With prices of of Japanese game music imports skyrocketing, the musicians responsible for the soundtracks are looking to make their music more readily available to their fans abroad, and so they’ve created a free album just for them called IMPORTED.
You can download or listen to the album directly on Bandcamp. It contains a range of music from rock and electronic to ambient and jazz. The list of artists and the game soundtracks they’ve worked on before is below:
- Tenpei Sato (Disgaea series)
- eiceph (Street Fighter IV)
- Go Sato (Raiden series)
- Dr. COVA (Phantasy Star Online and Sonic series)
- Takayuki Nakamura (LUMINES series and Rodea The Sky Soldier)
- Yu Shimoda (Mega Man 9 and 10)
- Jupiter-B (DARIUSBURST series)
- Takahiro Izutani (Metal Gear Solid and Bayonetta series)
- Marusho (F-Zero GX and Yakuza series)
- Yuu Miyake (Katamari Damacy series)
- Akira Ueda (Super Mario RPG game designer)
- DEIDARA
The album was put together by Kevin Pescoran, a fan of Japanese game music who was getting annoyed with the high prices of importing the albums. “I grew up listening to soundtracks for games like Street Fighter II, Metroid Prime and Sonic Adventure 2,” Pescoran said. “But when I tried to get my hands on more recent soundtracks like Sonic Unleashed, VANQUISH, or Bayonetta, I could only find them for $80 to $100, and realized there was a need for an easier way to get this music to fans around the world.”
The album also includes the musical debut of Super Mario RPG game designer Akira Ueda who said that composing game music is a hobby to him. “I was in charge of the sound effects for Final Fantasy IV and background art and map design for Seiken Densetsu 2 and Super Mario RPG, but when I think of my favorite games, I reminisce each game with its music together. My musical skills are limited but I had pleasure creating for this album,” Ueda said.
