Your favourite anime music

[Maruno]

What music do you really like? The songs that are just catchy, moving, entertaining, quirky or otherwise interesting enough for you to keep listening to them. And why do you like them so much?

And when I say music, I mean songs/music that feature in, and/or are written for, an animé. This includes classical music, Franz Ferdinand's "Do You Want To" (Paradise Kiss) and things like that.


I'll have to think up a few things and post them later.

[Falciferum]

Of the anime I've actually had a proper good watch of, my favourite opening music is Outlaw Star's, not only a brilliant tune overall but has a nice heavy bit in the middle which must always be headbanged to.
The original theme to Genshiken I also have admiration for as you may have read in a thread elsewhere, complete with video link.

Of the anime I haven't seen but have heard the music, the opening to Kannazuki no Miko is a staggeringly good piece of trance from Kotoko (Re-Sublimity), and I like the theme to Bubblegum Crisis Tokyo 2040, because it's heavy.

Also I think I'll mention Rozen Maiden, I don't particularly like either the opening or closing soundtracks but the little bits of background music that play through an episode I've noted as being particularly good. To me they all sound like the intros to what would be some really epic songs but which haven't been written.

[Maruno]

muchan said:

Obviously there are stuff I don't really like and stuff I really adore, but they are so vast I don't really like naming favourite songs at the risk of forgetting and missing out loads of songs I really adore.

I'm the same way. The advantage here is that you can add on songs and music you think of later.

For starters, pretty much all the songs and music (assuming "song" means "music with words" as in "sing") in FLCL is great. I think they're probably better than they might otherwise have been because the music was written first, and the anime directed around it, rather than the other way around (or even just slapping a tune over a scene). This made the music more a part of the anime, and the anime is so memorable that the music becomes a fond part of your memories.

I like both the first opening and the ending songs of "Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei", the opening because of the hand-shaking "bure bure bure bure", and the ending because it's hauntingly reminiscent of some kind of old-style jazz horror music (the... imaginative, shall we say, visuals accompanying said songs makes them better).

Then there's the "Dance Like You Want To Win" music from "Neon Genesis Evangelion" (the synchro attack). I liked it because, like FLCL, the scene seemed to fit around the music (I don't know if that's the case here, though), because that scene was so impressive and easily the best mecha battle scene ever, and because it's tune is played on the piano. The classical feel of the piano delivering that somewhat light-hearted music in the midst of a very tense battle in which precision and perfecting is vital is really quite... I don't know what the word is. Invigorating? Unexpected? Perhaps someone else can describe it better than I can.

Speaking of that word I don't know, another example comes from "End of Evangelion", just as Third Impact begins ("Komm, Süsser Tod", meaning "Come, Sweet Death"). The light-feeling piano that plays throughout doesn't fit with the scenes it plays over, even though the lyrics do. Whatever key its in doesn't imply a kind of sorrow that perhaps might be more fitting, although because I like the contrast I'd say it's best just the way it is.

[Navarre]

A second for Komm, Süsser Tod, it's a song which has impact whether you first hear it in the movie (the scene in which it begins is.... interesting, to say the least) or not. It just sort of heightens the horrible, screaming horror that is the climax of that film.

As for Dance like you want to win, (hehehe) I'd definetly go with 'Uplifting'. I personally wouldn't give it the title of best battle (for me, Asuka's hilariously outmatched battle against the army in The End of Evangelion wins), but the song infuses the scene with a sense of joy that is quite uncommon in the rest of series, which is always a plus.

Keeping with the theme of Evangelion, 'Thanatos' and it's various remixes are a perrenial favourite of mine (inlcuding the vocal song, 'If I can't be yours) and very little beats 'The Beast' for 'look, here is a horrible monster we have unleashed upon the world'.

Other series? I think I'd definetly go with Slayers. Allll the opening songs of that series are wonderful, conveying, to me at least, the sense of adventure which sometimes takes a backseat to hijinks (also, they're sung by Megumi Hayashibara, would just seems to get everywhere). Many of the image songs are pretty good too, although I suppose it's a matter of taste, everyone seems to think 'More than words' is just that great, which I personally don't. 'So In the World', a song by Gourry, the team's lovable oaf, if probably my favourite.

