Coolest. Soundtrack. EVAR.

[Dannyalcatraz]

Hmmm... for background for a combat heavy night in a Modern RPG:

I could suggest:

Judegement Night Soundtrack

Praxis "Warcraft (Bruce Lee's Black Hour Of Chaos)" or "Rivet"

Sepultura's "Roots"

Godflesh "Locust Furnace," "For Life," oh heck...anything by Godflesh!

 

[DrunkonDuty]

whenever I've tried gamign with a soundtrack we always just end up yelling over it and drowning it out. How do you folks get around that, or do you not worry?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Usually, I set the volume just high enough for people to comfortably talk over it and set my CD changer to "shuffle." Another buddy does the same with his I-Pod (something I may yet do).

Let me tell you, the magic deliverd by a little psychology of sound can be worth it.

When I had my players fight intradimensional humanoid feline raiders attacking their ship, they handled it like the old pros they were, even as they lost.

Even when their PCs woke up naked on a beach and told that the BBQ they smelled was "cabin boy" and they were the next to be hunted, so they'd better run, they still acted like experienced role-players.

But when I (intentionally) played Kodo's main theme to "The Hunted" to announce the official start to the hunt...it was wicked the way they actually responded to the pounding drums. Their voices got louder- partly because of the volume- but also because of increased tension.

Similarly, I had it on shuffle play one night- I was hosting but not the DM. The party wound up being hired to clear out some undead that were plaguing a small township.

Pure coincidence created magic: everyone's neck hair stood up and play briefly halted when Black Sabbath's "Children of the Grave" came on just as the dead were rising from their graves!

 

[Mighty Halfling]

• Sum of All Fears
• Mask of Zorro
• Requiem for a Dream
• 12 Monkeys
• Lifeforce

 

[Jedi_Solo]

As a rule of thumb anything by Hans Zimmer (The Rock, Broken Arrow, Gladiator, Pirates 2 & 3, etc) will have good battle music. Crimson Tide doesn't have good battle music but even that has incredible atmosphere music. Also look at the Bourne movies (Bourne Identity, Supremacy and Ultimatum) for good stuff as well.

 

[Mighty Halfling]

I love Basil Poledouris, the man behind the music of Conan, Starship Troopers, Hunt for the Red October, Flesh + Blood and RoboCop. Great soundtracks. Anyone know of a Basil Collection? I'd buy that in a second!

 

[Presto2112]

If you're able to find them, the soundtracks to some video games are phenomenal! I was able to get the soundtrack to God of War. Astounding game music. Some of the music in Diablo and Baldur's Gate are great as well.

 

[RobJN]

I would recommend (in addition to the excellent albums already mentioned):

-- Anything by Yoko Kanno (Escaflowne, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Cowboy Bebop)
-- For BBEG fights, you might try the Shadow of the Colossus, by (spelling of his name varies) Ko Otani.
-- Anything by Yuki Kajiura (particularly the .hack//SIGN and Noir soundtracks)
-- From an anime with a (SURPRISE!) American music composer: Blood+ ("Blood Plus") by Mark Mancina

I'd also recommend just about anything by Jerry Goldsmith, James Horner, Hans Zimmer, John Williams (although, I tend to stay away from his better-known material). And to emphasize: Last of the Mohicans should be required listening for DMs.

Another batch of music I finally got hold of with no regrets and plans to use in future gaming: the (reimagined) Battlestar Galactica soundtracks.

For short bursts of awesome try to find anything by Immediate Music and/or Globus -- these are the written-just-for-the-movie-trailer people.

Away from the silver screen, from video gaming, check out Kameo: Elements of Power (samples of the soundtrack on the website). Eighty-piece orchestra + 40 piece choir = outstanding soundtrack.

 

[RangerWickett]

This thread delivers.

I assure you, if you ever run a Conan game, nothing starts the game better than casually starting the opening theme to the Conan movie. Players, in the middle of pre-game chatter, recognize those quiet drums and Mako's eerie voice, and they quiet down. And then the music kicks in, and the players are ready to grab a man-ape by its throat and hurl it off a cliff to the jagged bones below.

For my next campaign, I plan to acquire a lot of instrumental music, but since the premise of the game is killing God, I'm already looking for suitably epic rock music for when the PCs come face to face with His servants and warriors. Right now I've got "I" by Black Sabbath (Dio years).

 

[Mark Hope]

Gotta agree with all the great suggestions above (and find those I don't have.)

If I had to recommend one soundtrack at the moment, I'd name one I have only recently discovered: Children of Dune (the miniseries). Awesome. Check it out. You will not regret it.