Sonic Team - Sonic Adventure 2 Multi-Dimensional Original Soundtrack (2001)

CD1: 1) SA2 ...Main Riff for Sonic Adventure 2; 2) Event: Let's Make It!; 3) Escape From the City ...for City Escape; 4) The Mad Convoy Race ...for City Escape; 5) That's the Way I Like It ...for Metal Harbor; 6) Can't Stop, So What!? ...for Metal Harbor; 7) Won't Stop, Just Go! ...for Green Forest; 8) Keys the Ruin ...for Pyramid Cave; 9) Unstable World ...for Crazy Gadget; 10) Highway in the Sky ...for Final Rush; 11) Boss: -GUN- Mobile; 12) Advertise: SA2 ...in the Groove; 13) Event: Strategy: 14) This Way Out ...for Prison Lane; 15) Rumbling HWY ...for Mission Street; 16) Chasing Drive ...for Kart; 17) Down in the Base ...for Hidden Base; 18) On the Edge ...for Eternal Engine; 19) Advertise: SA2 ver. B; 20) Kick the Rock! ...for Wild Canyon; 21) A Ghost's Pumpkin Soup ...for Pumpkin Hill; 22) Dive into the Mellow ...for Aquatic Mine; 23) Deeper ...for Death Chamber; 24) Space Trip Steps ...for Meteor Herd; 25) Boss: Masters of the Desert: 26) Event: Reunion; 27) Advertise: Prof. Omochao; 28) Chao Race Extended Mix (Chao's Doki-Doki Banana Chips Run Mix); 29) Chao Garden Extended Mix (Chao's Wack-Wack Up & Down the Ground Mix)
CD2: 1) Vengeance Is Mine ...for Radical Highway; 2) Rhythm and Balance ...for White Jungle; 3) Mr. Unsmiley ...for Sky Rail; 4) The Supernatural ...for Final Chase; 5) For True Story ...for Sonic vs. Shadow; 6) Event: Conquest; 7) Hey You! It's Time to Speed Up Again!!!; 8) Still Invincible ...No Fear!; 9) Advertise: Rhythmic Passage; 10) Boss: Suitable Opponent; 11) Remember Me? M.F.M. ...for Iron Gate; 12) Way to the Base ...for Sand Ocean; 13) Trespasser ...for Lost Colony; 14) Crush 'Em All ...for Weapons Bed; 15) Soarin' Over the Space ...for Cosmic Wall; 16) Event: 3 Black Noises (Revival... Chaos Control... Reflection...); 17) Advertise: SA2 ver. C; 18) Event: Sonic vs. Shadow; 19) Bright Sound ...for Dry Lagoon; 20) Lovely Gate 3 ...for Egg Quarters; 21) I'm a Spy ...for Security Hall; 22) 34N, 12E ...for Mad Space; 23) Event: The Base; 24) Boss: Shut Up Faker!; 25) Scramble for the Core ...for Cannon's Core; 26) Cooperation ...for Cannon's Core; 27) Deep Inside Of... for Cannon's Core; 28) Supporting Me ...for Biolizard; 29) Event: Madness; 30) Event: The Last Scene; 31) Live & Learn ...Main Theme of Sonic Adventure 2

An ambitious, expansive and epic attempt to create something spectacular for Sonic the Hedgehog's first big anniversary ends up becoming the series' highest benchmark of quality.

Key tracks: "Escape from the City", "Kick the Rock!", "Live and Learn"

I've long cultivated an analogy of Sonic the Hedgehog soundtracks as a band discography for my own fun, and continuing on that theme, Sonic Adventure 2 is the sprawling, multi-disc epic created by a band that's high and lofty with ambition, unafraid to tackle any obstacle and wanting to expand their sound in every single direction. That's right - in the world of Sonic music this is the Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, the Sandinista, the White Album.

