1 minute was a typical duration of a song in NES games, and it wasn't much longer for Genesis and SNES games either. As they had to loop over and over again for hours, there was not much repetition within that minute.

Short songs are awesome. And most songs over the 2 minute mark usually have a lot of repetitive parts to form more of an arrangement any way.

There are a lot of cool short modules and as ant1 says, look up modland. Strolling around that FTP is a nice way to spend your evening anyway.

http://youtu.be/0_LPLmFq8ek

soleviio no worries my friend, i respect your knowledge of this stuff; i'm enjoying your tune flying on a sunbeam quite a lot right now. a sub 1 minute mix tape? brilliance. great idea

sketchman3, that's golden stuff. i suppose i've been limiting my melodies to fit within one milkytracker loop, and there's only so many ways you can permutate it before it gets old

I'm learning this the hard way. I set out to do a 3 minute tune, but end up fully developing the theme by the 1:45 mark, more often then not. Sometimes I'll get lucky.

However, I wonder if sometimes it's not really a case of the song naturally developing as a short tune, but just me not knowing how to let the listener digest an idea before moving on to another one.

That's what happens when most of your composing is with short video game loops, I guess.

Edit: As far as actual examples go, this is one of my favorites:

nah, I definitely caught what you meant. Sorry if my post came off as abrasive, haha. It would be interesting, though, if maybe the community put together a compilation of tracks that don't pass a certain limit (say 1:00 or 1:30). Would certainly be a melting pot of style!

I like smashing as much good music as I can into 3, 4, or 5 minutes

But I have done a lot of songs recently around 2 minutes. Just because I believe that's the direction the song seems to take.

I think a good album has a mix of the two..

i agree, i was seeking tunes that capture what the shortened length implies: a strong melody with simple instrumentation. just one idea. perhaps i've spent too much time on my super nintendo recently, and this has fallen a bit out of style. i've tried my hand at it, it's good fun (maybe even risen into the lower realms of mediocrity) (criticism appreciated if anyone has thirty seconds to kill), so i was hoping others would know what else is kicking around

i'm impressed with the selection this board has provided. word

Couldn't say it better myself.

But honestly, it is fun to challenge yourself too by trying to smash as much good music into 1:00 that you can

I think length is entirely dependent upon the musical material, to be honest. If you have a theme that keeps developing and developing, hell, let it develop as much as you want it to. If it's not developing much but the instrumentation is keeping things interesting, just cut it short if it gets repetitive--if not, let it grow. Length should be a byproduct of musical fluidity and arrangement, not the other way around.

Most of my favourite Radix songs are 1 - 2 minutes long. Here you go.

Also whilst not directly related, a lot of good VGM is just loops of short songs.

i listen to a lot of pop punk so most of my songs barely make 2 minutes now. i feel like shorter songs lend themselves to higher replay value, if that makes sense?

most of my tracks are like 3-6 mini songs in the same key

ant1 himself. it's a pleasure.

couldn't agree more

hrm i thought this was about filesize until i read it

but yes i am a real fan of the shorter songs but people don't seem to give them as much respect as a 5 minute song... and most peoples 5 minute songs only have about 30 seconds of musical idea in them anyway!

there are loads and loads of really short little module files if you look around at modland (i know looking for good music at modland can feel like looking for a needly in a haystack sometimes though) for example (modarchive has a minimum length requirement) and they will have more of an Old School Sound and won't be post hardcore punk rock