Video Game Music (with orchestras)

August 14, 2005 5:58 PM

Video Games Live, a game-music-with-orchestra concert tour, has gotten lots of press; videogame music's gettting new attention.
posted by Tlogmer (10 comments total)

Co-executive produced by . . . Clear Channel Music Group

Urgh . . . so conflicted. Also Tommy Tallarico kind of makes me want to throw things.
posted by jenovus at 6:21 PM on August 14, 2005

I'm glad that some people are starting to take video game music seriously. Whenever I see a contemporary tv show or movie where video game sound effects are represented by pong-like bleeps it infuriates me to no end. Video game music has matured tremendously over the year. Some games, like Katamari Damacy, have soundtracks that are so good they are almost a selling point to the game.
posted by joedan at 6:48 PM on August 14, 2005

I love good video game music, but it annoys me when game developers license radio hits to use for their soundtrack instead of composing their own material. Then the media latches on to the works of Snoop Dog or Green Day and such as "gaming music". That's not gaming music!

I wrote a whole long rant on this over at my gaming blog, but in a nutshell I feel that gaming music comes from classic themes of Mega Man, Super Mario, Sonic the Hedgehog... something without mainstream marketability. Tossing today's flash in the pan into a video game doesn't make it video game music. Not to me.
posted by Servo5678 at 7:11 PM on August 14, 2005

This reminds me of a site I found a while ago: Lucido Felice Quartet, a string quartet that has video game music in their repetoire (as well as pop music arrangements). They used to have MP3s online, but not anymore. I downloaded a few before it was too late, but I didn't take any of the game ones, alas.
posted by easternblot at 7:45 PM on August 14, 2005

I hum/whistle/play Mega Man themes all the time. Ditto for EarthBound. And I bought the Katamari soundtrack. But any time a game features music by Good Charlotte or Primus or who-the-fuck-ever I just end up muting it.

Have you heard the music for the (freeware) game Cave Story? Now that is some classy square-wave stuff.

Why do I feel old all of a sudden?
posted by jenovus at 8:01 PM on August 14, 2005

(Although I should mention there are some patch bugs in the newer version of Cave Story, so download the game from the Home of the Underdogs if you are interested. You can download a music player (!) from the developer's page if you like; it is the second link.)
</derail> . . .?
posted by jenovus at 8:07 PM on August 14, 2005

I used to do the Sonic the Hedgehog level select cheat so I could hear the music from the sound test.
posted by danb at 10:21 PM on August 14, 2005

If you're partial to videogame music, especially metally covers of such, check out the Minibosses... and see 'em if you get the chance, they put on a great show and sound even better live.
posted by davelog at 10:43 PM on August 14, 2005

For other video game music, check out The Advantage, The OneUps, and Saskrotch.

/music genius
posted by Mach3avelli at 12:17 PM on August 15, 2005

Ditto for EarthBound

Scored by the great Hiro "Hip" Tanaka, greatest VG composer of all time!

I was doing live-action video game music for a while too, but a lot of the songs we wanted to play were a little outside our reach.

Mach3avelli: man, I love playing Saskrotch for people. Most of them have never heard anything like his mixes.
posted by sonofsamiam at 1:08 PM on August 15, 2005