It is no secret that I thoroughly enjoyed the music in the game Yo-Jin-Bo and therefore quite enjoyed the Yo-Jin-Bo ~Unmei no Freude~ ROCKS OST. Disc 1 had a whole bunch of vocal numbers sung by the various game’s voice actors and disc 2 had the in-game music. It is therefore that I had no qualms about reviewing the Yo-Jin-Bo ~Unmei no Freude~ ROCKS Zan CD, which is basically disc 1 of the Yo-Jin-Bo ~Unmei no Freude~ ROCKS soundtrack with three additional pieces.
It is therefore that I will only talk about the first three tracks which are new to me. The first track starts off as a pretty straightforward rock track, but then halfway through it throws a complete musical curveball that I thought was really cool, if difficult to describe. The ending offers some nice controlled chaos as well. The second track is a more straightforward, catchy, hard rock track. The third one is the biggest surprise with its swing feel and heavy use of saxophone and piano. It’s an unexpected choice but it works surprisingly well for Yo-Jin-Bo. Of all the bonus tracks, the first one is definitely my favorite.
All three tracks are enjoyable and fans may think they’re better than the rest of the vocal songs. If there is one thing I want but is lacking on both this CD and the Yo-Jin-Bo ~Unmei no Freude~ ROCKS disc 1 is karaoke versions of these vocal tracks. The Yo-Jin-Bo voice actors’ vocals can be hit or miss for some people, but the music itself is consistently good and I would have liked to hear how the pieces sounded without vocals.
I am not sure if Yo-Jin-Bo ~Unmei no Freude~ ROCKS Zan is worth the price of admission on its own, since it does not add much to the Yo-Jin-Bo ~Unmei no Freude~ ROCKS OST. Having the three bonus tracks is great, but I do not really need the other 15 since I already have those in the other Yo-Jin-Bo soundtrack. So the final question I’m left asking is why this “complete” version of Yo-Jin-Bo ~Unmei no Freude~ ROCKS disc 1 wasn’t part of the full OST release in the first place? Perhaps, based on this album’s release date, they were recorded at a later time?