1998's Sonic Adventure brought Sonic to the 3D world, and in the process introduced and in some places codified many of the trademark elements now associated with the series. One of those was the music. The infectiously melodic sound of the original 2D games was obviously restricted by the hardware of its time, which towards the late 90s and the adoption of CDs as the primary format for games was no longer an issue, and so a reinvention was not only possible but in many ways necessary. Spearheaded by Jun Senoue, who had taken the step to become the primary musical coordinator for the series and who boasted some serious guitar chops of his own, the soundtrack for Sonic Adventure had a decent amount of variety as the music team took every advantage of the new sound possibilities, but above all it was tied together by Senoue's energetic and dynamic guitar-lead rock approach. The melodies were still present and in the forefront, but through Sonic Adventure, the entire series became synonymous with the revved-up riffs and solos that Senoue cast over the high-speed action, backed by his incredibly virtuosic band.

The release of Sonic Adventure 2 was the key event for Sonic's 10th anniversary celebrations, and the aim for the game was to make into the kind of an Event that an anniversary milestone should be. Thus, the plot increased the stakes and injected a fair bit of before unseen dramatic flair to the series, the level set pieces became more bombastic in an endless internal contest to one-up the previous level, and Senoue's soundtrack team were driven to be more ambitious to match the increasingly epic nature of the game. The main goal was to keep increasing the variety. While Sonic Adventure already featured multiple playable characters each with their own levels, the songs that played during the stages remained the same depending on the area. For Sonic Adventure 2, the decision was made for each character to bear their unique musical flair that would tie together their levels while making the journey of each hero (or anti-hero) stand apart from the others. The other big addition was the increased presence of actual vocals accompanying the music. The first game had already featured vocal themes for all the characters and so Sonic Adventure 2 kept up that tradition, but in addition the soundtrack team began to utilise vocals throughout the actual stage songs, leading to several stages having their own unique sung lyrics accompanying the songs. As a soundtrack it was bigger, bolder and more expansive than the already ambitious Sonic Adventure score - in every way possible they could think of.

The core of the Sonic Adventure 2 soundtrack is still close to the sound that Sonic Adventure introduced, so the familiar guitar-lead anthems are present throughout across the two discs, but there's now the added twist of each character having a signature sound that breaks the soundtrack into neat little stylistic sections. For half the characters, the songs are rooted in the core sound but with different emphasis points and variations for each one. Sonic's stage songs are appropriately closest to the signature sound and they're among most unabashedly energetic of the set, with a peppy rock attitude speeding through Senoue's guitar wails. They're the closest representation of the series' newly adopted main style and in doing so end up being the most instantly hit-like (if you can describe video game songs as such), and in particular the first stage song, "Escape from the City" has deservedly become an iconic piece of the series' history: it's a snappy pop-punk anthem with free-spirited vocals and some of the most infectious melodies of the whole series, combined with an outrageously feel-good chorus. Tails' and Eggman's stages skirt around the same direction as Sonic's, but Tails' sections slightly nudge the guitars to the side from way of bright keyboard melodies, while Eggman's part of the soundtrack makes the riffs crunchier and rhythms more appropriately mechanical. The quality keeps consistently high throughout, and in fact while Sonic's songs might be punchier, Eggman and particularly Tails' score are full of delightful arrangement details and hidden mini melodies underneath the big ones. They never stop sounding fresh, which is definitely a boon when you're repeating the same levels over and over again in search of the elusive A-rank completions.

The broader divergences come with the other three characters. Shadow the Hedgehog is a creature on a roaring rampage of revenge for most of his story, and so his stages take a darker atmosphere while the genre shifts into a mixture of drum 'n' bass, jungle and techno, aggressive hyper-active beats keeping the adrenaline flowing, with the heavily filtered vocals that are barely legible giving the songs an intense, brooding feel. Rouge's jazz pop grooves are the complete opposite, with bright acoustic guitars, horns and rhythmic wordless vocals dum-dum-duming across breezy, light-as-air melodies. And then there's Knuckles. In Sonic Adventure, Knuckles' character theme beared a big rap influence and for the sequel the sound team drilled down on this, with all of his stage songs showing off a hip hop vibe and coming with full rap verses, with barely any instrumental time in-between. They are also incredible. Knuckles' stage songs are among the most fun in the entire game - utterly and completely cheesy of course, because when you have lines like "echi-don-a, that's what I'm representin'" or "the great emerald's power allows me to feel" it's unavoidable, but they are delivered with perfection. Hunnid-P has a great, charismatic flow, the production is top-notch with a suave jazz-rap groove vibe, and there's hooks for days. "Kick the Rock!" is just as iconic as "Escape from the City", "A Ghost's Pumpkin Soup" should be a regular part of everyone's Halloween playlist, "Dive into the Mellow" defines chill-hop, and "Space Trip Steps" soars and floats appropriately. The downtempo "Deeper" isn't quite as flashy as the rest, but the sudden monologue where Hunnid-P out of nowhere enacts a dialogue between Sonic and Knuckles all in same breathless voice tone (and which never appears in the game, it's a soundtrack-only inclusion) is a moment of baffling creative madness that becomes the de facto highlight of the song.

