https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LC0Q8fy_M8M
The problem is this particular rendering in Youtube has been somehow fubared. It’s like the guy passed it through a bad dynamic compression or something before uploading, so the volume is constantly getting adjusted like a bad analog recording. Anyway, it is certain that the track did not originally have these problems. In fact, there’s another version of the same track here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwhsayTKfss
And the problem with this version is that it’s been sped up for some reason.
Anyway, yeah, hoping somebody knows what collection this version of the BGM came from. (I can verify it’s not in the "Gradius Ultimate Collection", which seems to maintain specifically only the arcade versions of Gradius music.)
GRADIUS III [REUP] (Thanks to Executable, the original uploader)
グラディウス III
Catalog Number KICA-1001
Release Date Feb 21, 1990
Publish Format Commercial
Release Price 3000 JPY
Media Format CD
Classification Original Soundtrack, Arrangement, Drama
Published by Konami
Composed by Konami Kukeiha Club
Arranged by Konami Kukeiha Club
Performed by
~VGMdb~ (http://vgmdb.net/album/325)
FLAC / CUE / LOG / SCANS
[900221][KICA-1001] GRADIUS III (FLAC+CUE+LOG+BK)[447MB]
~MEGA~ (https://mega.co.nz/#!ON5xUITb!LIe020XJWBH-Ni0Sa7l9mCXHrQqoxma9TxuK9TR9zTc)
pw: Sun7
~ENJOY~