Music: Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 03:29, 13 March 2024


The original promotional CD

Oni's soundtrack is a mix of symphonic, techno, and ambient pieces. As far as who composed it, these are the names credited on the back of the CD, but see below for an in-depth investigation:

“	Martin O'Donnell, Michael Salvatori - TotalAudio Paul Sebastien - Power of Seven	„

Contents	1 TotalAudio 2 Power of Seven 3 Specific attribution

Subpages
Promotional soundtrack CD In-game music data Myth music in Oni Fan-made music

TotalAudio

TotalAudio is a music and sound production company founded by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori, apparently incorporated officially under the name O'Donnell/Salvatori Inc. The company was contracted to score Bungie's games starting with Myth: The Fallen Lords. In 2000, Marty would join Bungie as an employee, but TotalAudio continues to operate (at least for the purpose of copyright maintenance and royalty collection). O'Donnell and Salvatori have individually gone on to compose for various games.

Regarding Oni's music, O'Donnell stated in this interview that the first work on the soundtrack was done by Power of Seven and that TotalAudio then composed as much new music as they did, making the soundtrack a 50/50 product between the studios. Since O'Donnell and Salvatori worked closely at the time, we do not attempt to distinguish which of the two men composed each piece assigned to TotalAudio in the table at bottom.

Based on findings by Odyssey Sound Team, who are recreating unreleased music that was produced by TotalAudio for Oni and other games, certain tracks can be assigned to TotalAudio based on the same synthesized instruments being used for Halo CE. These tracks include Searching and The Hunt, as well as the music in the mus_amasian OSBD (named by fans as "Up and Away") and the ending of End Titles. The beats in Searching, The Hunt, and End Titles originally come from the E-MU Phatt Beats collection, which TotalAudio used in other projects; the unused Halo CE tracks HERE and HERE use beats from the same collection, as well as "A Walk in the Woods" from Halo CE. "Up and Away" also shares samples with "Perchance to Dream" from Halo CE and "Dream Again" from Halo 3.

The atmospheric ambient tracks in Oni (collected here), some of which were strung together to make the CD's Ambient Suite and some of which are only heard in-game, are quite different from the other music in Oni, but these are also the product of O'Donnell/Salvatori. Similar ambient work can be heard in TotalAudio's score for the 1999 game Septerra Core, specifically "Secrets of Marduk", "Holy Guard", "Mystic Delving", "Biomech Heart", and "The Chosen Ruins". Five of Oni's ambient tracks are actually reused from Myth I/II, TotalAudio's previous work for Bungie.

Power of Seven

The name echoes Bungie's "cult" of the number 7, but Power of Seven was an independent digital music content publisher founded in Minnesota and headed by Paul Sebastien. Bungie fans also know them for producing the opening themes to Marathon 2: Durandal and Marathon Infinity.

In 1996, Power of Seven was acquired by audio company Headspace, Inc. and the studio was relocated to Headspace's HQ in San Mateo, California. In 1999, Headspace renamed themselves Beatnik, Inc. (The California company which currently creates meditation audio programs under the name Headspace is unrelated.) Beatnik became defunct in 2011.

The "trio"

Although the original entity known as Power of Seven ceased to exist when it was integrated into Headspace, Paul Sebastien was allowed to use the name for contracted work outside of the Headspace business. When Oni's upcoming soundtrack first began to get some press, this article from spring 2000 called Power of Seven a "trio, consisting of musicians NVerse, Brian Salter and Kim Cascone."

"NVerse" was apparently an alias for Paul Sebastien. In 2023, Sebastien confirmed by email that he created Trailer as well as other possibly unreleased tracks. Sebastien was also a founder of the techno band Psykosonik; over the course of the band's existence (1992–1997), four of their electronic dance songs charted in the Billboard Top 40 even though they only released two albums. The style of Trailer resembles the output from his band, as exemplified by songs like Teknojihad and Killjoy.

Brian Salter, who has composed for other games, also released his own album called "Missing Scenes (1997-2005)" under the artist name Plektric in 2005. The following tracks are very clearly alternate versions of tracks from Oni:

1. Furies (Konoko Chase)

4. Two New Villains (Whirled Piece)

5. Ellipse (Oni Fever)

6. Mr. Bailout (East Wind)

7. Drop Zone (Pursuit)

Salter released additional alternate versions of two of these pieces on Smartsound.com: Terminus (Konoko Chase) and Crucial Dossier (Whirled Piece). The article Konoko Chase documents all versions of Salter's piece.

