Feed Your Brains (through your EARS)

So, driving the fifty-five minutes home from work today, I felt an irresistable urge to pillage, plunder, and kill off major characters with no warning. I soon realized it was because I'd gotten my iPod stuck on "repeat" on the Game of Thrones soundtrack by Ramin Djawadi.

 

If you've seen the show, the main theme triggers an almost visceral reaction...a bone-deep feeling of 'shit's about to happen'. Maybe it has something to do with the phenomenal title montage, maybe just because I like the show almost as much as the books. Regardless, the music is what we call 'strong shit' back in Texas. Even if you've never read the books or seen the HBO series, the music is literally soul-stirring. If you don't feel a shiver from the main theme, you have no soul. Negative soul. You are a soul vacuum. And you suck.

Like Ned Stark, I'm one brooding bastard.

I can thank Ramin Djawadi for yet another notch on my soundtrack-loving belt: he did the soundtrack for both Medal of Honor reboots, and, like Game of Thrones, it is solid work. He has a great feel for mood, and he slips an accent of eastern melody into his arrangements that sneaks up like a Rufie in your Zima. Being the obsessive product of 21st century fandom, I Wiki'd him and found that he's a protege of the ubiquitous Hans Zimmer. No big shock there.

So, you ask: Why are you, the gaming Stick in the Mud, bitcher and moaner and theorist of games both video and tabletop, writing about music? And not even Lady Gaga or whatever refuse is currently spewing out the Top-40 sphincter...nope. This is weird music. What many would consider classical music. No words. No AutoTune(tm). No twerking, for Chrissakes. What is this shit?

It's game stuff, that's what it is. Video games. Tabletop games. Movie soundtracks, or, better yet, trailer themes. It's something most people take for granted, but they're seeing the sewer and missing the gold mine. Theme music, fools.

I got started in 'theme' or 'positional' music when I bought Midnight Syndicate's Dungeons & Dragons on CD. Of course I bought it: it had D&D in the title. Ostensibly 'mood' music to be used at the gaming table, it's also 'strong shit'. You can cue it up and let it roll, and the music takes you places. Paradoxically, you can cue it up and do other things (like make a Savage Worlds character) and the music doesn't intrude. It's there if you actively listen, but it fades into subliminal mood-setting when you don't. From that perspective, I guess it's the perfect accessory to the gaming table: it sets the mood without getting in the way. Yes, I've used it at the table. Yes, I got some funny looks. No, I didn't cue it up for special encounters. I just let it run on repeat, like elevator music. I think it worked. We had good game, and that's endorsement enough.

I've preached enough. All of you video gamers and tabletop grognards, give this shit a shot (say that three times fast). It's easily overlooked stuff, especially with the daily deluge of garbage constantly assaulting our eardrums. I'll leave you with a recommended listening list, and hopefully it will get you started with washing the contagion of Miley Cyrus out of your ears.

• Halo 3 Official Soundtrack   Marty O'Donnell absolutely laying it down. One Final Effort still makes me sniffle.
• Gaming Fantasy   Taylor Davis is just this violin-playing kid who does her own arrangments of video game soundtracks. The kid puts a whole new twist on Legend of Zelda and Skyrim.
• Any Battlefield Soundtrack   Okay, Battlefield 2142 is my favorite instrumental them of all time, but the soundtrack isn't available on CD or legit download. I got a copy of from a somewhat shady site I found from a Google search. Epic. That's the only word for this music. I know it's an overused word, but screw it. It really is epic.
• Two Steps From Hell  Two guys who make tons of movie trailer themes. They have one hell of a catalog, and Thomas Bergerson does solo work as well.
• The Greatest Video Game Music   The London Philharmonic (no shit), covering video game themes. Sure, some of it is cheesy (did you really need a symphonic version of Angry Birds?), but it hits some sublime peaks, including Battlefield 2 and Halo 3: One Final Effort.

Just because I feel charitable, I'll leave with Catelyn Stark sitting on the Iron Throne. When you're my age, Cat is the hottie of Game of Thrones.