Didn't comment on this when I first listened to them last week, but the second track is awesome. Chilling in a way that reminds me of the Super Metroid title screen, which is a beautiful thing.
And unfortunately yeah, they took out the best parts of the first one.
Edit: To be more specific, I meant the mood of the track, since it's obviously an updated version of the SM track. Few music tracks in the Prime series gave off that same kind of mood in my opinion, but this one pulls it off well and I hope that Other M's music as a whole goes in this direction. Not trying to say I don't like what they did for the Prime series, since I love a lot of those tracks, but this reminds me more of the way the music from the older games (and Fusion to an extent) was like. More haunting/chilling/alien than energized/action oriented, if you know what I mean. Not that those are exclusive to either type of Metroid game, since pretty much every one has a mix of both types.