Yuki Kajiura's score for Noir was also good, especially the Latin number 'Salva Nos' and 'Canta per me', the series slightly overused 'look, stuff it happening' theme.

I could go on forever, my MP3 player's stuffed full of em' but those are some of the favourites which popped up first.

[Navarre]

Hooray for double posting because I thought of something new to say!

So I completely forgot about Susumu Hirasawa and the Paprika soundtrack. Whilst most of it is pretty nondescript (read; I hardly ever listen to the middle because it's all samey), about four of the tracks stand out. The first is Parade (Yes, That parade for those who have seen the film) and its vocal version. I've always enjoyed songs which take me places, and the places this one goes are just a little left of sane, which is... interesting... maybe's it's just the connotations of the song, but I love it. The opening song, meditational field, is a lovely bit of electronic happiness, and the ending song is cool too, although the random oooh/ughu/whatevers can be a bit grating the first time you hear it. Hirasawa's soundtrack for Millenium Actress is a lot more solid throughout, but the good ones (Chiyoko's theme and Rotation Lotus 2) don't have the same punch as the ones from Parika, I feel.

And if you like moderny type Jazz, you could do worse than The Thrill's soundtrack to Blue Submarine 6. The first time I heard it, I didn't think it meshed particularly well with the whole post-apocaliptic-the-world-is-flooded thing, but the songs by themselves stand as some energetic and interesting pieces of music.

[Indefinite Description]

Oh yes, Paprika... As far as Satoshi Kon's anime are concerned, though, Paranoia Agent's 'Dream Island Obsessional Park' (also Hirasawa) remains supreme for me.

(All together now) Raa-eee-yaa Ra-Ra-ee-yo-ra...

[Navarre]

*goes and listens to 'Dream Island Obsessional Park'*

Hehe, typical Hirasawa, although instead of weird male vocals (apart from his own) it has opera and birdsong? Me likey. Incidentally, you can get some of his stuff for free from his website, so gogogo! (if you like that kind of stuff.... like me....)

Looking through my collection again, I see Azumanga Daioh, which, whilst not listen-toable all the time, is nice in small bursts... of particular note are probably the five million different versions of the 'new school term' theme, and a couple of the tribute songs (especially psychotic elastic band song Moi Moi) by Oranges and Lemons(?), who, if I'm not mistaken, did the ending song of Haibane Renmei (good link eh?), the opening song of which is wonderful, especially when the chorus/bridge/thing is played at full blast through E142's speakers, I loved that series just for that.

[Navarre]

I keep posting here, someone else do so and save meee....

Just a quick new one, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei... the general oddball crazy psycho tone of the show we've all come to know and love is captured in its music, and it's by turns relaxing, sad, hyper and silly, a must... hear?

[Indefinite Description]

Fair enough, since I happen to have the RahXephon OST on my desk: 'Hemisphere' is good, in a crazy-dreamer-vertigo-anxiety way.

[Navarre]

Oh dear... what music to plug now...

Hellsing... Hellsing music wins. Hellsing Ultimate not so much, I'm a big fan of choral music, but the weird guitaryrockypianoy wonderful that is Hellsing... it's slightly dark, and just.. I don't know, but it fits. And I love Shine, even though it's slightly cheesy power ballad type rock.

And I liked Hemisphere too. I haven't actually seen RahXephon, but Hemisphere is good, as is The Chariot for the whole 'oh good lord we are going to die eeeee piano' thing it has going.

[project_2501]

GITS:SAC oppening theme : inner universe-Origa

wins hands down
it kicks so much ass

2501

[Navarre]

Katamichi catchball is now the new definition of.... something?? Potemayo's music wins in so many ways (and loses in some in terms of the soundtrack...) but the opening is like liquid happy.... if only the chorus wasn't a freaking tongue twister.....