Thank you, Schala, for another year of doing all of this work for everyone's enjoyment!
I was lamenting how few soundtracks I liked from this year. I have to admit that my gaming tastes have become pretty narrow (Japan-developed or Japan-inspired games galore), and to be quite honest, I tend towards melodic music over all else, even at the sacrifice of subtlety or innovation. As a result, I tend to shy away from a lot of soundtracks that nonetheless deserve praise. After some time checking it out (in no small part to the nominations here), I have a hunch that I would have nominated The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt for second place had I heard it during the year, but it’s a bit too late for me to really dig into that soundtrack, and I kind of want to save it for when I hopefully play the game in the coming year. So all I've got this year is a shout-out to a soundtrack I enjoyed and a single nomination.
Honorable Mention: Atelier Shallie: Alchemists of the Dusk Sea
In 2013, I nominated Atelier Ayesha – the first game in this trilogy – as my runner-up for soundtrack of the year. While Atelier Shallie’s soundtrack does not carve out quite as memorable or unique of a musical identity, it shares the spirit of its predecessor: that of a lovely, whimsical fantasy adventure brushed with shades of pensive, melancholy, and serene mood, setting it apart from traditional JRPG fare.
This iteration of the long-running series sees young composer Hayato Asano take on a leading role. Stylistically, he’s a great fit with his cohorts Daisuke Achiwa and Kazuki Yanagawa, who also do some good work on this soundtrack. Achiwa’s work is often a bit too straightforward for my tastes. Speaking as an Atelier neophyte, he reminds me a bit of Motoi Sakuraba, having worked on a fantasy franchise for too many iterations and steadily losing creative steam. Still, his straightforward composing style can create simple and effective moments like
Aquamarine, with its small collection of instruments and a soothing, hummed melody.
I praised Yanagawa in my nomination for Ayesha – his work really seems to align with the Dusk trilogy in its atmosphere, as well as a pleasant and engaging sense of melody. Check out
Abundant City of Water and
Sanctuary of Water (noticing a theme here? I love the drips of water in this song, by the way), and the battle theme,
Sweep! -Part 1-. Speaking of battle themes, just as the story of Atelier Shallie is split between two protagonists, so too did Yanagawa and Asano split responsibility for the battle themes, creating 3 versions of a battle theme for each protagonist that steadily increase in intensity throughout the story, kind of (in a crude comparison) like Rosalina’s Observatory from Super Mario Galaxy. Yanagawa also gives us
The Beat Octopus, a bit of a bizarre number with something of a tango feel – at least for a moment, before becoming a pretty groovy rock number. Huh.
To be honest, while Yanagawa’s work on Atelier Ayesha is still my favorite in the series, it’s really Asano who does the heavy lifting on Atelier Shallie’s soundtrack. Melodically he’s close to Yanagawa, but with a more upbeat and percussive sense of rhythm. I really like the united hits of the clacking percussion, strings, and piano in
Red Light, which is one of my favorites.
Handball and
Explain! have a fun vibe to them – the little inflections and trills in the melodic parts certainly lend to this. I feel like on the whole his battle themes here, the “Stella” series, are better than Yanagawa’s “Sweep!” series. You can check out
Part 1,
Part 2, and
Part 3 here. Part 2 is my favorite, though I like parts of all three. He provides a quieter, more somber moment with
In the Feelings of the Bereaved, and an epic Atelier battle theme in
Jump From Being Hazy Clouds, which is a pretty sad Engrish translation, isn't it. Anyway, it’s a great spread, and I look forward to more from him and the GUST gang in the upcoming Atelier Sophie.
1. Undertale
If my Undyne avatar didn’t already give it away, I join the masses in nominating Undertale for my soundtrack of the year. Surprise, surprise.
If you didn't know: I love melody and leitmotifs. And that is why Undertale is my jam, my peanut butter and jam, my space jam. It’s one of my favorite soundtracks from the last five years, no doubt.
When Toby Fox talks about his composing in interviews, about picking up instruments without a musical background, about hearing tunes in his head and integrating them into the soundtrack fundamentally unchanged, he does so in such a blasé way that it reinforces my idea of Undertale’s soundtrack being whipped up in a fever dream. That’s not to say that this soundtrack is a one-hit wonder – indeed, that’s a hard argument to make given that the soundtrack itself is a whopping 101 tracks long. Rather, I mean that this soundtrack has a lot of heart.
