[News] The Black Mages III news. A bunch of pointless speculation follows.

Originally Posted by Servilonus

If they DID do the Dream Oath Opera though, I wouldn't mind if they used that guy again. Heh, they could use him AND the female vocalist from Otherworld, and they got a Draco and Maria right there. But if I could pick any song for them to do, it'd totally be the DDO. I used to play that song on guitar (and bass) alot. I'd love to be able to play a BM version

Fun fact: mr. goo is Draco at "Tour de Japon" and "Voices" concerts. :biggrin:

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I think this is a good time to bump this old thread.
The album is due to release on March 19th and plenty of info is available now.

Track list:

1) "Opening ~ Bombing Mission" [from Final Fantasy VII] (Kenichiro Fukui)
2) "Neo ExDeath" [from Final Fantasy V - "The Final Battle"] (Michiro Okamiya)
3) "The Extreme" [from Final Fantasy VIII] (Michio Okamiya)
4) "Assault of the Silver Dragons" [from Final Fantasy IX] (Arata Hanyuda)
5) "Kuraminokumo" [from Final Fantasy III - "This is the Last Battle"] (Kenichiro Fukui)
6) "Distant Worlds" [from Final Fantasy XI] (Kenichiro Fukui)
7) "Premonition" [from Final Fantasy VIII] (Tsuyoshi Sekito)
8) "Grand Cross" [from Final Fantasy IX - "Final Battle"] (Keiji Kawamori)
9) "Darkness and Starlight" [from Final Fantasy VI - "Maria and Draco"] (Part 1 by Tsuyoshi Sekito, Part 2 and 4 by Kenichiro Fukui, Part 3 by Michio Okamiya)
10) "LIFE ~in memory of KEITEN~" (Original Composition by Nobuo Uematsu)

Official Site
The Blog Mages 2008

Unfortunately, it will be a one disc album after all.
At the official site you can watch a few promotional videos/interviews. Samples of all the tracks (except track 10) can be heard in background during those.
Track 5 isn't new, it's "This is the Last Battle", the bonus track from FF III DS OST.

About track 10:

Originally Posted by Nobuo Uematsu

About 8 years ago, I met a boy named "Yoshitaka Tagawa" who was 15 years old then. Yoshitaka(who is the big big fan of FINAL FANTASY) got acute myeloid leukemia from his childhood, and it was difficult for his doctor to expect how long he could live. I wish him to get better and presented him the song "LIFE". After I presented him that song, he started to participate in a lot of events of mine from far Kyushu with his mother. When I first met him, he seemed to lack energy, but while meeting him for a several time, he got energetic and smiled a lot. In fact, I met him at "PRESS START CONCERT" last year, and he was full of vigor. Everybody around him was thinking confidently that he is getting better, but on Jan.25th 2008, He suddenly passed away. I was really sad and was full of regret. I thought that the delightful things must have waited for him in his future. But no one can predict what's going to happen, he passed away.

I think the title track, "Darkness and Starlight" is going to be really special.

Originally Posted by Michio Okamiya

Darkness and Starlight, the main track of our 3rd album. We divided and shared the arrangement in three members, and finally attached each parts into one pieces! It became an amazing track which exceeds more than 15minutes. There are 4 parts in the track, and each parts have a different kind of essence. So it's actually count as 1song, but it's a substantial work as same as 7 or 8 tracks.

The part which I arranged is "part 3". And it has a added part which had been in Uematsu-san's head for about several years. So, this will be the first time full version of Maria and Draco appears. The added part is the Battle scene of Ralse and Draco, so the guitar and Uematsu-san's organ are played hard just like a battle of them! I hope you'll have fun listening to it!

Incidentally, we did such a bad thing.... Oh, I mean... We did a great thing that we sang the chorus! Well..., it was the most difficult time of all the recordings. What??? We have to sing at the live concert?!?!?

Yeah, the mages themselves sing the chorus, and in the last video Uematsu says the opera singers from the previous orchestral concerts (which means mr. goo as well ) return. Semi-humorous, semi-epic, just like "The Skies Above", but bigger and better! (I hope)

So, what're everybody's expectations?

There's nowhere I can't reach.

A sample of the last track can be heard in their final video.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

So, has anyone watched the DVD yet?

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?