Why am I so noobish at picking custom music?

[HeroLinik]

OK, I had to bring this up after reading a review of SMSE that has now unfortunately been lost on Knux's forum. It apparently stated that Kirby music was used way too much, and Chad was marked down for doing this, as well as plucking tracks out of thin air.

I've been trying to avoid getting a negative review of the TGCA remake for musical reasons, but no matter how hard I try, I always have difficulty picking custom music for levels, and I often keep picking music from games that I've played to use in levels, and a lot of it is from Pokemon. Do you guys have this issue as well when picking custom music, and is there anything wrong with only using music from certain game franchises like Zelda or Kirby? What are your strategies for picking good custom music tracks?

[SuperWingedYoshi]

For me, custom music has to fit to what the level looks like and plays like. Sometimes I even choose the music first and make the level based on the music as I constantly listen to it while making, I think I did that in later phases of my CC9 level making.
In my CC7 contest level I picked Monkey Island music because the level was set on a pirate-ish airship, and Yoshi's Story music because I like Yoshi it just felt fitting for a more dramatic atmosphere.
I'm really not a guy who checks which game the custom music comes from. If it fits, then I don't care if it's 100% Mario, 100% Zelda or 100% Pokemon. It just has to fit to me. Speaking of SMSE, I didn't really see anything wrong with Chad's music choice.

For my personal music choices, I don't always pick music from games I've played. Of course I can only pick the music though which I've heard and approved. That's either the games I've played (mostly Mario), the games of which I've seen videos (mostly Mario as well, but other stuff too), or SMW hacks I've played and/or ripped the music from (which is a wild mix of music usually and actually my favorite source of custom music at the moment because of the diversity and the fact there's not that much of a sound-wise difference between SMW remixes of, let's say, Yoshi's New Island and Castlevania music as there would be between original Yoshi's New Island music and Castlevania music.

[JupiHornet]

For me the hard part is actually picking music, but I have a gigantic MP3 folder with every song from every episode that I have played (plus some of my own) that I pick my music from. Or I go on YouTube.no3 and get a song. This helps because my video game music taste sucks, as I learned the hard way from qig's contest.

[SuperMario7]

It's fine to pick music from games you've played. That's what I do for nearly all my music. You can still get a wide variety of tracks just from games you've played. But just look up the soundtrack for that game on youtube and see what fits. For more dramatic levels/bosses, I'll sometimes use music from movies, so you might want to think about that too. But that won't work in most levels so be careful.

[HeroLinik]

Speaking of SMSE, I didn't really see anything wrong with Chad's music choice.

I'm just gonna throw in the fact that it was Jayoshi who reviewed SMSE. He marked the music section down based on the fact that, according to his opinion, Kirby music was used too much, and this was also factoring in the idea that when SMSE was completed a lot of designers were using Kirby music in their levels. The reason I made this topic was because I was getting worried someone would mark down the TGCA remake for having too much Pokemon music or overused tracks such as SMG music. As the SMBX Community Guide: From Veterans to Everyone put it:

Your level's music must either belong to the Kirby Series or the Super Mario Galaxy duology.

[Mable]

As the SMBX Community Guide: From Veterans to Everyone put it:

Your level's music must either belong to the Kirby Series or the Super Mario Galaxy duology.

Pls tell me you don't take this Guide seriously. It's Garbage since michel wrote it.

There can never be enough Pokemon tbh. For myself i will use Pokemon ORAS in my episode.
You shouldn't worry that much about it. What counts is that people enjoy what you do.

[HeroLinik]

As the SMBX Community Guide: From Veterans to Everyone put it:

Your level's music must either belong to the Kirby Series or the Super Mario Galaxy duology.

Pls tell me you don't take this Guide seriously. It's Garbage since michel wrote it.

I don't even take this guide seriously. I've actually made an SMB1 level for that same episode, Winter Kingdom. That has Pokemon OR/AS music in it, although I am debating whether I should change it to something more fitting for a snow level.