We're getting back to our indie roots this week and we are staying there for a while. After a foray through some of the bigger artists to ever grace a video game soundtrack I need a breather. I've enjoyed the trip and I'm sure we'll visit some other big names again but right now we need to change gears. I've especially enjoyed our recent foray into Bucketheadland. I thought Buckethead was a good way to transition from the big names back into the world of the experimental underdog. I hadn't listened to a lot of Bucket's more recent stuff and I spent all of last week catching up. It's been great and I'll be listening to him daily as we start sliding back into the warm embrace of the indie game community. I'm looking forward to exploring some more of the gorgeous music that has emerged from this ridiculously talented and hardworking circle of music makers.
With our return to indie game music comes a return to lush and layered electronic music. In 2014 Serge Melkonyan better known as Elkony composed the soundtrack for a little indie game that would become an mobile classic: Triada Studio Games' Shadowmatic. The track “Intro” from that soundtrack is everything I love about indie game music. It's a perfect statement piece that tells you exactly what this game and this soundtrack are all about. It mixes sonic references and stylistic flourishes from sources like Steve Reich, Brian Eno, and Arvo Pärt with Massive Attack, Pink Floyd and Aphex Twin. The soundtrack perfectly compliments the meditative gameplay but is also great headphone listening for a morning commute or lazy Sunday lie-in listening. There's a level of craftsmanship married to a kind of self disciplined sense of exploration here that meets the listener on their own terms. The piece weaves and floats along that impossibly fine line between emotional and cerebral that good electronic music often does. Throughout the rest of this stunning soundtrack Elkony manages to conjure the spirit of each of the game's puzzle solving locations with an ambient and laidback ease reminiscent of a musical Zen master. The soundtrack made the top 15 video game soundtracks on iTunes and Apple Music for 2015 and the studio also won an Apple Design Award that same year. I recommend checking out the track and if you're into mobile puzzle games check out Shadowmatic too. It is definitely worth your time too. Symbols, Retro, Sea and Childhood are all standout tracks that I stream regularly and I'll be playing more Shadowmatic once I've finished writing too. I just can't recommend this one enough.
