Exile Game Studio

Blackwatch · Joined: 01 Sep 2008 Posts: 98 Location: Midwest votes: 4

Can any one recommend some good music for the period (other than an Indiana Jones soundtrack)?

Silverback · Posted: Tue Dec 23, 2008 2:10 am Post subject:

I'd Google the term(s) 1930(s) music. It'kk bring up lots of results for the period.
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HarrierPotter · Posted: Tue Dec 23, 2008 3:34 am Post subject:

Silverback's suggestion is good. Also important is how you want to use the music.

If you just want to set a mood at the beginning of a session, then popping in a couple pop/jazz tunes would be good.

If you're looking for pieces to fit with your scenes (like good rousing Indy material), you're just as well off mining film scores and other "classical" music of all types both pre- and post-'30s. Orchestral music was a fully mature form in the period with great variety, and much of what we still listen to today was written well before the '30s. Much of what's been written since would fit the period, but just happened to be written later Smile

Are you familiar with period films at all? Musicals were big back then and would give you a good feel for the era.
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LOCATION: "Back in Nagasaki / Where the fellas chew tabaccy / And the women wiki-waki-woo"

John Aynge · Posted: Tue Dec 23, 2008 4:03 am Post subject:

Squirrel Nut Zippers
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JohnK · Posted: Tue Dec 23, 2008 8:09 am Post subject:

Hullo, Shawn,

Blackwatch · Joined: 01 Sep 2008 Posts: 98 Location: Midwest votes: 4

Thanks to the need to burn a lot of vacation at the end of the year, I've had a lot of time to prowl the web and the local music shops. I was a little surprised of some of the music that a google searched kicked out, so I ended up just looking for approariate sound tracks as well as bugging the nice lady at the local NPR station. I'm pretty sure she thinks I'm a total whackjob, but, she did recommend a couple of good compilations.

catbeard · Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 3:40 am Post subject:

Hey thar,

I distinctly remember the very first time, bout 17 years ago, I played a game where the GM had background music cued up and going. It added so much to the atmosphere that I've never run a game without it. I even go so far as to find a 'theme song' for my campaigns, and play it at the beginning of every session to get the players settled. Works like a charm, and I'll usually give a quick recap of the last session to get everyone up to speed.

The side effect of this is that I have a MASSIVE collection of soundtracks and experimental music, and can make some recommendations for a decent HEX collection. The first few are plain obvious but there's a bunch that I'm betting you ain't heard of....

FILM SCORES:
Indiana Jones (of course)
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (rousing fun)
King Kong (was whipped up in a ridiculously short time after Peter Jackson canned the existing soundtrack, great considering)
Jurassic Park I-III (not amazing, but not bad)
10,000B.C. (not saying any thing about the film, but the soundtrack's great for that primitive atmosphere)
30 Days of Night (reeeeeaaaaallllly creepy)
300 (great music for a good bloodletting)
Alien 3 (an awesome soundtrack, very moody, been high on the playlist for years)
The Riddickles of Chronic - I mean the Chronicles of Riddick (another great dark atmosphere album)
Constantine (great for more supernatural stories)
The Descent (wonderful, claustraphobic)
Hero (if your adventurers ever end up in Shang-hai)
House of Flying Daggers (or the Forbidden City)
The Last Samurai (or Japan)
The Mist (great for "they're everywhere!" moments)
Pathfinder (the film score,not the game - stirring action/adventure tracks)
The Prestige (a fantastic and insidious masterpiece IMHO)

K so they are my film score suggestions, and there's plenty more that didn't make the list but are still good. Plus I also want to recommend a couple albums that fall under the catch all of world music:

"Duality" by Dead Can Dance (astonishingly brilliant)
"Seven Veils" by Robert Rich (wonderful haunting arabesque music, great for an otherworldy feel)
"Tycho Brae" and "Mundus Subterranus" by Lightwave (a bit synthy, but reaaaallly spooooky)

lastly, I think you should all go right now and download or buy this album from iTunes:

"Lost World" by Michael Sterns

written specifically as a soundtrack for a non-existant film based on the 1912 novel, apparently. The opening track is a bit new age hippy, but the rest are all killers. "Lost World Theme" should be the opening track to all your Hollow Earth Expedition games. I can't recommend this one enough. Go. Now. Get. It.

Happy listening!

Dr. Floyd Fallweather · Joined: 09 Jul 2010 Posts: 13 Location: Delaware

The Rocketeer (a must for a daredevil pilot or rocket ranger) by James Honer and some of the Titanic score he wrote.

The Shadow (Jerry Goldsmith; a must for a man of mystery, mentalist or other costumed crimefighter)

King Solomon's Mines (also Jerry Goldsmith) is an excellent score with a good intro, adrenaline boosting, and triumph inspiring just like Indiana Jones, but I bet that most folks wouldn't recognize it becuase the movie was so bad.

Also, pick different music based on each scene...for example...the IJ music from RotLA Map Room is not the thrill button and would work just fine for any deep mystery scene. Also, the latest IJ film has some perfectly fun action music that is meant for the character "Mutt." In fact, most the action music has very little in the way of thrill buttons, so don't rule IJ out.

The Phantom score by Thomas Newman (I think) (not the Phantom of the Opera--the 1930s purple-suited jungle hero movie).