All the Music Games Give Unto Me

I recently took notice of a trend concerning my music appreciation. Because of certain games, I have taken notice of or purchased music concerning those games.

Consider this, I would never have heard Gary Jules cover of Tears for Fears' Mad World if it were not for this Gears of War commercial. Jonathan Coulton would still be a mystery to me if it wasn't for his brilliant Still Alive at the end of Portal. I've also been introduced to others with included soundtracks from Beyond Good & Evil, the Orange Box set of games, and Mirror's Edge, which featured the same song (also titled Still Alive) mixed seven different ways.

I actually went out of my way to listen to the soundtracks from a few other games too. The soundtrack for GTA IV, Halo 3, and especially Halo 2. The second featured a few artists such as Breaking Benjamin, Hoobastank, and four compositions from Incubus. Plus I liked the games. I also purchased Jami Sieber's Hidden Sky album based only on hearing the music from 2008's Braid.

Some other interesting ventures bridging the gap between music & games also made their way to my playlist. You might smile at Weezer - The 8-bit Album's classic sound and familiar melodies of original nerdrock. On the flipside, there's The Ocarina of Rhyme; it's that Zelda game plus rap and not too bad overall.

All this and I haven't even listed all the music I've bought in Rock Band which lead me to purchasing a band's album. I already knew some bands before, like Disturbed's Indestructible and Avenged Sevenfold's self-titled album. But I got some other music based solely on what I heard in the game. The artists and albums include Lacuna Coil's Karmacode, The Material's Tomorrow, Paramore's Riot!, Bullet For My Valentine's Scream, Aim, Fire, and my most recent find, Tickle Me Pink's Madeline.

Harmonix makes mad cash from me and others like me...

-- "Dude, I service society by rocking, OK? I'm out there on the front lines liberating people with my music!"