Video game music has evolved over the last 30 years. What was once simple blips and beeps are now orchestrated masterpieces, and the composers who write these works of art garner fanbases like any other developer or musician. Names like Jesper Kyd, Inon Zur, Koji Kondo, and Nobuo Uematsu are immediately recognizable to their fans for their work. But I'm not going to be talking about any of them today. I'm going to be talking about Yoko Shimomura.
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Shimomura has been composing video game music for years. No, really. Her first major work was writing the soundtrack for Street Fighter 2, back in the early 90's. Yep, she's the one responsible for Guile's Theme. This theme song should be immediately recognizable to any video game fan or internet denizen. It garnered meme status with the "Guile's Theme goes with anything" meme back in the early 2010's. Even Smooth McGroove did an a capella cover of it!
It's kind of funny, because her family didn't really approve of her going into video game music as a career. She started out as a piano teacher in a music store before applying to work for Capcom. She wrote music for a couple games before Street Fighter 2, but SF2 was the first game where Shimomura was, for the most part, the sole composer of the soundtrack.
Since then, Shimomura has gone on to write music for A LOT of well respected games. She's the mind behind the Super Mario RPG soundtrack, mixing upbeat melodies with a sense of danger and adventure:
But her real claim to fame is composing the soundtrack for the Kingdom Hearts games. Each location has a distinct style to them, which is not easy! I love the theme from Traverse Town, one of the first areas you land on. The song feels like home. It's welcoming, makes you want to put your feet up by the fire, and spend time with your loved ones.
And yet, when you listen to Hollow Bastion theme, it's a very different sound. There's this urgency, this unease. It's like the music pushes you to press forward, rushing your way through the area. There's something cerebral about the Hollow Bastion theme. It's a beautiful design, yet punctuated by the impending doom awaiting Kairi and Riku.
But for me, these games pale in comparison to one other game composed by Shimomura: Legend of Mana. This gem on the PS1 is one of my all time favorite games, partially because of the soundtrack. I personally believe Legend of Mana to be Shimomura's Swan Song, and the pinnacle of her work. Sweden's Sinfonia Drammatica performed a Legend of Mana concert in 2009, and Shimomura was in attendance at the concert! This is their performance of the Opening Theme from the game:
I still get chills when I listen to this song or even think about it. It's that good! But that's only one song out of many. The music fits each and every location, and every bit of story. Legend of Mana is unique in that the game's plot is broken up by many small stories, some of which come together to form larger story arcs. My favorite story arc, the Faerie Arc, is a winding tale. Four childhood friends are now at war with each other. Escad and Daena are fighting to prevent Irwin, a half demon, from sucking the life out of Matilda. The arc culminates in a battle against Irwin on the head of a giant zombified sky serpent. Irwin is attempting to resurrect this serpent to destroy the world. And the boss fight music? Well, have a listen yourself:
Does that sound like a boss fight song, or does that sound like a boss fight song? I put this song on par with Force Your Way from Final Fantasy 8 or Those who Fight Further form Final Fantasy 7. It feels like a boss fight song. The whole soundtrack is like this. It's beautiful, it fits the world, and honestly, it's the best of Shimomura.
Gotta say, I had a lot of fun going through youtube pulling up the music for this post. I hope you enjoy the music as much as I do, and I want to challenge each and every one of you. I want you to make a post about your favorite band. Share it with #hive-193816, the Music community created by @uwelang. Share a bit about what you love about them. Make the post drip with your enthusiasm for the band. Make us fall in love with the band, just like you did.
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