GAME MUSIC CDS
REVIEWS
PART 2
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| Album : Gran Turismo 1 & 2 |
| Reference : SRCL-4269 & ? |
| Publisher : Sony Music Entertainment |
| Released : 05/21/98 & ? |
| Composers : Masahiro Andoh (Ingame Tracks), Isamu Ohira (Menu Tracks) |
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| Gran Turismo 1 : | Gran Turismo 2 : |
| | |
| 01 Moon Over The Castle | 01 Moon Over The Castle |
| 02 Kiss You Good-bye | 02 Blue Line (Vocal Version) |
| 03 Like The Wind | 03 Never Let Me Down |
| 04 Get Closer | 04 Blade |
| 05 Freedom To Win | 05 Call Of The Wind |
| 06 Nobody | 06 Blowing Away |
| 07 More Than Living | 07 Hot Tin Root |
| 08 Going To Extremes | 08 Get Into It |
| 09 A Man Of The World | 09 Blue Line |
| 10 Green Monster | 10 Moon Over The Castle (Type-R) |
| 11 Second Chance | 11 Welcome Back G.T. |
| 12 Like The Wind (Vocal Version) | 12 Windroad |
| 13 Toward The G.T. | 13 Poker Face |
| 14 The Motorious City | 14 Gold Rush |
| 15 Joy Of Garage | 15 The Drift Of Air (Version 2) |
| 16 Take Your Dream On | 16 Soul Of Garage |
| 17 Turning Point | 17 Get Ready ?! |
| 18 Mr. 4WD | 18 You Made It ! |
| 19 Beat The Corner | 19 From The East |
| 20 Final Lap | 20 The "Real" Motorious City |
| 21 The Drift Of Air | |
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| Comments : |
| |
| Racing games are my favorite type of video games, the story begans a long |
| time ago with Out Run and it reached Gran Turismo 1 & 2 recently. These |
| games are the most realistic car simulations i've ever played with all the |
| available cars, the various upgrades and tuning (Damn ! Only the whells can |
| be self-tuned, i wanted to add an aileron ... ;). |
| |
| And these games are some of rare car games which feature instrumental rock |
| soundtrack. But that's only for the japanese version, because the european |
| version got lame techno musics (these are good exemple of the fast made |
| techno shits i described in Einhander album review :) and the US one is full |
| of "top-charters" featurings ... |
| |
| In fact the soundtrack of both jap. episode is composed of : |
| - Intrumental rock during the opening and the race itself, these sounds like |
| Satriani or other guitar heroes as these are mainly composed of long |
| guitar solos but also feature great organ solos. On both CD these are the |
| first ~10 tracks. |
| - Jazz-funk during the menu and the ending, these are generally small pieces |
| of music (even named as "bonus" on the CD) expecting The Drift of Air, |
| which is more than 3mins long. On GT1 album, there are more funky pieces |
| than on the GT2 one. On both CD these are the second ~10 tracks. |
| |
| Both episode got the same opening music (on second album it features a piano |
| solo at the beginning and there's also a "Type-R" version which sounds more |
| synthetiser orchestrated, nice alternative). For the ending, there are songs |
| with feminine english vocals and instrumental versions of these are also |
| present on the albums with sax solos instead of song. These songs aren't the |
| best i've heard, but it's okay. Also both episode features The Drift of Air |
| music, in GT1 album this one is more funky and on GT2 album more jazzy, but |
| allways great. |
| |
| My favorite one is GT1 soundtrack. But i can't explain why ... Perhaps |
| because i allready listened to it more times than the second one. These |
| musics are perfect for this kind of game and listening these during real |
| driving is great, but can be dangerous because of the fast driving spirit |
| (erm, joking ! ;) ! |
| |
| Important note about these CDs : |
| |
| As i wrote previously, these two albums are the soundtrack of the japanese |
| Gran Turismo games, but there are also albums of the US version soundtrack, |
| so beware !!! The best thing to do is to check the tracklisting or the |
| reference of the CD (i don't got the one of the second album ...). |
| The GT1 jap. album is available at : http://www.animenation.com and the GT2 |
| jap. album is available at : http://www.synsoniq.com. |
| There is also a remixed album of GT2 japanese soundtrack called Gran |
| Turismo 2 "Extended Score Groove", but i don't how good it is, so once again |
| check the title. :) |
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| Album : R4 : Ridge Racer Type 4 |
| Reference : ZMCX-103 |
| Publisher : Media Factory Inc. |
| Released : 01/27/99 |
| Composers : N. Ohkubo & T. Nakanishi |
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| 01 Urban Fragments 14 Quiet Curves |
| 02 Turn the Page 15 Motor Species |
| 03 On Your Way 16 The Objective |
| 04 Garage Talk 17 Move Me |
| 05 Spiral Ahead 18 The Ride |
| 06 Pearl Blue Soul 19 Movin' in Circles |
| 07 Naked Glow 20 The Parade |
| 08 Your Vibe 21 Epilogue |
| 09 Lucid Rhythms 22 Ridge Racer - One More Win |
| 10 Thru 23 Ready to Roll ! |
| 11 Silhouette Dance 24 Party's Over |
| 12 Burnin' Rubber 25 Eat'em Up ! |
| 13 Revlimit Funk |
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| Comments : |
| |
| Contrary to Gran Turismo, this game is not a simulation, but an arcade game. |
| That means that you don't have to choose tons of settings on your car, you |
