Symphonic Fantasies music from Square Enix, on sale September 15.

[Yggdrasil]

Symphonic Square Enix Music in One Collection / Sample the orchestral sounds of Square Enix's latest soundtrack in advance.

Album of the year?

[CDFN]

Could be.

[Ramza]

For those who care, we kinda sorta did a big interview about this album and its producer a month ago.

http://www.rpgfan.com/features/Symphonic_Fantasies_Interview/index.html

Our review of the album will appear on this site promptly on September 10th.

[SilverwingsX2]

my copy arrived today. awesome album, best i ever purchased.

[Prime Mover]

1. I hate Medleys

2. The tracks they picked really don't interest me

3. We need more orchestrated FF9, the best orchestral music in the series, and one of the only not to have an orchestral remix album.

[Ramza]

1. I hate Medleys

2. The tracks they picked really don't interest me

3. We need more orchestrated FF9, the best orchestral music in the series, and one of the only not to have an orchestral remix album.

I don't feel you at all on #1 and #2. I totally feel you on #3.

[Prime Mover]

Medley's just feel like a cheap trick to me. It's something that highschool bands do to Disney tunes, or philharmonic orchestras do when they're forced to do a cheesy pop concert for the masses. It's a way of getting through a bunch of tunes quickly, to try and satisfy everyone, when you can tell that noone involved really cares.

Medley tunes don't have to have beginnings and endings, because they're in the middle of other tracks. Therefor, they simply have to arrange the melody a few times before creating some 4-bar transition to the next tune. It's just dissatisfying to me. A lot of my enjoyment of a piece of music is hearing it's overarching progression from beginning to ending. I totally lose that in a medley.

[Ramza]

There is a difference between lazy medley arrangements and good medley arrangements. These are clearly in the category of good. Particularly the Chrono Trigger arrangement.

[Prime Mover]

No. Good medley's have the same problems as Bad medleys, but the music just sounds better. They still suffer from not having a beginning, middle and end to each section, because the structure inherently doesn't have one.

Sorry, but I'm universally opposed to medley's. At best, they're worse than individual arrangements. The best thing a medley can do is offer 3 seconds of silence between songs and be on different tracks... wait...

[Ramza]

No. Good medley's have the same problems as Bad medleys, but the music just sounds better. They still suffer from not having a beginning, middle and end to each section, because the structure inherently doesn't have one.

Sorry, but I'm universally opposed to medley's. At best, they're worse than individual arrangements. The best thing a medley can do is offer 3 seconds of silence between songs and be on different tracks... wait...

I know I'm a month late on my snarky reply, but I'm universally opposed to inappropriate usage of apostrophes.

medley plural = medleys ... medley's = a possessive wherein something is owned by a medley

If you're familiar with the source material, you know whether you're hearing beginning, middle, or end. For someone who likes VGM (which is almost always *looped*) I fail to see how not having a definitive beginning or end is a problem. If the medley includes the full melodic theme of any given track, you got what you were looking for.

[Dice]

1. I hate Medleys

2. The tracks they picked really don't interest me

3. We need more orchestrated FF9, the best orchestral music in the series, and one of the only not to have an orchestral remix album.

I don't feel you at all on #1 and #2. I totally feel you on #3.

I found the Chrono Cross' Medley was the best - otherwise I'm inclined to agree.
I hate when the arbitrary "songs of choice" usually get pinned to game-important themes, rather than actual good tracks.