John Williams’ original Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone soundtrack was a whimsical, wondrous album with a hook that was instantly as memorable as anything he’d done for Star Wars or Jaws. The Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire soundtrack (Amazon) retains elements of Williams’ themes, but its musical evolution is nowhere near as … Read more
Superman Returns is the archetypal superhero soundtrack, expertly incorporating the full spectrum of full-color emotions — heroics, passion, dread, wonder, inspiration — while paying homage to John Williams’ original tracks. The soundtrack opens with the familiar Supes crescendo in “Main Titles”, calling to mind the engrained vision of Christopher Reeve’s Superman running down a Metropolis … Read more
The Chronicles of Narnia soundtrack has me torn. On the one hand, I’ve now got another fantasy-themed soundtrack that I can use in my role-playing game sessions. On the other, my geek music collection now includes a song by Alanis Morissette. I mean no offense to the women geeks out there, for whom this is … Read more
Radio Active #8 is dedicated entirely to the music of the Atomic Swindlers, a Ziggy Stardust-meets-The Fifth Element rock’n’roll band. The podcast features a review of the band’s album Coming Out Electric as well as two tracks from the CD. There’s also the first-ever Radio Active podcast, in which Nuketown’s readers and listeners in the … Read more
There are great movie soundtracks, ones that resonate with your soul, invigorate your blood flow, and generally kick ass. This is not one of those albums, but it is a very amusing album, and one that fans of 1980s “B movie” horror flicks should enjoy, if not outright love. The Deadly Spawn (Amazon) was one of … Read more
Battles is 12 track audio compact disc dedicated entirely to the sound of warfare. Created by Toxic Bag Productions, the disc contains battle “soundscapes” from four genres: Fantasy, the American Civil War, World War II, and Science Fiction. Toxic Bag is probably best known for their Gamemaster’s Collection, a collection of four CDs consisting of … Read more
At least a third of what made Halo such a great game was its original soundtrack, which combined good ol’rock’n’roll with synthesized orchestras and erie discordant notes to perfectly complement the action happening on screen. The music is just as important to its sequel, but just as Halo 2 is has a certain over-the-top, Hollywoodish … Read more
The Two Towers provides gamers with a second invigorating soundtrack to augment their campaign’s audiospace, albeit one that isn’t quite as successful as its predecessor, The Fellowship of the Ring. As a movie soundtrack, The Two Towers is very enjoyable, providing an epic, cinematic score to a movie that sweeps across the vast lands of … Read more
For decades, Dungeons & Dragons players have cobbled together custom soundtracks for their games from diverse sources, including various movie soundtracks (Conan the Barbarian, Lord of the Rings), game music tracks (Baldur’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights) and even specialized albums (Midnight Syndicate, Toxic Bag Productions). But now they have an official soundtrack, one sanctioned by the … Read more
At Dawn at Rivendell is filled with the music and poetry of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, as performed by the Tolkien Ensemble. This is the Denmark-based Tolkien Ensemble’s third outing, and this time around they are aided in their endeavourer by Christopher Lee, who played the villainous Sauramon in the Fellowship of … Read more