What's your favorite sonic soundtrack?

I have a thing for Sonic 2's soundtrack. I love every song in it (well maybe Hill Top's not so much).

But talking about songs that I like to listen to in my day, like any regular song that does not belong to any game, is Live and Learn. I fucking love this track, and it's amazing because I don't like playing SA2.

 

I grew up playing Sonic 2 as a kid so that OST was the earliest I was bopping my head to when it comes to Sonic.. but the Sonic CD Japanese soundtrack really hits home for me when it comes to energy, tone, and how well it fits the environments/levels in the game.

Also you can’t go wrong with Sonic 3’s soundtrack.. I think now as an adult I consider 3 to be my favorite of the Genesis trilogy (hell even the 16-bit prototype tracks are a good listen)

 

Sonic Advance 3 has a really cool soundtrack that I will always love, even if many are turned off by the GBA's sound quality.

Spoiler: cool tunes

 

Chaotix. The pop/funk/jazz/hip-hop style of classic Sonic pushed to its' absolute zenith. There are so many great musical ideas in this soundtrack. Things like the four time of day variations of the hub theme (Walkin'/Hyper-Hyper/Evening Star/Moonrise), of which the latter two are absolute killers. How there are great, intricate, instantly memorable melodies in every song, even those for things as insignificant as the character select and tutorial screens (Take Off/Combination) The choice of synth, the incredible basslines, the overall complexity of the arrangements. For the stage themes, Midnight Greenhouse and Seascape are both masterpieces, and last but certainly not least, Door Into Summer remains the single greatest track in the entire franchise, IMO.

 

I have a strong nostalgia for the Mega Drive trilogy, but when it's about bangers that goes hard, then I would go with Sonic Adventure, Sonic CD, Sonic Rush, Sonic Unleashed, Sonic Generations, Sonic 2006, Sonic Lost World, Team Sonic Racing and especially Sonic Runners.

There's a special thing that I love so much about the calm / ambiental songs (I think some of them are underrated) Kenichi Tokoi, Fumie Kumatari and Tomoya Ohtani composed around the franchise. This one being a good example:

Spoiler: Good songs to hear in a playlist, seriously.

Speaking about Ohtani, I really miss these kind of songs he used to compose.

 

Relevant, in case you want to read more opinions (or in case a moderator wants to merge everything): https://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?threads/favourite-sonic-music.21773/
https://forums.sonicretro.org/index...-series-that-you-thought-were-the-best.17181/
https://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?threads/favorite-sonic-soundtrack.39577/

 

Sonic CD is probably still the most impressive one to me. Every Sonic soundtrack from 1 - Generations is great, but that one has the most diverse mix of sounds and some of the most emotionally resonant tracks as well.




You can separate the series pretty cleanly into eras based on the sound, but NOTHING else in the series sounds quite like this game to me. The dreamy acid house influence makes it feel otherworldly but the crunchy 90s dance influence/hip hop grounds it in something contemporary, if that makes sense? It feels like they landed on something perfect for a character like Sonic. His world was strange, but there was enough familiar, modern elements to make it feel cool and inviting. It's magical.

In general, I prefer the Classic era of Sonic than what came after. It was influenced by genres like New Jack Swing, Hip Hop, R&B, Soul etc. and those are just the sounds I find most nostalgic. They really had a good grip on what made this stuff work too. some of the original trilogy's songs had melodies strong enough to be radio hits. My mom will still hum along to chemical plant sometimes if she hears it, and she doesn't normally care for game music. The following decades are really good too for other reasons but this era is the one that stuck the most for me.

 

Sonic 3 and Chaotix are my favourites. Fumie's contributions to Sonic Adventure are definitely up there as well.

 

Spencer Nilsen's soundtrack for the North American version of Sonic CD. It's my favorite Sonic game soundtrack by far. The slow version of the theme song is truly a masterpiece, despite the lyrics being kind of childish. Musically, that theme song, and so much of the level music, really captured the mood of the early 90s. Honestly, I love the soundtrack so much that I tend to over-rate Sonic CD as a game itself--the game is lovely for the animations and CD-quality music, but the gameplay itself isn't quite up to par with the main Genesis Sonic games.

"Shadow the Hedgehog" is my second-favorite soundtrack.

 

Sonic CD (EU/JP)

 

So many to choose from obviously, but Sonic CD (US) warps me to another dimension. I still play many of these songs frequently. A particularly great moment was listening to Collision Chaos, present and future, while driving through some smoky mountains, at sunset, approaching a large city. Some sort of dystopian synergy!

 

Overall, Sonic Unleashed has my favorite OST. That game has some of some of my favorite songs ever, even including songs that aren't from games.

 

Black Knight. It's varied, rocks incredibly hard, has 4 Crush 40 songs (one of which is a totally different style from their usual fare), another vocal theme that's also amazing, and maintains a high quality throughout. Disregarding the vocal tracks, because they naturally hold an advantage, the best song is Dragon's Lair.

 

Oh yeah, Black Knight has a amazing soundtrack. I should have listed that one as well. I really like the non-Jun Senoue Rock songs and the Orchestral ones. Also, With Me is probably one of my favorite vocals in the entire franchise. It would be really cool if Ema'd return to sing another song.

 

Sonic CD (J). The American version brings out something very special in me, something I can't quite describe. But the Japanese version is on another level.

Every single Sonic game has at least an absolute banger though.

 

I don't know man the title screen theme slaps¹

¹ induces anxiety

 

Sonic Eraser's theme is amazing. It's both horrendous and an earworm. An achievement for instrumental music!

Anyways, my pick is splintered between Sonic Adventure and Sonic CD JP/EU. Both are some of the most brilliant showcases of Sega's sound team, and easily stand amongst the top of the crop of vgm in general. SA1 shows incredible range and production value with insane levels of variety, while SCD has one of the most finely honed sounds put to record, and both are just kings of popping off catchy riffs, exciting chord structures, and powerful rhythms that follow you day in and out.

Only Daytona USA, Ristar, NiGHTS and the Jet Set Radios come close in Sega's own catalogue (and two of those were composed by Tomoko Sasaki, Naofumi's wife!), and better OSTs outside of them are few and far in between. Man, you really can't fuck with good Sega music. Unstoppable.

My runner-ups for Sonic OSTs are probably 3D Blast (either version), Chaotix, SA2 and Unleashed. 3DB's Genesis version makes some of the best use of the YM2612 (the credits and final boss music are phenomenal), and Jacques' greatest tracks from the Saturn version (Green Grove, Rusty Ruin, Diamond Dust, Gene Gadget, special stage) are some of the hookiest in the franchise. Chaotix's OST is so good that it's insulting it's on a game that shoddy; seriously, jazz and RnB Sonic music is a solid "hell yes". Unleashed is consistently high production value and a great blend of world music, drum n bass and j-rock. And SA2 is.. SA2, enough said.