 
In-between these, there's a scattered number of various cutscene scores (Event), menu music (Advertise), boss themes (Boss), minigame medleys and other miscellanea, all of which display a similar genre-fluid freedom. The only thing slightly less than exciting than the stunningly consistent rest of the collection is the orchestral suite "3 Black Noises" which by its very nature stands out and halts the flow, and the two Chao Garden (think of a tamagotchi side game that could very well be a game unto its own) medleys which are charming but, in lack of a better word, a little 'kiddy' at times; the Chao Garden mix has some nice background moodscapes, but the Chao Race medley can be a little too saccharine and like out of a pre-schooler show. Still, from a completionist point of view it's good they're here and at least they're at the end of the disc, where they won't break the flow inadvertently. The boss themes are great throughout, and the melancholy but defiant and determined "Supporting Me" is de facto one of the definitive songs of the soundtrack, and even the cutscene tracks get their chance to shine with the heroic introduction scene of "Let's Make It!" which interpolates Sonic's character theme (not present on this soundtrack set), and especially the bittersweetly beautiful ending theme "The Last Scene" being particularly great. And of course, there's "Live and Learn", the main theme of the game. "Live and Learn" is quite certainly the apex point for Crush 40, the Sonic Team house band who frequently perform the main themes for the games, as well as the series' overall greatest theme song, to the point that you could at this stage call it the main theme of the entire franchise - it's an iconic song and an absolutely top-notch anthem, full of great riffs, great passionate hard rock vocals (not normally my cup of tea but Johnny Gioeli gets my points), a fantastic middle-eight and a final chorus that kicks up the gear all the way to eleven as the final send off.

You take all that and combine that together, and you can make a very real and very strong case that the soundtrack for Sonic Adventure 2 is quite possibly the greatest of all Sonic the Hedgehog soundtracks. Given the overall rock solid quality control across the decades that the series has held onto in its music, even whenever the games may not have been all that, that's a pretty high and mighty claim. It boils down to how this acts like the perfect sweet spot for the franchise's music. The style that the Blue Blur is most associated with - the wildhearted rock anthems - is polished to perfection here to the degree that it's these songs that define the sound, and it's thanks to this soundtrack that these aesthetics have become such a defining aspect of Sonic the Hedgehog. On top of that, the sound team took that boost of ambition and inspiration and rode it towards places they maybe couldn't the last time, adapting that polish and aesthetic towards entirely new ideas, casting the series' musical net wider almost overnight. Combine that with some incredibly strong songs, many of which feel like they could have even had a life outside video games if they were nudged towards that direction, and you get a soundtrack that is as aweworthy as it is expansive. It is exactly like those colossal multi-disc rock albums listed before - a triumph of ambition and inspiration from musicians who wanted to reach the next level.

But if we want to really crack open why this is getting the rare full score out of me, we need to dig a little deeper.