When asked by email in 2023 about the bonus MP3 No One Left to Trust, released as promotional material, Salter recognized it as his work, and he also recalled making Fight and Internal Space.

Kim Cascone is a noted experimental electronic composer, and his work (some of which can be found here) is way more avant-garde than what you'd expect to hear in a game – though he did score Obsidian, a 1997 surrealist puzzle game. Cascone briefly mentioned that he was working on "sound design for a Japanese anime game" at the end of this 1998 interview, which he confirmed by email in 2022 to have been Oni, however he referred to his contributions as "spec work" and didn't think that his "sound design" was used in the final game. Paul Sebastien's recollection in 2023 was that Cascone's work was on "audio sound FX areas such as gunshots and foley sounds etc. primarily — not music".

Specific attribution

The art used for Marty O'Donnell's Bandcamp re-release of the OST (no longer online).

Based on the styles of the musicians, their public statements, private correspondence with them, and their released music, we can attribute these individual pieces with a fair amount of confidence:


CD track	Name	Composer
1	Oni Anime	O'Donnell/Salvatori
2	Trailer	Paul Sebastien
3	East Wind	Brian Salter
4	Searching	O'Donnell/Salvatori
5	Pursuit	Brian Salter
6	Loss	O'Donnell/Salvatori
7	Hurry	O'Donnell/Salvatori
8	Fight	Brian Salter
9	Ambient Suite	O'Donnell/Salvatori
10	Internal Space	Brian Salter
11	Farewell	O'Donnell/Salvatori
12	Konoko Chase	Brian Salter
13	Oni Fever	Brian Salter
14	The Hunt	O'Donnell/Salvatori
15	Whirled Piece	Brian Salter
16	End Titles	O'Donnell/Salvatori
--	No One Left to Trust (bonus MP3)	Brian Salter
--	All in-game ambient tracks	O'Donnell/Salvatori
--	mus_amasian ("Up and Away")	O'Donnell/Salvatori
--	mus_xgrv1 ("X-Groove")	O'Donnell/Salvatori

