I'm not finding any samples or downloads of this anywhere.

So, is it "f---ing wonderful," or what?

Hint: it starts with a "g" and ends with "amemp3s.net".

Well, "f---ing wonderful" might be too strong. It seems like all the Persona 3 albums are much better if you've played the game. I found the OST quite mediocre when I first heard it, but after I played the game (which by the way was much better than I had anticipated, definitely some fresh air in an all too stagnant genre), I started digging the music. Burn My Dread: Reincarnation basically takes all the dominant key themes from the original OST and lengthens them and re-arranges them a bit. If you're a casual fan of P3's music, it might be best to get this CD and skip the OST, as the OST contains a lot of crappy filler tracks that are very uninteresting outside the game.

The style of Persona 3's music is youthful, hip, contemporary J-pop, with cheesy "Engrish" vocals in some tracks (not such a big problem as it might sound, though: the vocals easily merge into the background and can be ignored after a while). A lot of people hate it, and I can clearly see why. Personally, I've started liking it more and more after playing the game, it really places it in context. Like previous Persona soundtracks, it's actually a lot deeper than a brief, shallow listen-through will reveal. It reminds me of what Stuart Wilson said about director Roman Polanski: "Very deep water pretending to be shallow water".

The album isn't "f---ing wonderful", but I like it. But, if you haven't played the game, you might not.

Yeeeaaahhh, about that...I don't know how to work that site.

I mean, I thought I was supposed to be getting MP3s, not SFVs, or just text lists of the tracks that're supposed to be on the album.

Don't know how to work Bit Torrent, either.

I listened to it earlier in the year. I'm not listening to it at this point in time nor am I considering it. Feel free to draw conclusions.

Allow me to elaborate:

As far as the original soundtrack goes, I'm actually more interested in the stuff that has accompanying vocals.

I'm mostly interested in the musics backing the town, namely "Want to Be Close," "Dormitory," "When the Moon Reaches the Star," and "Polonian Mole."

The battle theme with vocals, "Mass Destruction," is awesome, too.

I definitely dig the contemporary styles employed.

SIDENOTE: I find both the game and its music reminiscent of anime; for some reason, it keeps reminding me of RahXephon (probably because of the island urban locale, and emphasis on teenageism and character relationships) even if there aren't any mechs (not like RahXephon ever used its mechs well anyway).

...

That all said, do you think I'm going to end up liking the arrange album?

Or, for that matter, what other soundtracks would you recommend, that are similar to Persona 3, other than maybe Parasite Eve (for its contemporary styles) or other Shoji Meguro scores (since you ought to expect I've checked out the rest of his discography after checking out Persona 3).

From what you've said so far, I definitely think you'd like the Persona 3 arrange album. Go for it.

As for recommendations of other soundtracks with the same style, that's a little tricky... Whatever you can say about P3's soundtrack, you can't deny that it has a pretty unique sound for being a game OST, so it's hard to find albums close to it's sound. Meguro's other work is pretty different. On the other hand, "contemporary" is a very broad term that can mean anything, really.

I'd recommend trying the soundtracks to the previous games in the Persona series, Persona: Be Your True Mind, Persona 2: Innocent Sin, and Persona 2: Eternal Punishment. They were composed by other people, and sound pretty different from P3 (in my opinion much better), but they too put focus on a contemporary sound. You could also try Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers, and it's Hyper Re-arrange album. Especially the latter is reminiscent of P3's soundtrack, and heavy on the "hip" vocals, if you like that sort of sound.

Other than those, I don't really know what to recommend... Racing Lagoon OST, perhaps...? Anyone else got any other ideas?

Dracula Perfect Selection!

Har har.

I'd second the recommendation of both Persona 2 OSTs, but on their own merits more than any perceived similarity to Persona 3.

definitely check out Persona3 FES if you didn't already. I like it even more than Burn my Dread because it's a little more laid-back. You might also want to try some random pc-dating game soundtracks, Meguro definately got his inspiration for the daytime themes there.

im not a big fan of happy go lucky sounds, and im not sure if i would have given this soundtrack a real chance without playing the game beforehand. i would describe the game as a fresh breeze of air, same goes for the soundtrack and this arranged CD. sure, the vocals can get a bit in the way and all that j-pop attitude might turn some people off, but id say go for it.
its a unique mix in game music, every arrangement is admirable crafted with great precision. theres only one song i dont like on this cd, and thats the velvet room arrange. but i didnt even like the original in persona 3. the velvet versions of persona 2 are prefered.
im sure everyone can find something for them on this cd, if only a little bit of curiosity.

Seconded. As bad a rap as it gets, I rather enjoy it...Unlike the "rap" of this album.

No. I hope the "Har har" signifies a joke, because otherwise it's very misleading. Other than both albums having some rap on a few tracks, they sound nothing alike at all. Besides, I find the "rap" reputation both these albums have received to be pretty off too, since they both only have three tracks each with rap vocals.

