. (Spring 2001)

More experimentation with acoustic and orchestral instruments as loops. I like this song and think it is catchier than it deserves to be. Nice juxtaposition of industrial, orchestral and world beat elements. (Summer 2001)

Just one of those things to kill time. No real point or memories regarding this piece. It seems to have quite the appropriate title. (Summer 2001)

I was listening to Digital Underground's "Humpty Dance" and liked how the strange bass line is made up of just a low sliding rumble. I decided to investigate that a bit and created the basis for this song. The title is because I wrote this song instead of working on a movie like I really wanted to. As proof of my own avoidance I named the song for exactly what it was...not a movie. (Summer 2001)

This song is made up of snippets of loops from the following songs: Billy Joel's "Pressure", Fiona Apple's "Fast as You Can", the Delfonics "Didn't I Blow Your Mind this Time" and Duran Duran's "Wild Boys" and "View to a Kill." I think it works at the beginning but had nowhere to go so I dropped in the vocals from the CDs I own. The guys say "Higher" a lot so that's what I called it (see #5, #16). (Summer 2001)

Broke

I don't remember much about writing this song other than I had no money when I did it. A bit slight but a song I rather like for the little whirling whip sound and the break down that happens around the 2:30 mark. (Fall 2001)

Why is song 24 called 30? Simple. I wrote it around the time I turned 30. While it was a tough birthday for me I don't think I was quite as angry as the song indicates. I wanted to try something "heavier" with some electric guitar loops I'd gotten but I still found myself adding softer elements to it. (9/2001)

Don Pablo

I was so excited we were going to Don Pablo's for lunch I decided to put together some of the Spanish guitar loops I had acquired and create this little ditty. I really like the counterpoint in the guitars and how they come together at the end. One of the coolest songs on here and it started as a joke...just like #7 did. (10/2001)

This song started with me hearing how some different and non musical sounds sounded. I started throwing them into a rhythm that you hear at the beginning. I really liked it and it seemed to go somewhere on its own. The name comes from the Enneagram Personality Types. Regina was telling me about it the evening I wrote this. Turns out we are both classified as "Epicurean" in this test so that became the name. (11/2001)

I still intend to write a Christmas song. This could work as another song in the future and it has some cool things going on even though it is just a short idea at this point. This is the first song on here where you can hear me sing as I hunt around for a melody that might be usable. I'm not a great singer but you can tell what I had in mind any way. (12/2001)

Weird for Me

This song was named sort of like #26 in that I remember hearing this phrase around the time I wrote it but I have no idea in what way, etc. Considering this song is only a few months old, I don't remember anything about writing but it has a kicking little drive to it and some cool piano parts. (12/2001)

This is a song of all original loops except for the drums. I experimented with a range of instruments and playing some loops backwards. It ended up sounding like incidental music for a James Bond movie so that is how it got its name. (1/2002)