The Campaign Builder's Guild

What is the soundtrack to your gaming experience?  Is it classic orchestral?  A crazy rock/bebop fusion?  Soothing instrumental?  Do you have one at all?

I'm asking this as a DM who considers the entire aural experience of gaming as important as anything merely verbal, visual or textual.  For me, the use of musical ambiance plays a large role in the players' immersion in the fictional environment.  My music of choice is as follows:

Anything by Nujabes (popularised by Samurai Champloo) - good travel music, especially through unfamiliar or magical environs, or simply as a way to relax the mood.  I've found that some of his more upbeat and fast-paced tunes can lend a bizarre, disconnected, or absurdist atmosphere to combat.

Akira Yamaoka's Silent Hill contributions - I suppose it kind of goes without saying that if it's in the Silent Hill soundtrack it's a little twisted and no small bit creepy, but Yamaoka has a certain flair for it.  Good for psychological horror, or any situation where you want to weird your players the fuck out.

Anything by Nobuo Uematsu - many folks think Uematsu has never been better than when he composed for the SNES instalments of Final Fantasy, and that may be true.  But for me, his later tunes (especially IX and X) really achieve a great fantasy atmosphere with little to no Medieval connotations.  Ten, especially, has great music for the occasion, and some of the music can be employed specifically for "boss" encounters. (A word of warning, though: do not use the standard battle music; it gets old fast) Even X-2 has something to offer if you're interested in a more hip, modern, jazzy approach.

And a "Nature's Sounds" or "Sounds of the City" compilation is never out of order.

But I digress...

What music do you play by?  What is your gaming soundtrack?

Hmmm... all of the above sound like good ideas to lift ASAP...

for something a little unexpected, I'd say Radiohead does some good music. Usually, anything with words is a bad idea, but... I guess mumbling doesn't count. Also, Gustav Holst's Planets are always good. I especially like Saturn. I've had at least one DM who used the Mummy soundtrack. Good times.

I find movie soundtracks to be some of the best things to use during a game for my group. Some of my more favorite would be Dragonheart, First Knight, Interview with a Vampire, Matrix Reloaded (just the orchestral), Star Wars and Star Trek.

I find though with my current Heavy Gear game that Nu Metal (Disturbed, Lacuna Coil, KoRn) tends to give the needed sound for 15 foot mechs thrashing each other.

Lacuna Coil FTW!

Honestly, though, I've found Midnight Syndicate to be great for games with a more gothic, creepy feel. Soundtracks for video games work as well as movie soundtracks, especially Homeworld (usually for sci-fi) and Warcraft III. Also, some of the classics work wonders too - A well timed moonlight sonata when approaching the vampire's castle is a beautiful thing, and unveiling the demonic overlord of the BBEG is sooo much cooler when done to Beethoven's 5th Symphony, preformed by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, or to Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor.

In modern games, the sky's the limit. My players still talk about the time I had them attend a rave, and increased or decreased the volume of the techno depending on how well they did on listen checks, realistically simulating their ability to hear over the music.

The whole raising/lowering the volume idea is a masterful touch.

And how could I have forgotten Midnight Syndicate?!?

I must be castigated and flagellated for my folly...

Also, I recall once when I had the players encounter a Creature-From-Beyond-the-Stars, and I employed a nigh-imperceptible high pitched whine to get the players on edge.  It worked well - a little too well.  Combined with the dimmed lightining and my musical selection (not to mention my artistic rendering of the beast itself), they ended up being too stressed to finish the encounter!

Which goes to show: too much ambience can be a bad thing.

A lot of post rock bands can do pretty well for this.

examples are Sigu ros, mogwai, and especially explosions in the sky.

also, for dramamtic combat,, you can't go wrong with Carl Orff's Carmina Burana (specifically O Fortuna)

O Fortuna FTW!

I stopped using music, when I stopped playing vampire. I find music too distracting these days, (then again I tend to sing along with anything I hear, almost reflexively). If I had a good singling voice this might not be as much of a problem...

QuoteThe whole raising/lowering the volume idea is a masterful touch.

Thanks, I was rather proud of myself. :)

I do tend to avoid anything with words as much as possible, unless it's for a specific use. (IE, the PCs are in a club, or at a concert, or something.) Words are distracting for me as the DM.

O Fortuna is amazing, especially for epic battles. I used the techno remix once for space fighting, it was fun.

Just had a thought.
Since a lot of games around here are pbp, this can make music both harder and in a way easier.

What if for a game (especially an IRC game) the dm set up a internet radio station or podcast that the players listen to.

What do you think?

I'm not familiar enough with the internet to know if such a function is possible, but if it is, IRC just kicked up a hypothetical notch.

Quote from: Salacious AngelO Fortuna FTW!

Our college choir recently performed the whole Carmina Burana, which I have on CD.  Though I have not actually played D&D in some time, and have never really considered playing music during such sessions, I imagine certain tracks from this would be high on my list.  It jumps quite nicely from the tense (O fortuna, fortune plango vulnera, estuans interius) to the joyful, and then with a few bawdy tavern parts ("I am the bishop of gambling," "drink drink drink drink" and so on) thrown in.

Also:

The Gladiator and Pirates of the Carribean soundtracks.

Any 'Dead Can Dance'.  Ambient music of all kinds, particularly some Brian Eno.  Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan for eastern themed games.  Classical music in general.    

There's this fairly recent anime called Welcome to the NHK here: http://www.mrpc.us/fansub.htm
It has an excellent soundtrack, especially when it gets into the whole "conspiracy" monologues.

Quote from: Wrexham3Any 'Dead Can Dance'.  Ambient music of all kinds, particularly some Brian Eno.  Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan for eastern themed games.  Classical music in general.    

Seconded.

I find that most dance/trance tracks contain too many vocals/unfitting beats to suit most rpgs. Really, when you're fighting a Beholder, the last thing you want to hear is someone singing about dancefloors.

I used to plan out big soundtracks with various movie, video game, and TV show scores, but nowadays, since we play mostly online, I just don't have time or inspiration.  Here are some examples of things I used:

Batman Score (Danny Elfmann)

Last of the Mohicans Score (Randy Edelman)

Star Trek VI Score (Clif Eidelman)

Buffy and Angel TV Show Scores (Christophe Beck, Robert Duncan, Robert Kral, Others I don't know the name to)

Various Classical and Romantic Symphonies and Operas (Giacomo Puccini, Gustav Mahler, Franz Liszt, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Mily Balakirev, Modest Mussorgsky, Nikolai Medtner, and Pyotr Tchaikovsky) - As you can see, I tend to like the darker music more than anything else.

If I were to still use music for sessions, I would probably use:

Serenity Movie Score

Firefly TV Show Score

Lord of the Rings Movie Score

Lost TV Show Score

X-Men 2 Movie Score

Spiderman 2 Movie Score

Batman Begins Movie Score

Punisher Movie Score was pretty good and had some nice parts

Harry Potter Movie Scores (especially PoA)

That's about it for now... if I think of more, I'll add.