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-{|align=right
+{| style="float:right; margin-left:10px;"
 |-
-|[[Image:OST case front.jpg|thumb|200px|The original promotional CD's cover art.]]
+|[[Image:OST case front.jpg|x200px]][[Image:OST case back.jpg|x200px]]
-|valign=top|[[Image:OST digital cover.png|thumb|200px|The art used for Marty O'Donnell's Bandcamp re-release of the OST (no longer online).]]
+|-
+|colspan="2" align="center"|The original promotional CD
+|}
+[[Oni]]'s soundtrack is a mix of symphonic, techno, and ambient pieces. As far as who composed it, these are the names credited on the back of the CD, but see below for an in-depth investigation:
+{{Pullquote|Martin O'Donnell, Michael Salvatori - TotalAudio<br>Paul Sebastien - Power of Seven}}
+{| style="white-space:nowrap"
+|
+{| cellpadding=10 style="width:50%; text-align:left; border-color:#d0d0d0; border-width:1px; border-style:solid; border-collapse:collapse; border-spacing:0px; empty-cells:show; background-color:#f9f9f9;"
+!Contents
+|
+[[#TotalAudio|TotalAudio]]<br>
+[[#Power of Seven|Power of Seven]]<br>
+[[#Specific attribution|Specific attribution]]
+|}
+|
+{| style="width:50%; style="vertical-align:top; text-align:left;"
+! style="padding-left:50px"|Subpages
+|-
+| style="padding-left:50px"|
+[[Music/CD|Promotional soundtrack CD]]<br>
+[[Music/Ingame|In-game music data]]<br>
+[[Music/Myth|Myth music in Oni]]<br>
+[[Music/Fanmade|Fan-made music]]
+|}
 |}
-[[Oni]]'s soundtrack is a mix of symphonic/cinematic, techno/dance, and atmospheric/ambient pieces. As for the question of who composed it, these are the names credited on the back of the CD, but see below for an in-depth investigation:
+__NOTOC__
-*Martin O'Donnell, Michael Salvatori - TotalAudio
+==TotalAudio==
-*Paul Sebastien - Power of Seven
+[[Image:TotalAudio logo.jpg|right]]
+TotalAudio is a music and sound production company founded by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori, apparently incorporated officially under the name O'Donnell/Salvatori Inc. The company was contracted to score Bungie's games starting with [[Myth|Myth: The Fallen Lords]]. In 2000, Marty would join Bungie as an employee, but TotalAudio continues to operate (at least for the purpose of copyright maintenance and royalty collection). O'Donnell and Salvatori have individually gone on to compose for various games.
+Regarding Oni's music, O'Donnell stated in [https://halo.bungie.org/misc/nico_marty_interview.html this interview] that the first work on the soundtrack was done by Power of Seven and that TotalAudio then composed as much new music as they did, making the soundtrack a 50/50 product between the studios. Since O'Donnell and Salvatori worked closely at the time, we do not attempt to distinguish which of the two men composed each piece assigned to TotalAudio in the table at bottom.
-;Subpages
+Based on findings by [https://odysseyaudio.org/ Odyssey Sound Team], who are recreating unreleased music that was produced by TotalAudio for Oni and other games, certain tracks can be assigned to TotalAudio based on the same synthesized instruments being used for Halo CE. These tracks include '''Searching''' and '''The Hunt''', as well as the music in the [[Music/Ingame#mus_amasian1|mus_amasian]] OSBD (named by fans as '''"Up and Away"''') and the ending of '''End Titles'''. The beats in '''Searching''', '''The Hunt''', and '''End Titles''' originally come from the E-MU Phatt Beats collection, which TotalAudio used in other projects; the unused Halo CE tracks [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8U53VnSjP94 HERE] and [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puXwE00GGDM HERE] use beats from the same collection, as well as [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDVDwgCQ6Qo "A Walk in the Woods"] from Halo CE. '''"Up and Away"''' also shares samples with [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmMvyjuSa60 "Perchance to Dream"] from Halo CE and [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIojM_JA2bU "Dream Again"] from Halo 3.
-:[[Music/CD|Promotional soundtrack CD]]
-:[[Music/Ingame|In-game music data]]
-:[[Music/Myth|Myth music in Oni]]
-==TotalAudio==
+The atmospheric ambient tracks in Oni (collected [https://iritscen.oni2.net/wiki/ambient/ here]), some of which were strung together to make the CD's '''Ambient Suite''' and some of which are only heard in-game, are quite different from the other music in Oni, but these are also the product of O'Donnell/Salvatori. Similar ambient work can be heard in TotalAudio's score for the 1999 game [[wp:Septerra Core|Septerra Core]], specifically [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S75KEwqVC8A "Secrets of Marduk"], [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6chnK88LpQ "Holy Guard"], [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5lMvMaHz0c "Mystic Delving"], [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBp7cIsjYg4 "Biomech Heart"], and [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKWpK77vV2o "The Chosen Ruins"]. Five of Oni's ambient tracks are actually [[Music/Myth|reused from Myth I/II]], TotalAudio's previous work for Bungie.
