CartridgeCulture
05-25-2016, 05:47 AM
I've been thinking about how to approach tagging video game music. I have an entire history of game music to catalog, but the vocabulary we use to describe music hasn't really caught up with video games. Whether this is a problem of vgm largely being a novelty to even hardcore music enthusiasts, or its misrepresentation as being exclusively for younger audiences... well, that's a discussion for another time. For now, I was curious how you go about approaching tagging your video game music.
For the moment, I tag video game soundtracks as Game, and film/tv/broadway soundtracks as Soundtrack. My reasoning for separating vgm into its own 'Game' genre is this: Soundtracks for stage, TV, movies... they often share a similar-enough compositional style... cinematic, orchestral. And while these qualities are definitely present in video game music, vgm is very much its own unique genre, sharing similar compositional styles that aren't really present anywhere else. Or where inspiration from other popular music genres does creep in, the music is often still composed and executed in that very unique, "gamey" sound. That, and the fact that there's historically-relevant 'video' game music in games that primarily don't use video, like pinball, and it just makes a lot more sense to me to categorize the genre as its own unique thing.
BUT, then you have things like the soundtrack to the Godfather, and the soundtrack to Miami Vice, which despite being strongly different in general composition, are both quasi-officially categorized as Soundtrack/Stage & Screen. So would that make vgm, regardless of its style and composition, fall under the Soundtrack/Stage & Screen genre? I think I'd still lean towards vgm being its own genre, but maybe more for the vehicle of delivery? For me it's easy to look at a shelf full of cartridges and imagine them as cassettes or LPs, published and sold music albums by recognized and cataloged authors... but for now, I'm interested in your thoughts on the subject, and I have a few questions for anyone willing to share!
1) POLL: What genre do you tag your vgm with?
2) Do you tag official CD soundtracks as Soundtrack/Stage & Screen, or your vgm tag?
3) What genre would you tag Streets of Rage? Techno? Game?
For the moment, I tag video game soundtracks as Game, and film/tv/broadway soundtracks as Soundtrack. My reasoning for separating vgm into its own 'Game' genre is this: Soundtracks for stage, TV, movies... they often share a similar-enough compositional style... cinematic, orchestral. And while these qualities are definitely present in video game music, vgm is very much its own unique genre, sharing similar compositional styles that aren't really present anywhere else. Or where inspiration from other popular music genres does creep in, the music is often still composed and executed in that very unique, "gamey" sound. That, and the fact that there's historically-relevant 'video' game music in games that primarily don't use video, like pinball, and it just makes a lot more sense to me to categorize the genre as its own unique thing.
BUT, then you have things like the soundtrack to the Godfather, and the soundtrack to Miami Vice, which despite being strongly different in general composition, are both quasi-officially categorized as Soundtrack/Stage & Screen. So would that make vgm, regardless of its style and composition, fall under the Soundtrack/Stage & Screen genre? I think I'd still lean towards vgm being its own genre, but maybe more for the vehicle of delivery? For me it's easy to look at a shelf full of cartridges and imagine them as cassettes or LPs, published and sold music albums by recognized and cataloged authors... but for now, I'm interested in your thoughts on the subject, and I have a few questions for anyone willing to share!
1) POLL: What genre do you tag your vgm with?
2) Do you tag official CD soundtracks as Soundtrack/Stage & Screen, or your vgm tag?
3) What genre would you tag Streets of Rage? Techno? Game?