Level Up!

My apologies for a lack of postage yesterday. The real world managed to hit me over the head with a blunt workday, so I wasn’t able to get anything important done, like pleasing the readers. At any rate, my post about Sonic 2 HD got me reminiscing about the music. Sonic The Hedgehog introduced me to one of my favorite musicians of all time, Jun Senoue. Let’s take a bit of a look at what he’s done, and what he’s been up to lately.

Jun was first introduced to my ears when he started working on Sonic games back in 1994, the first being Sonic the Hedgehog 3. If I say the words “Launch Base Zone”, how many of you can instantly just start humming the tune? I know I can. By the time he’d got to that game, he’d already worked on a few titles, such as Dark Wizard. Timeless tunes can easily come from someone who’d been making music since the age of 3.

Now we fast forward a few years. If any of you had been Sonic-heads at any time, then chances are you played the last classic of the series, (in my opinion) Sonic Adventure 2. The Sonic Adventure series introduced us to his band, Crush 40. For years, I’ve listened to the guitar riffs that he composed in awe. You can not like the games all you want, but if Jun’s got a guitar in his hand, you’re more than likely going to like the song.

So what’s he been up to since Sonic Adventure 2? Plenty. He took part in composing music for some games that we don’t like to talk about too much, like Shadow the Hedgehog, and Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. He was appointed as the sound director for Sonic and The Black Knight. He also did some work for Super Smash Bros: Brawl. Who else would you trust to work on the background music for Sonic’s stage? He’s been in the credits for some non-Sonic related games, too, like Inital D, and Outrun 2 SP.

Outside of videogames, he’s got an endorsement from ESP, a japanese guitar/musical instrument manufacturer. He’s also a columnist for the Japanese metal magazine, BURRN! He contributed a guitar solo to the new Hardline album. He’s just all over the place. A very busy man spreading his music as far as he can take it. It seems as though Jun is ALWAYS working on something, and given his track record, that should be quite fine by all of us.