-TotalAudio was a duo consisting of Marty O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori, also referred to as O'Donnell/Salvatori Inc. (same company or not?). This was an outside company contracted by Bungie to score their games. When it comes to Oni, however, Salvatori may not actually have composed anything. O'Donnell states in [https://halo.bungie.org/misc/nico_marty_interview.html this interview] that he personally composed the half of the soundtrack which Power of Seven did not. In the same interview, Salvatori is referred to as a producer and engineer working with Marty, not a composer, but the interview was three years after Oni released. O'Donnell specifically seems to take credit for "Oni Anime" and "Farewell" on his [https://web.archive.org/web/20010203124800/http://mp3.com/artists/18/totalaudio_bungie.html mp3.com artist page]. When O'Donnell released the Oni soundtrack on Bandcamp for a short while, the sheet music for "Hurry" was included as an extra, credited to O'Donnell/Salvatori Inc. but not any specific person.
 ==Power of Seven==
 [[Image:Power of Seven logo.gif|right]]
-The name echoes Bungie's "cult" of [[Seven|the number 7]], but Power of Seven [https://marathon.bungie.org/story/faq.html#15 was an independent digital music content publisher] founded in Minnesota and headed by Paul Sebastien. Bungie fans also know them for producing the opening themes to [[wp:Marathon_2: Durandal|Marathon 2: Durandal]] and [[wp:Marathon Infinity|Marathon Infinity]].
+The name echoes Bungie's "cult" of [[Seven|the number 7]], but Power of Seven [https://marathon.bungie.org/story/faq.html#15 was an independent digital music content publisher] founded in Minnesota and headed by Paul Sebastien. Bungie fans also know them for producing the opening themes to [[wp:Marathon 2: Durandal|Marathon 2: Durandal]] and [[wp:Marathon Infinity|Marathon Infinity]].
-Sebastien was also a founder of the techno band Psykosonik; over the course of the band's existence (1992–1997), four of their electronic dance songs charted in the Billboard Top 40. In 1996, Power of Seven [https://marathon.bungie.org/story/power_of_seven/power_of_seven.html was acquired by] audio company Headspace, Inc. and the studio was relocated to Headspace's HQ in San Mateo, California. In 1999, Headspace renamed themselves [[wp:Beatnik (company)|Beatnik, Inc.]] They became defunct in 2011. (The Californian company which currently creates meditation audio programs under the name Headspace is unrelated.)
+In 1996, Power of Seven [https://marathon.bungie.org/story/power_of_seven/power_of_seven.html was acquired by] audio company Headspace, Inc. and the studio was relocated to Headspace's HQ in San Mateo, California. In 1999, Headspace renamed themselves [[wp:Beatnik (company)|Beatnik, Inc.]] (The California company which currently creates meditation audio programs under the name Headspace is unrelated.) Beatnik became defunct in 2011.
 ===The "trio"===
-Determining which people at Power of Seven actually worked on Oni's soundtrack is more difficult. [https://www.gamespot.com/articles/bungies-mp3-contribution/1100-2451769/ This article] from spring 2000 calls the group a trio consisting of "NVerse", Brian Salter and Kim Cascone.
+Although the original entity known as Power of Seven ceased to exist when it was integrated into Headspace, Paul Sebastien was allowed to use the name for contracted work outside of the Headspace business. When Oni's upcoming soundtrack first began to get some press, [https://www.gamespot.com/articles/bungies-mp3-contribution/1100-2451769/ this article] from spring 2000 called Power of Seven a "trio, consisting of musicians NVerse, Brian Salter and Kim Cascone."
+"NVerse" was apparently an alias for Paul Sebastien. In 2023, Sebastien confirmed by email that he created '''Trailer''' as well as other possibly unreleased tracks. Sebastien was also a founder of the techno band Psykosonik; over the course of the band's existence (1992–1997), four of their electronic dance songs charted in the Billboard Top 40 even though they only released two albums. The style of '''Trailer''' resembles the output from his band, as exemplified by songs like [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIHANekdtvU Teknojihad] and [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZH2Pslw8BkI Killjoy].
+[https://www.vgmpf.com/Wiki/index.php?title=Brian_Salter Brian Salter], who has composed for other games, also released his own album called "Missing Scenes (1997-2005)" under the artist name Plektric in 2005. The following tracks are very clearly alternate versions of tracks from Oni:
+:1. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kQ5dSisqq8 Furies] ('''Konoko Chase''')
+:4. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPUztY78Mmk Two New Villains] ('''Whirled Piece''')
+:5. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gszaqu5fneQ Ellipse] ('''Oni Fever''')
+:6. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WIphvcQx6k Mr. Bailout] ('''East Wind''')
+:7. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBZAwe3ZkIc Drop Zone] ('''Pursuit''')