If the fact that I've already written so, so many paragraphs within this review alone about Sonic the Hedgehog music didn't tip you off, once upon a time I was a dedicated, full-time Sonic the Hedgehog fan. I was the kind of person who signed up to several forums dedicated to the series, became a regular contributor and a semi-known name across most of them, who would listen to the various soundtracks on repeat on a near-daily basis and who would play these games regularly over and over again - especially Sonic Adventure 2 or rather the SA2: Battle version on the GameCube. My formative years of being on the internet revolved around this franchise, and I felt a genuine community spirit with it: I'd idly spend late night hours just browsing pages of topics of like-minded people discussing various minutae, shared the excitement and joy whenever something new was announced or discovered, and some of the people I met through that eventually became friends who I still hang out with regularly in the real world. All of that was a long lifetime ago, but it's left a permanent imprint on me and as an obvious result, the series will always have a place in my heart even if I've more or less left the fandom behind as an active member - I still play the games, buy the soundtrack CDs and collect the odd piece of merchandise that ticks my boxes where and when I feel the need to. And out of all the great music in the entire franchise, it's the soundtrack to Sonic Adventure 2 that to me most represents that period of my life and the sort-of special part the series has held for me during parts of it: it was Sonic Adventure 2 that effectively pulled me down through the rabbit hole, I spent genuinely countless hours playing it through those years, and the physical version of this soundtrack was the first of its kind I ever purchased and thus became even more special as I could play these songs out loud through my CD player (and I am glad I did spend my pocket money on it - this goes for well over £200 in Discogs now).

We music fans, by default, have special records that we cling to because they're attached to parts of our life that made us who we were: albums where we get emotional just by hearing certain melodies because they take us back to years ago when we heard them brand new, where we know each lyric by heart like they reflect the secrets of the universe for our ears only, and through which we relive all those emotions over and over again while we dive into the sounds that are so familiar that they're where we feel most comfortable. This collection of songs here is from a cheesy video game starring a bunch of Saturday morning cartoons, but it has that exact same effect for me as any of those other, more "serious" albums I hold on particularly personally resonant pedestals; even when the melodies come with mental images of bouncing around blocky graphics or the lyrics I know by heart are along the lines of "Got places to go, gotta follow my rainbow" or "Don't call me Knuckles, gimme your props". Sonic Adventure 2 is my favourite Sonic game and among my top video games of all time, this soundtrack is by far my number one game soundtrack of all time, and both of those factoids represent much more to me than those phrases can convey.

I took part in a small Sonic convention in the UK once, that had somehow managed to nab Johnny Gioeli and Jun Senoue as guests of honour. As part of their appearance, they performed a live concert as the official final event of the convention. If "Live and Learn" hadn't already become a classic part of Sonic history, it certainly became such through the experience of hearing a big room full of fans belting out its chorus in unison with the duo. It's one of those moments in time I'll never forget, and nearly every song out of the sixty here has vivid memories just as strong as that, even if tied to smaller moments across the few years of my life where these songs were genuinely relevant for me. Those may have just been particularly geeky early teenage years, but I have nothing but wonderful memories of that period in time, and this album is time machine that takes me back to them.

Rating: 10/10

Sonic Team - Sonic Adventure 2 Cuts Unleashed: SA2 Vocal Collection (2001)

1) It Doesn't Matter (Theme of Sonic); 2) Escape from the City (for City Escape); 3) Believe in Myself (Theme of Tails); 4) Unknown from M.E. (Theme of Knuckles); 5) Fly in the Freedom (Theme of Rouge); 6) Throw It All Away (Theme of Shadow); 7) E.G.G.M.A.N. (Theme of Eggman); 8) Live & Learn (Main Theme of Sonic Adventure 2); 9-16); Instrumental versions

The vocal themes from the game where the series grew a beard and got more serious. Still cheesy and lovably so, but with a serious focus to the craft. 

Key tracks: "Believe in Myself", "Unknown from M.E.", "Live & Learn"

Sonic Adventure 2 was released on Sonic's 10th birthday and as the anniversary game it aimed to deliver everything in a bolder, more epic way than ever before in the series: including the series' first steps into more serious themes in contrast to the usual Saturday morning cartoon plots. SA2 does a better job of balancing that inherent mismatch than many of the little more misjudged attempts since, and that same balancing act applies to the vocal theme songs that had become a new feature for the series with the first Sonic Adventure game. There is no escape from the inherent cheese in Sonic vocal themes (which is partly the reason why they can be so lovable), and the songs on the Sonic Adventure 2 themes on Cuts Unleashed aren't attempting to fight against it either. Even if these are rock songs about neon-coloured animal characters, they can still try to take themselves seriously within their own world; the source material doesn't have to mean you can't try to say something about the characters.

