Your personal Baldur's Gate soundtrack
As well as videogames, I like have a handful of other passions; chief among them music. It is in equal measure evocative and evocable, and as I revisit the games I enjoyed several years ago, the soundtrack that accompanied my initial forays into Faerûn is gradually revising itself.
I am going to share three musical moments I have recently enjoyed whilst playing the Baldur's Gate games, and invite any of you who have soundtracks of your own to do the same.
1. Just my type of adventuring party!
“You're just my type… oh, you’ve got a pulse and you are breathing…”
Korgan fancies Mazzy. Haer’Dalis fancies Aerie, who fancies Haer’Dalis right back. Aerie, Jaheira and Viconia fancy the protagonist. The protagonist, having been raised by monks, in all likelihood fancies Viconia, Jaheira, Aerie, Haer’Dalis, Mazzy, Korgan, the Town Crier and anyone else in the realms who hasn’t been chunked or disintegrated.
Baldur’s Gate is a game as charged with adolescent sexuality as… well, any other Bioware game, and I can’t sit through a single flirting or romance dialogue without this suave little piece of prog-pop coming into my head.
Saint Motel – My Type
2. Double trouble in Brynnlaw
“Where the riverboat swayed beneath the sun is where the river runs red…”
As if breaking a childhood friend out of a magical asylum isn’t enough, the party must then steal a boat from the self-appointed ‘pirate king’ of Brynnlaw, Desharik. The alarm triggered, the group must make their escape, hurrying to the docks before Desharik and his pirate army can catch up.
This happened on my most recent playthrough of this short-but-fun mission, and Ocean Colour Scene made for an exciting musical accompaniment. The fact that Jan, the bungling thief in question, threw off Cayia's pirate guards with a Mirror Image spell makes the opening lyric "I see double" that much more appropriate!
Ocean Colour Scene – The Riverboat Song
3. Our Ninth Portents of Alaundo opened up at Exodus
“We climbed ’til we could climb no more; too old now, and too few…”
On the north-western edge of Scotland, in the St kilda Archipelago, is the isle of Hirta. Evacuated in 1930, the island is home only to ghosts, and in 2013 became the subject of ‘Hirta Songs’, a collaboration by two seminal Scottish artists: poet Robin Robertson and singer/songwriter Alasdair Roberts.
Exodus imagines the departure of the island’s 36 inhabitants, and paints a predictably haunting picture. Whenever I’m exploring Faerûn’s coldest, darkest, quietest corners, this piece of music comes unbidden into my head, and very affecting it is too.
Alasdair Roberts and Robin Robertson – Exodus
I am going to share three musical moments I have recently enjoyed whilst playing the Baldur's Gate games, and invite any of you who have soundtracks of your own to do the same.
1. Just my type of adventuring party!
“You're just my type… oh, you’ve got a pulse and you are breathing…”
Korgan fancies Mazzy. Haer’Dalis fancies Aerie, who fancies Haer’Dalis right back. Aerie, Jaheira and Viconia fancy the protagonist. The protagonist, having been raised by monks, in all likelihood fancies Viconia, Jaheira, Aerie, Haer’Dalis, Mazzy, Korgan, the Town Crier and anyone else in the realms who hasn’t been chunked or disintegrated.
Baldur’s Gate is a game as charged with adolescent sexuality as… well, any other Bioware game, and I can’t sit through a single flirting or romance dialogue without this suave little piece of prog-pop coming into my head.
Saint Motel – My Type
2. Double trouble in Brynnlaw
“Where the riverboat swayed beneath the sun is where the river runs red…”
As if breaking a childhood friend out of a magical asylum isn’t enough, the party must then steal a boat from the self-appointed ‘pirate king’ of Brynnlaw, Desharik. The alarm triggered, the group must make their escape, hurrying to the docks before Desharik and his pirate army can catch up.
This happened on my most recent playthrough of this short-but-fun mission, and Ocean Colour Scene made for an exciting musical accompaniment. The fact that Jan, the bungling thief in question, threw off Cayia's pirate guards with a Mirror Image spell makes the opening lyric "I see double" that much more appropriate!
Ocean Colour Scene – The Riverboat Song
3. Our Ninth Portents of Alaundo opened up at Exodus
“We climbed ’til we could climb no more; too old now, and too few…”
On the north-western edge of Scotland, in the St kilda Archipelago, is the isle of Hirta. Evacuated in 1930, the island is home only to ghosts, and in 2013 became the subject of ‘Hirta Songs’, a collaboration by two seminal Scottish artists: poet Robin Robertson and singer/songwriter Alasdair Roberts.
Exodus imagines the departure of the island’s 36 inhabitants, and paints a predictably haunting picture. Whenever I’m exploring Faerûn’s coldest, darkest, quietest corners, this piece of music comes unbidden into my head, and very affecting it is too.
Alasdair Roberts and Robin Robertson – Exodus
0