| can get really weird cars and the driving won't be ultra-realistic. In other |
| words, it's more fun ! :) This game is the fourth episode of the Ridge Racer |
| series. |
| |
| All the Ridge Racer episodes featured techno soundtracks. The one in Ridge |
| Racer (episode 1) and Ridger Racer Revolution (episode 2) were very "simple" |
| dance tracks, with even well know voice samples like some you could hear in |
| old commercial dance musics. In Rage Racer (episode 3) There was allready a |
| kind of fusion between techno and rock. |
| |
| Ridge Racer Type 4 soundtrack is once again techno/drum'n bass with rock, |
| funk or even acid-jazz influences. All these styles add a great touch to the |
| music and makes it away from basic and boring drum'n bass. Some tracks sound |
| like Prodigy recent work, with trash guitar and ultra-fast beat. |
| |
| The track 22 "Ridge Racer - One More Win" is the main theme and got some |
| funky feminine lyrics. Track 19 "Movin' in Circles" is a remix of this song. |
| There's also a Pacman theme remix, track 25 "Eat'em Up", also filled with |
| sound fxs from the old game (This track can be heard when winning the Pacman |
| car in the game, RR4 and Pacman are both Namco games ! :). |
| |
| My favorites tracks are : |
| - Track 7 "Naked Glow" features a fast breakbeat along with funky guitar |
| accords and a piano melody, this music got several "disctinct" parts, |
| there's even a great bass guitar solo. |
| - Track 9 "Lucid Rythm" is kind of "ambient" stuff expecting the drum'n bass |
| beat. The piano melody is so nice. The accords in background are |
| enchanting. |
| - Track 12 "Burnin' Rubber" is the most rythmical track of the album. There |
| are lots of brass and vinyl record scratching. |
| |
| After Einhander, here is another different and good exemple of great techno |
| music in video games and after Gran Turismo another different and good |
| exemple of great car game music. :) |
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| Album : Super Mario World |
| Reference : WPCL 233-4 |
| Publisher : Warner Music Japan |
| Released : 02/25/91 |
| Composers : Koji Kondo, Sadao Watanabe (Disc One Arrangements) |
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| Disc One : | Disc Two : |
| | |
| 01 Welcome to Mario World | 01-12 Super Mario Bros. |
| 02 Super Mario World | 13 Super Mario Bros. 2 |
| 03 Morning of Yoster Island | 14-43 Super Mario Bros. 3 |
| 04 Mario ! Stay Alert ! | 44-72 Super Mario World |
| 05 Thank You, Mario ! | 73-96 Sounds Effects |
| 06 Super Mario Bros. | |
| 07 Shining Coral | |
| 08 Go ! Go ! Raccoon Mario | |
| 09 Mario Club Band | |
| 10 Peaceful Kinoko-World | |
| 11 Good Night, Mario | |
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| Comments : |
| |
| This album is a kind of tribute to Mario musics, which were composed by |
| Nintendo main musician : Koji Kondo, who was also responsible of Zelda or |
| Kirby games scores. Note that contrary to the title, it doesn't only |
| features music from Super Mario World but also previous titles stuff (NES |
| episodes not Gameboy ones) and as this has been released when Super Mario |
| World came out on Super NES, you won't hear musics from Mario 64. |
| |
| The first disc is the principal one, it features jazz arrangements of the |
| various Mario themes. In general, i don't really like Mario musics, i mean, |
| during the game it fits perfectly the atmosphere but it's mostly child |
| themes (expecting the great underground music in Mario Bros ;). But with |
| these jazzy instruments and arrangements, it sounds completly different ! |
| All kind of jazz are used here, from slow one to rythmical one with some |
| extra flavours like track 8 which sound a little bit reggae (but not too |
| much ;) or track 9 wich sounds like a circus band. My favorite track is |
| number 4 which covers the old ghosts level music, it starts slow with an |
| instrument which sounds similar to the original one (in the game) then the |
| drums comes and brass replace the main instrument, in the middle of the |
| track it sounds again like the game and after a while the arrangement change |
| to a groovy stuff and it's a disto guitar which plays the theme with |
| extended solos ... MARVELOUS !!! The musicians are really long experienced |
| ones cause these for someone who never heard originals musics, it would hard |
| to think that it comes from the child-Mario-games, believe me ! :) |
| |
| The second disc is a kind of encyclopedia as it features nearly all the |
| musics of Super Mario 1, 2, 3 and World episodes. It's not really listenable |
| as a complete CD cos some themes are stressing ones or too basic ones (for |
| exemple Mario Bros musics were the first ones composed for the NES so it's |
| really simple synthetic tunes) and all certainly too short ! On this disc |
| are also present, as a kind of database, all the sounds effects from Mario |
| World, quite fun. :) |
| |
| So in my opinion it's more a one CD album with a bonus CD than a two CDs |
| one, but the first CD is so great. Last note is that this album is nearly |
| impossible to find as it's nearly 10 years old ! |
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