The rapping style is totally different between the two albums. Dracula Perfect Selection harkens back to the uber-cheesy late 80's style rap, while Burn My Dread ~ Reincarnation sounds more like "modern" rap (or at least tries to... ). I think the rap in both albums is pretty terrible (though strangely enough, it fits perfectly in-game in Persona 3), but saying they're the same is like recommending an Iron Maiden album to someone looking for more stuff sounding like Limp Bizkit.

Well, Bernhardt said he wanted contemporary styles and Dracula PS fits the bill. Sort of.

(and personally, I'd recommend the Iron Maiden album anyway and say "here's what good music sounds like"...but that's just me).

Well, if "contemporary" was the only criterion, I have about 500+ albums to recommend. Like I said previously, it's a really broad term. If you're only going by "contemporary", you might as well recommend the upcoming Rockman arrange CDs, or Final Fantasy VII, or Thunder Force V, or... get my point?

I was going more after the preferences he stated in post #6, like "The battle theme with vocals, "Mass Destruction," is awesome, too.", etc., and based on that, I don't think he'll like Dracula Perfect Selection. It doesn't sound the same at all.

LOL! Definitely agreed.

Of course it was. I was betting on the infamy of Drac PS's 'rap' nature.

All that being said, I love Dracula Perfect Selection.

I don't suppose there's any J-Pop that Persona 3 tried to imitate, or would be similar to the crazy-sexy-cool-artsiness of the vocal tracks of Persona 3, is there?

Guys, check "Megami Tensei Online Imagine Original Soundtrack" if you manage to find it.
Without a doubt one of Meguro's best if you enjoy his "regular" Persona2/SMTIII/Nocturne style (ie it's not jpop + 200 remixes of the same track as Persona3 pretty much is).
Later,

Alcahest

Oh, really? And what would Meguro's "regular Persona 2 style" be...? Both P2 soundtracks were composed by Toshiko Tasaki, Masaki Kurokawa, and Kenichi Tsuschiya.

Was this pressed onto a CD or was it only through a download service? I've never seen it at an online store.

I would love to have a disc of the unreleased music from Nocturne.

Haha i got mixed up, my bad. Scrap the Persona2 part from my post.

Yeah Online Imagine OST was pressed and given with the Premium Package version of the game.
Later,

Alcahest

Seconded. Go seek out the original sounds first.

http://www.rpgfan.com/soundtracks/perso … index.html

Well, GEEZ, y'all couldn't have told me none of this earlier?! I WANT.

I couldn't have asked for a better tracklist; it's practically all of my favorite tracks from the OST!

Tell you what? You asked for our opinions on the album and you got it, and that tracklist has been available from different resources for at least half a year.

I agree with most points in that review, the album is pretty good. To make a misplaced entry into the "Have you ever changed your opinion about a soundtrack"-thread, I must say that no other VGM album has changed so drastically for me. When it came out I positively hated it, but it has grown incredibly, and now I love it (which is very surprising, since this music is definitely not my style - sometimes you just surprise yourself). Like I already mentioned two months ago in this thread, if you've played the game and enjoyed the music, go for it.

Kinda late to the party but...

Persona 3 FES OST >  Persona 3 OST

No vocals, no filler, just good stuff.

yes, its perfect for a straight listen, just like Burn My Dread ~ Reincarnation.

meguro is climbing the ladder.

Mostly agreed, P3 FES OST is much tighter overall. Practically no filler on that disc, people who got fed up with the amount of filler on the first OST should really check the FES CD out. But, the very best themes from the whole P3 project are still on the original P3 OST, and P3 FES's version of "Mass Destruction" is much inferior to the original. Love FES's "Interval of Time", though (like 10 times better dungeon theme than the Tartarus variants from the original).

Another comment on the arrange album: I can't believe they left the Master of Shadow/Master of Tartarus theme off it! That was the best track, and really deserved an arrange version. The rest of the track selection is spot-on, though.

youre right, that one is also one of my favorite P3 tracks. maybe they will pump it out in some next chapter

First of all, not to sound rude, but those who label Burn My Dread as sounding "jpop-like" must know nothing about jpop because it sounds absolutely nothing like jpop.  It has some vocals.  That's it.

I posted a write up about my feelings on Burn My Dread a while ago, and I still consider it one of the best arrange albums to come out in say the last decade or so.  If you like Persona 3's music at all, get Burn My Dread.  I agree with what was said about Fes too.  Overall, much tighter package than the Persona 3 OST, and includes some really good music new to the game.  Plus it has a really cool techno version of Chris' theme from the first Persona game.  I about choked when I first heard that.

I haven't heard the Online soundtrack yet, and didn't know Meguro did it.  Guess I'll have to find that.

- Justin Pfeiffer

Are you referring to track 8 on the CD? If I'm not horribly mistaken, that is a remix of the Snow Queen's theme from P1, not Chris's theme. I don't hear Chris's theme anywhere on the P3 FES CD.

Most of the songs were only extended, experienced aural upgrades, and in some cases, may have had instruments switched around.

The only 3 songs that were fully remixed are "Want to Be Close," "Deep Breaths," and "Living with Determination," which all experienced some mixture of disco, jazz, and rap/hip-hop.