The three hero side songs (the game splits its length between the good guys and the anti-villains) demonstrate this refined approach pretty well. The songs for Sonic, Tails and Knuckles are all remakes of their themes from the first Sonic Adventure, and where the first game openly and blissfully waded into the cartoon cheese, the versions here buckle up and try to take themselves a little more thematically seriously. "It Doesn't Matter" now has a pop punk pace to it, replacing the original wind-in-hair highway rock and its carefree attitude suits Sonic's character far better. "Believe in Myself" is now an A-grade pop/rock anthem with a fire in its belly, featuring some lush arrangement details that wonderfully underline the song's upbeat ideas. I'm not afraid to admit I have an irrational adoration towards the song, but it's a fantastic representation of the mix of cartoon wholesomeness and genuinely quite excellent hooks that Sonic themes often aim for. It's "Unknown from M.E." that truly takes a leap as a reimagination though. For some reason Sonic Team decided on Sonic Adventure that Knuckles' chosen musical style is hip-hop and his theme in Sonic Adventure has the slight clunkiness of people with no hip-hop past trying to fit that genre into Sonic the Hedgehog; for SA2 the team went all-in and honed down on their approach, smoothed all the rough edges off, and realised how to pull it off the best. The SA2 version of "Unknown from M.E." features slicker rap sections, smooth RnB-flavoured choruses, a fantastic vocal interplay between the leads for the respective sections and a constantly shifting and evolving production that gets increasingly more exciting. Replace the lyrics with something less geeky and all three songs could stand up on their own two feet - a case in point that just because you're doing game themes, it doesn't mean you can't take the craft seriously.

The three dark side songs are all brand new compositions and highlight the expanded genre palette of SA2, where each character was paired up with a distinctive sound for all their levels, and where the themes are a logical follow-up of that. "Fly in the Freedom" is a smoothly floating, jazz-flirting pop tune which is once again an arranger's playground, from its suave guitars to the underlining backing vocals; out of all the songs here, it's the song that's least like what you might stereotypically imagine as game music and it's kinda impressive in its own way. Over on the complete other side, "E.G.G.M.A.N." is a hammy cartoon bad guy anthem and relishing in it: it's by far the most outrageous song of the lot but it's captivating much like a great villain song should, and it's laden with the kind of hooks that keep your foot tapping for days. "Throw It All Away" is the weakest of the lot: its moody techno goes a bit over the top in its attempt to sound dark and edgy, but ultimately its main crime is that it's twice longer than it should be, its couple of good building blocks repeated ad infinitum without much change and in comparison to all the other themes, comes off very one-note. A lot of Shadow's gameplay segments feature songs in a similar style and with vocals to boot, but they all do the same thing better than his actual main theme does.

In addition to the six character songs, the mini-album also features the game's main theme and one of the stage songs. "Live & Learn" has become more or less the definitive vocal theme song of the series and the equivalent of a signature song for Sonic Team's house band Crush 40, and it's really obvious why. It's a fist-pumping anthem loaded with energy, packed with a powerful signature riff, featured Johnny Gioeli's best vocal performance in the Sonic history, and just when you think it's reached its peak, the song shoots out one level higher for the last chorus in a brilliant example of a key note change done right. No Sonic main theme has ever come close to "Live & Learn" and it may as well be the series' main theme for what it's worth. The inclusion of "Escape From the City", the song from Sonic's first stage, is a little random but practically an act of precognition: time has turned the stage into an iconic Sonic moment and simultaneously turned the song itself into one of the series' all-time classics, and so its inclusion feels almost justified here as if Sonic Team anticipated it would become one of the game's big songs. And it is a great song, of course - super-addictive feel-good pop punk with one of the franchise's best choruses. By the end of the album you also have instrumental versions of each song, which aren't really a positive or a negative thing: they help to hear the production details but like most instrumental versions, mainly get shelved after one listen.

