Mood Music - Nar Shaddaa and Hutt Space

By bubblepopmei, in Star Wars: Edge of the Empire RPG

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My players have arrived in Hutt Space and will have several sessions in the area and on Nar Shaddaa.

I like to add soundtrack to our sessions - largely this is not the Star Wars orchestral music.

When you think about the city-moon of Nar Shaddaa and the culture of the Hutts and their Cartel, what music comes to mind?

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My players have arrived in Hutt Space and will have several sessions in the area and on Nar Shaddaa.

I like to add soundtrack to our sessions - largely this is not the Star Wars orchestral music.

When you think about the city-moon of Nar Shaddaa and the culture of the Hutts and their Cartel, what music comes to mind?

Oddly Basil Poledouris's soundtrack to Conan the Destroyer comes to mind. Some of the themes have the right blend of brutal culture, lavishness one would expect in Hutt space, with some barbaric (for lack of better terms) action music that sounds of struggling it out in a world of oddity with a mystically nuanced atmosphere.

Some of the tracks remind me of lands where slaves would toil and those who prove stronger can challenge the alien challenges above.

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Not every part of Nar Shaddaa is a lawless nightmare. Some parts of it are a lawless dream (so long as you can afford it). Nearly any music could be appropriate so long as it's tailored to the scene you're trying to play.

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Not every part of Nar Shaddaa is a lawless nightmare. Some parts of it are a lawless dream (so long as you can afford it). Nearly any music could be appropriate so long as it's tailored to the scene you're trying to play.

Yes, obviously. That's why I am asking people what comes to mind for them.

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Gustav Holst's "The Planets" seems to fit most any SW game in my opinion.

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I don't have any one music or sound per location. I do have a ton of music, sound effects, and ambient noise loaded on my laptop to use. 10 hours of cantina music, mass effect club music, pub background ambience, city square ambience, landing ship noises, blaster fire, panicking crowd, star destroyer alarm, etc.

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I don't have any one music or sound per location. I do have a ton of music, sound effects, and ambient noise loaded on my laptop to use. 10 hours of cantina music, mass effect club music, pub background ambience, city square ambience, landing ship noises, blaster fire, panicking crowd, star destroyer alarm, etc.

I took a bunch of official samples and loaded them into a drum machine in my DAW so I could have a custom soundboard, but we at the table actually felt it was more of a distraction than anything. How are you managing what sounds like a massive library of sounds?

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I just have multiple windows loaded in my browser at the beginning of the session. I pretty much know ahead of time what they'll be doing. I've got my cantina music ready always, then they might be headed to a jungle planet so I'll have that ready. Blaster fire is always ready. There are so many 10 & 12 hour loops of stuff on youtube it's pretty easy to set multiples playing and not have to fiddle.

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I just have multiple windows loaded in my browser at the beginning of the session. I pretty much know ahead of time what they'll be doing. I've got my cantina music ready always, then they might be headed to a jungle planet so I'll have that ready. Blaster fire is always ready. There are so many 10 & 12 hour loops of stuff on youtube it's pretty easy to set multiples playing and not have to fiddle.

Hm, that makes my pushbutton approach sound much easier, kudos to you for keeping it inline! I don't mean to steal OP's thread, but I like this topic enough to start a new thread.

[edit] except there are already a number of threads about GM using theme music, just no Consolidated List.

Edited by themensch
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The special edition soundtrack to The Old Republic video game has a good mix of Star Wars cantina music... some is kind of in the vein as Williams stuff in ANH, and there are a couple of bits I like to use for more high class establishments that have a 30's Edith Piaf (French) vibe to them. You can find the sountrack online. The tracks in question are:

Shake That Wampa Down

See You On the Dark Side

Smeeleeya Whao Tupee Upee

Run Kessel Run

One Chuba Too Many

Shapa Keesay

Yancy

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Also if you're looking for something a little different than Williams, Kevin Kiner wrote some great ethnic themes for different planets in Clone Wars, you can find a few of them on the Clone Wars Season 1-6 Series Soundtrack, or download some additional pieces off his official website.