And here I go again, using abstract, touchy-feely words to describe music. This soundtrack’s greatest strength lies in these melodies, and there are so many strong, memorable melodies here. Some people think that the goal of a melody is to be catchy, and while catchiness is not a bad thing, I think that melody is capable of much more. A melody can evoke an enormous variety of emotions and sensations, and Undertale uses its melodies to color in its world and cast of characters, creating a point of memory that the player can reminisce about and return to. “Catchiness” speaks to memory in some way, perhaps, but not to emotion. I think emotional ties to this music surely play into why, less than four months after Undertale’s release, there has been a huge splash in Undertale remixes. There are some really damn good ones out there, but this isn’t the place to talk about that.
That isn’t to say that there aren’t songs on this soundtrack whose best attributes are their catchiness.
Enemy Approaching is a hell of a normal battle theme, and I commend any composer who can create a normal battle theme that I won’t tire of.
Ghost Fight and its counterpart
Dummy! are great fun, scat-jazz pieces inspired by an early era of rollicking jazz.
Dating Start! is awesome, and more eloquent minds than me can do the rest of the work on that one. Even tracks with smaller roles to play are no less of a joy to listen to –
Stronger Monsters and
Can You Really Call This A Hotel, I Didn’t Receive A Mint On My Pillow Or Anything (what a great Mother-esque name – and a song that reminds me of Mother 3 and Hotel Dusk, two of my all-time favorites, to boot) come to mind.
It’s Raining Somewhere Else is literally a single moment in the game, but it is a wonderful, pared-down moment with a noir feel and a background susurrus of city bustle.
Shop is a 50-second loop that I could easily listen to ten times on repeat. It’s so simple, but it really fits the sensation of the places where it is used – chilled and plucked on the outside, but warm and relaxing on the inside.
Quiet Water is an even shorter loop with even less going on, which makes me wonder how it creates as much as atmosphere it does. I feel that it’s just a spot-on representation of the place in the game it’s used in.
People bemoan the lack of cohesion from piece to piece, and the mix between chiptune, electronic music, and natural instruments. I found it all wonderfully eclectic in the same vein of the Mother series – each change in genre and instrumentation made for a fresh change of pace, particularly when each change brought a fantastic new melody with it. Compare the heroic
Spear of Justice with the frenetic, ghosting
Amalgam – both battle themes, both completely different in vibe, both super dope.
But it’s really the link between melody, memory, and emotion that gives this soundtrack, and this game for that matter, its “heart.” The way the guitar in
Home stumbles about is brilliant. It carries a leitmotif – one briefly introduced in the game's startup intro,
Once Upon A Time – that is later used towards the end of the game in the moving, eponymous
Undertale, a song with a slow, sad buildup that – how many times can he say it? – perfectly fits the moment of the game it’s used in, dredging up the warmth and heartache it has become associated with. It’s the leitmotifs that reel this all into a soundtrack rather than a mishmash of tunes, a continuous dream rather than a fitful one. Even more impressive is that the use of leitmotifs never feels forced – I missed a couple on my first way through the game and, returning to it, found new appreciation and theming in songs I already adored. I won’t be the one that draws out the impressive web of leitmotifs and all the story-related theming at play, but I await the day that someone does.
I want to recognize the songs that are everyone’s favorites, because most of them are also mine. They are all spoilerish, and I very much recommend hearing them in their proper contexts rather than here.
The neutral final boss theme, rightfully linked here with its intro, is probably my favorite of all. It’s one of my favorite moments in the game, too, and those things go hand in hand. I love the moment, eight seconds in, when the song breaks open. It feels like the most emotionally complex of the boss themes, solemn and climactic yet still somehow desperate, and the later use of a certain leitmotif, regal and stately before becoming punchy and aggressive, is unexpected and moving.
Hopes and Dreams (three million views?!) is pitch-perfect, a fist-pumping theme for an incredible closeout to the game that somehow manages to breathe new life into a jokey-sounding leitmotif.
Megalovania (six million views?!?!) is the embodiment of a badass showdown. And
Battle Against a True Hero (well, two million is still pretty good) is a frantic struggle which somehow carries a mournful air. Last but not least,
Bring It In, Guys! and Last Goodbye round out the soundtrack with a rousing sendoff, a well-composed pastiche of area and character leitmotifs that will send the memories flooding back through.
This is the rare soundtrack where the game’s music makes it moments. Its decisively drawn melodies create memories that bring the game along with it, with all of its jokes and characters, its confrontations and resolutions, its moments of heartwarming and sorrow. It’s a soundtrack that I won’t forget, which makes it a game that I won’t forget either.