I'll share an anecdote. I used to be a fairly massive Sonic fan, but there was a point in time where I had ended up losing touch with the series. Where at one point I had been listening to random Sonic soundtracks on a nearly daily basis, I had also started to become more obsessed with music general and finding myself in love with new bands and artists at an exponential rate, and thus listening to this music and playing these games had fallen off my radar nearly completely. One day, the SA2 version of "Believe in Myself" came up on a music player shuffle and on that very instant, as the song played, every single memory I had of playing the series and listening to the music in my more formative years flooded back into my mind. When I got home, I pulled the game back out of the shelf and started it for the first time in ages and went on to relive through it again - a moment that essentially solidified my love for the series once again (even if I'm hardly the same fanatic today as I was back in the days). Everything on this album is very close to my heart, as ridiculous as these songs can be. You most likely don't feel the same in the slightest should you listen to any of these songs without any connection to the games - you might wonder what exactly I'm rambling about in the paragraphs above. As such, I'm not going to say that you should listen to these songs even if you know nothing about the context; I mean you might get a kick out of them but I'm not going to bet on that. Instead, I'm going to finish this by simply saying that to it me it doesn't matter these are from a game about a blue hedgehog and his friends: there's a meaning here that's long since become something bigger than the source material.

Rating: 9/10

Sonic Team - Complete Trinity: Sonic Heroes - Original Soundtrack (2004)

Disc One: 1) Sonic Heroes (Opening Version); 2) Stage 01: Seaside Hill; 3) Stage 02: Ocean Palace; 4) Boss: Egg Hawk; 5) System Screen: Select; 6) Stage 03: Grand Metropolis; 7) Stage 04: Power Plant; 8) Special Stage: Bonus Challenge; 9) Event: Strange Guys; 10) Boss: VS Team Battle; 11) Stage 05: Casino Park; 12) Stage 06: BINGO Highway; 13) Battle: Casino Area; 14) Event: Monkey Business; 15) Event: My World; 16) Boss: Robot Carnival/Robot Storm; 17) Stage 07: Rail Canyon; 18) Stage 08: Bullet Station; 19) Jingle: Speed Up; 20) Jingle: Invincible; 21) Boss: Egg Albatross; 22) Event: Disquieting Shadow; 23) System Screen: Menu; 24) Battle: City Area; 25) Battle: Sea Area; 26) System Screen: 2P Vs. Menu; 27) Battle: Quick Race; 28) Battle: Ring Race
Disc Two: 1) Sonic Heroes (Title Version); 2) Stage 00: Sea Gate; 3) Stage 09: Frog Forest; 4) Stage 10: Lost Jungle; 5) Event: Excuse Me?; 6) Event: Unexpected Encounter; 7) Special Stage: Emerald Challenge; 8) Event: No Past to Remember; 9) Stage 11: Hang Castle; 10) Stage 12: Mystic Mansion; 11) Event: My Ambition; 12) Stage 13: Egg Fleet; 13) Stage 14: Final Fortress; 14) Boss: Egg Emperor; 15) Event: Metal Sonic... The Ultimate Overlord; 16) Event: All Heroes Gather; 17) Last Boss Ver. 1: Metal Madness; 18) What I'm Made Of... / Last Boss Ver. 2: Metal Overlord; 19) Event: Finale... Adventure Must Go On; 20) Special Stage: Emerald Challenge (Extended Version); 21) Casino Park (Original Version); 22) BINGO Highway (Remix)  

Old-school style but with modern production sensibilities, a return to roots in concept but with new tricks. The game may be contested but its score shouldn't be.

Key tracks: "Stage 03: Grand Metropolis", "Stage 05: Casino Park", "Stage 09: Frog Forest"

Sonic Heroes was designed as a throwback to the Sonic games of yore, even if that seems like a peculiar statement given the new gameplay elements it introduced. The two Sonic Adventure titles that had come to define Sonic in the world of 3D gaming were gigantic in scope and ambition, featuring significant gameplay mechanic experiments, expanding the character roster extensively while giving everyone a spotlight moment, starring epic set pieces and placing heavier emphasis on plot and character development. Heroes retained some of it - namely the amount of characters and new gameplay ideas in form of the team mechanic - but it intentionally aimed to simplify. The plot was there but didn't come define the game, and the hub levels were abandoned in favour of a classic two-zone level structure, relatively disconnected zone transitions and a more direct level design with a clear path between the start and end. There's some debate, to put it mildly, whether the game was successful in its goals and it certainly has some glaring flaws even I can't deny, but I've always been a defender of the game nonetheless - at the end of the day, despite its issues, the core gameplay was good fun and that's ultimately what matters to me.