For otherworldly stuff more as mood music... I'd recommend some of Brian Eno's work from the 80's of Jean Michel Jarre.

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The Cowboy Bebop OSTs have some great music as well.

If the characters are going into a rough and tumble bar/cantina, I would suggest something like classic hard rock, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, something where the jukebox sounds like it hasn't been updated in 20 years and the last guy who tried got shanked.

High-end sections of town might benefit from something like cerebral like Enya, music that is about as pompous as the populace.

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One of my favorates is Black Aria -Glenn Danzig.

We have a host of different soundtracks from movies, tv shows, video games etc. Xenogears being ome of our favs.

As for Nar Shadda? Perhaps Bladerunner soundtrack. I think it has the right mix of futuristic/sci-fi and decadence. It always brings the right image to mind when I hear it.

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Vangelis' score for Bounty is awesome mood music for the right environment.

Edited by Gallandro
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Also if you're looking for something a little different than Williams, Kevin Kiner wrote some great ethnic themes for different planets in Clone Wars, you can find a few of them on the Clone Wars Season 1-6 Series Soundtrack, or download some additional pieces off his official website.

I'll second this recommendation; there's some good stuff that sounds like Star Wars, but different.

-Nate

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Nar Shaddaa seems to have a Cyberpunk vibe to it I think. So maybe music in the style of Skinny Puppy:

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My players have arrived in Hutt Space and will have several sessions in the area and on Nar Shaddaa.

I like to add soundtrack to our sessions - largely this is not the Star Wars orchestral music.

When you think about the city-moon of Nar Shaddaa and the culture of the Hutts and their Cartel, what music comes to mind?

Edited by knasserII
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Lots of smokey jazz, maybe verging into Boogie or electroswing if you want to get more upbeat.

But essentially you want some real old school film noir music that will bring to mind shadowed backrooms, sexy Hutt lounge singers and the sort of music that Sam Spade and Cad Bane would listen to whilst pouring shots of cheap Corellian Whiskey knock-offs.

Edited by knasserII
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Nar Shaddaa seems to have a Cyberpunk vibe to it I think. So maybe music in the style of Skinny Puppy

For CyberPunk, I’d be inclined to go with Yello, Yaz, Depeche Mode, Erasure, or most anything else by Vince Clarke or in that same style.

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Stravinsky's Rite of Spring is familiar but tension producing Any Shostakovich

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Stravinsky's Rite of Spring is familiar but tension producing Any Shostakovich

Beautiful piece of music and VERY Star Wars. But it feels more like Tattooine or some other desert world to me than the corrupt city vibes I expect from Nar Shaddaa.

Edited by knasserII
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Oh, man. You have no idea how much time I just wasted on drivethrurpg. ;)

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This is pretty good ambient music for the setting when you're just doing general story-telling and RP stuff. It's a little more Blade Runner than Star Wars, and it never really gets exciting like what Star Wars sometimes demands, but as filler - it does set a good mood, especially if your story involves a lot of espionage or conspiratorial elements. I usually listen to it when I am writing. There is a series for this, "Space Ambient Music Mix 1-4" I think.

Some of this could work. It's probably the best Soundtrack I've ever heard in a video game (pretty close for Film and Television too), and it has quite a few options for different moods and scenarios. The main theme pops up every now and again, and kind of gives it a little too much patriotism flair, but... Star Wars is practically WWII in space anyway, so... it works. This one is good for ambient flair, but also, it works better for excitement, danger, action, surprise and other emotions.

Edit - there's a whole playlist for this. But it only posted the first song. Just look for "Medal of Honor Allied Assault OST" on youtube.

There's some good stuff in here, as well.

Some Retro Futurism stuff. It's not really "Star Wars", but it can still work in some cases. Plus, sometimes you just need something different.

Edited by Raice