Lunar -Silver Star Story- Complete Soundtrack

	Album Title: Lunar -Silver Star Story- Complete Soundtrack
	Record Label: Working Designs
	Catalog No.: N/A
	Release Date: May 28, 1999
	Purchase: Buy Used Copy

Overview

I was in the store one day, and I saw this massive sized box in the PlayStation game area. I decided to take a look, and saw that it was called Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete. I then noticed that it came with a bunch of other stuff as well, including the soundtrack. I didn’t think much about it, and bought it because it was an RPG and had extras. When I got back in the car and started listening to the soundtrack, I was instantly struck by the first theme. Thus began my interest in video game music. That’s right. This soundtrack is the reason I actually pay attention to any music from games. It’s that powerful.

Body

Even to this day, this soundtrack contains my three favorite town themes. “Thieves’ Bazaar” does a great job of setting up a lively bazaar atmosphere, even if it doesn’t sound exactly ‘thievey’. It starts out with some horn instrument and a funky bass line before a xylophone takes over the melody. It’s one of those pieces you can just groove too and have a good time. “Meribia” also uses a jazz style, but this time with a flute as the melody. That may seem strange, but it fits very well. The melody is accompanied by ‘big band’ style trumpets that just come out of nowhere to add to the theme. Around halfway through, there’s an acoustic guitar solo which serves as a transition to the best part. At that point, the flute and guitar trade off solos for almost the rest of the piece. The effect is quite unique and very well done.

But by far my favorite one is “Burg”. This theme has a subtle greatness to it. It starts out as a beautiful, light, and calm flute melody, later joined by strings. Less than halfway through, the pieces suddenly becomes more lively and bright. The strings retain the melody, but play it more majestically, while the flute (and later bells) adds another layer to the piece. What I love most about this piece is the evolution from a light, calm town theme to a lively and bright town theme. The beauty and greatness of this piece has not been beaten by any other town theme to date.

The soundtrack contains more great pieces than just the town themes. As most people probably already know, some great vocal pieces can be found here as well. The most popular one is probably “Wind’s Nocturne”, otherwise known as “Luna’s Boat Song”. This very beautiful piece starts out sad, but eventually becomes slightly hopeful. This is both done by the music and the lyrics. Even so, the piece never loses that sad feeling.

While not as popular, “Wings”, in my opinion, is better than “Wind’s Nocturne”. As the name suggests, this piece takes on a flying feel. It first starts off strong, like a bird just lifting off the ground, and then becomes calmer, like a leisurely glide. As the music progresses, it evolves into a majestic soar. While this piece isn’t as beautifully sweet like “Wind’s Nocturne”, it still had a greater impact. As I said before, this piece instantly amazed me, and still to this day, it has left an imprint on my mind that will not go away.

The battle themes are a little unique. They aren’t as upbeat as most other games’ battle themes. The normal “Battle Theme” is pretty lighthearted in comparison. Even so, it still sounds like a battle theme. The “Boos Battle Theme”, on the other hand, creates a more intense mood, while at parts remaining lighthearted. While not epic by most standards, “Go Go Go!” is one of those battle pieces that changes from portion to portion, creating a semi-epic feel.

Summary

Overall, every piece on this soundtrack is beautiful, with the exceptions of “Ghaleon’s Theme” and “Grindery”, which are easily the worst pieces on the album. I’d give them each a 3/10 rating. But the rest of the soundtrack easily makes up for that. Iwadare’s use of many instruments intertwining together is really well done in this soundtrack. As the game is fairly rare, you may have trouble finding it, but the game and soundtrack together is definitely worth it.

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