The goal of merging the modern day Sonic elements with the principles of the old games applies for the soundtrack as well. After the diverse, genre-blending soundtracks of the Adventure games, the Heroes soundtrack is a return to the straightforward bounciness and bubbliness of the early games: the instrumentation and production are richer of course, but so many of the songs here (in particular the level music) could easily be converted into the 16-bit world and feel right at home in terms of structure and songwriting alone. It also takes itself less seriously and borders on whimsical at times: a lot of it is increasingly bright and energetic, and from the flashes of hyperactive ADD-electronica to the occasionally downright bizarre event themes there's a sense of playfulness to the score. It fits the game to a T - it's a colourful and relentlessly upbeat soundtrack to match the similarly designed game. The music contained in this album is one reason why I like the game: a good soundtrack can really affect the whole experience, and certain parts of the Heroes soundtrack are up there with the best of the Sonic canon to prove that the series' tradition of great music is well and alive.

The zone music is where Sonic Heroes really shines. When the crazy slap bass of "Grand Metropolis" mixes together with the smooth guitar licks and thick, atmospheric synths, the images of running along the bustling sci-fi city and its wild downhills return fresh to the mind. "Casino Park" perfectly brings out the colourful neon glimmer of the bright night of its respective zone, while its zone counterpart "BINGO Highway" breaks it into a frenetically insane audio blast-out that's almost like a musical seizure, chaotically assaulting the speakers back and forth with its electronic effects. "Frog Forest" leads with a swirling guitar jangle and breezy percussion that befit the lush, green jungle it backdrops and make it stand out among the songs. "Hang Castle" and "Mystic Mansion" grow and build up; the two are the longest levels in the game and the themes for them understands this, taking their sweet time to nurture their haunted mansion disco vibe and moving the songs from one section to another in a way that relieves the length of the levels in-game and makes them interesting to listen to outside of it. The repeating element in many of these songs, and ones not mentioned, is a particular atmospheric touch, which you can really notice when listening to these outside the game: there's a depth to the production and the musical elements used that's very evocative in its own right, and which emphasises the mood and tone of each song to a point they're like instant transports to the scenes they aim to set. It's not a feature you find in most Sonic music, which gives the Heroes songs their own vibe even in the greater whole.

In addition to the stage songs, I've also always taken a special fancy towards the menu music of the game as a whole: it's weird how the music that plays when you browse through settings, game modes and such brings out some of the warmest memories, possibly because it's what greets you whenever you turn on the game. Much of the menu music in Heroes in fact sounds like it's practically cheering and pumping up the player for the actual main game. Finally, and I know this is as arguable as anything, but the "Bonus Challenge" version of the special stage music might just be the best special stage tune in the entire series - it's a melodic sugar rush and a perfect fit for the technicolour tubes it soundtracks, and remains the same explosion of joy outside the game.

Naturally, not everything on a 50-track two-disc soundtrack can be expected to be top quality, but it's mostly the more incidental music that's slightly not up to scratch: the orchestral cutscene scores, the fairly throwaway multiplayer level songs and some of the boss themes are the soundtrack's weak points with the least replay value. The actual meat of the dish, the stage songs and main themes, are high quality throughout though, offering an unique spin to the series' soundtrack tropes honouring both the old and new while giving its own interpretation of both. It takes a decided distance away from the general riffed up, guitar-driven sound the franchise has made its signature style in the 3D age and makes it work, distinguishing itself even as the years have passed and the series has further played around with its music. Even if you find the game flawed, there's plenty to appreciate in the score; and as someone who likes the game and is an afficianado of the series as a whole, the Heroes soundtrack has more than earned its place as something I can enjoy outside the game and admire its foot-tapping, perky compositions. Its high points earn it its high rating comfortably.

If I continue the highly flimsy analogy of Sonic soundtracks as a band discography that I entertain myself with, the Sonic Heroes soundtrack is the point where the artist returns to their roots but with the experience and skill set they've been nurturing ever since.

Rating: 8/10