-[[wp:Kim Cascone|Cascone]] is a famous experimental electronic composer, and his work is ''wayyy'' more avant-garde than what you'd expect to hear in a game, though he did score [[wp:Obsidian (1997 video game)|Obsidian]], a 1997 surrealist puzzle game. Cascone briefly mentioned that he was working on "sound design for a Japanese anime game" at the end of [https://web.archive.org/web/20170314155110/http://www.spiderbytes.com/ambientrance/cascone.htm this 1998 interview], which he confirmed by email in 2022 to have been Oni, however he referred to his contributions as "[[wp:Speculative work|spec work]]" and didn't think that his "sound design" was used in the final game.
+Salter released additional alternate versions of two of these pieces on Smartsound.com: [https://www.smartsound.com/royalty-free-music/searchresults?album=Eclectic%20Lounge Terminus] ('''Konoko Chase''') and [https://www.smartsound.com/royalty-free-music/searchresults?album=Atmospheric%20Energy Crucial Dossier] ('''Whirled Piece'''). The article [[Konoko Chase]] documents all versions of Salter's piece.
-[http://www.vgmpf.com/Wiki/index.php?title=Brian_Salter Brian Salter], who has composed for other games, also released his own album called "Missing Scenes (1997-2005)" under the artist name Plektric in 2005. The following tracks are very clearly alternate versions of tracks from Oni: 1. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kQ5dSisqq8 Furies] (Konoko Chase), 4. Two New Villains (Whirled Piece), 5. Ellipse (Oni Fever, aka Strikers), 6. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WIphvcQx6k Mr. Bailout] (East Wind), and 7. Drop Zone (Pursuit).
+When asked by email in 2023 about the bonus MP3 '''No One Left to Trust''', released as promotional material, Salter recognized it as his work, and he also recalled making '''Fight''' and '''Internal Space'''.
-It is unknown whether Paul Sebastien himself contributed to the soundtrack, as he may have been busy in his role as Director of Production at Headspace. Was he the mysterious "NVerse"? In any case, about nine days before the above press release naming the trio of "NVerse, Brian Salter and Kim Cascone", Sebastien [http://oni.bungie.org/newsarchives/2000/apr00.html#pos stated in an interview] (now lost) that Power of Seven would also be making "atmospheric ambient" tracks for the game.
+[[wp:Kim Cascone|Kim Cascone]] is a noted experimental electronic composer, and his work (some of which can be found [https://bandcamp.com/discover/kim-cascone here]) is ''way'' more avant-garde than what you'd expect to hear in a game – though he did score [[wp:Obsidian (1997 video game)|Obsidian]], a 1997 surrealist puzzle game. Cascone briefly mentioned that he was working on "sound design for a Japanese anime game" at the end of [https://web.archive.org/web/20170314155110/http://www.spiderbytes.com/ambientrance/cascone.htm this 1998 interview], which he confirmed by email in 2022 to have been Oni, however he referred to his contributions as "[[wp:Speculative work|spec work]]" and didn't think that his "sound design" was used in the final game. Paul Sebastien's recollection in 2023 was that Cascone's work was on "audio sound FX areas such as gunshots and foley sounds etc. primarily — not music".
-==Tentative attribution==
+==Specific attribution==
-Based on the style of each composer and their above statements and released music, we can confidently credit some tracks and speculate on the rest:
+[[Image:OST digital cover.png|200px|thumb|right|The art used for Marty O'Donnell's Bandcamp re-release of the OST (no longer online).]]
+Based on the styles of the musicians, their public statements, private correspondence with them, and their released music, we can attribute these individual pieces with a fair amount of confidence:
 {| class="wikitable"
 |+
-!#
+!CD track
 !Name
 !Composer
@@ Line 42: / Line 75: @@
 |1
 |Oni Anime
-|O'Donnell
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |-
 |2
 |Trailer
-|Sebastien?
+|Paul Sebastien
 |-
 |3
 |East Wind
-|Salter
+|Brian Salter
 |-
 |4
 |Searching
-|???
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |-
 |5
 |Pursuit
-|Salter
+|Brian Salter
 |-
 |6
 |Loss
-|O'Donnell
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |-
 |7
 |Hurry
-|O'Donnell
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |-
 |8
 |Fight
-|???
+|Brian Salter
 |-
 |9
 |Ambient Suite
-|Cascone or Salter?
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |-
 |10
 |Internal Space
-|???
+|Brian Salter
 |-
 |11
 |Farewell
-|O'Donnell
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |-
 |12
 |Konoko Chase
-|Salter
+|Brian Salter
 |-
 |13
 |Oni Fever
-|Salter
+|Brian Salter
 |-
 |14
 |The Hunt
-|???
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |-
 |15
 |Whirled Piece
-|Salter
+|Brian Salter
 |-
 |16
 |End Titles
-|O'Donnell
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
+|-
+| --
+|No One Left to Trust (bonus MP3)
+|Brian Salter
+|-
+| --
+|All in-game ambient tracks
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
+|-
+| --
+|mus_amasian ("Up and Away")
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
+|-
+| --
+|mus_xgrv1 ("X-Groove")
+|O'Donnell/Salvatori
 |}
-As for bonus track "No One Left To Trust", it's difficult to guess who made it, but it bears stylistic resemblance to "Trailer" and also to other work by Sebastien from that time period. When it comes to ambient tracks used in-game which were not in the "Ambient Suite" track on the CD, we know that some are by O'Donnell because they are reused from Myth I/II (see Myth subpage link at top of page).
 [[Category:Music]]