[Album] Final Fantasy IX (SSCX-10043)

It's nice to see some soundtrack reviews popping up again.

My feelings on this soundtrack are mixed. Some tracks are lovely but many are comparatively dull. Then there are tracks that start off interesting but don't seem to go anywhere. To its credit, the soundtrack is very cohesive as a whole. It functions fairly well in the context of the game despite a lack of moving themes. In album form it doesn't fare nearly as well. Something is wrong when there are 32 tracks on the first disc and I only find a handful of them to be memorable or enjoyable. The character themes are decent but still a far cry from the amazing collection of character themes from Final Fantasy VI. The whole rythmic and tribal nature of many of the tracks suit the game well but often meander into the realm of the forgettable. And the recurring motifs like the Melodies of Life/Oeilvert theme as well as the arrangements of character themes tend to be inferior to their originals, which were never spectacular to begin with. The combat themes are passable but not as good as what the previous three Final Fantasy games had to offer. It's not that the soundtrack is filled with bad tracks. It's that it's filled with average and unremarkable ones. I think it lacks the consistent sense of contextual attachment that many tracks in Final Fantasy VII benefitted from as well as the sheer beauty and general excellence of the music from Final Fantasy VI. So I find it comparable to Final Fantasy VIII in the end. That one was experimental with good highs and bad lows balancing out to average. Final Fantasy IX stays closer to average on the whole. Sometimes veering above that but not often or higher enough to make the entire package rise head and shoulders above the filler.

I'll give it a *** out of *****. It's probably slightly above average, but compared to some of the more inspired and exciting RPG soundtracks out there, it falls on the side of forgettable.

Jam it back in, in the dark.