Music for the Dark Future

By HoundoCullan, in Dark Heresy

Does anyone have any suggestions for music that would rock the Inquisition and set the mood for Dark Heresy? Ministry or Mozart?

Look into the band Apocalyptica, they do all their music on 4 cellos and its very grimdark, like classical metal. In addition look into movie scores, Iv used Hans Zimmers music from the Dark Knight, Gladiator, ect ect before too.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the Dawn of War 2 soundtrack would work quite nicely. I know it's available via Steam for free; other sites may have it, too.

Works by Romantic-era composers probably would work better than music by Classical-era composers; Beethoven comes to mind. Works by Prokofiev and Rachmaninoff might work too; look for Prokofiev's "Dance of Knights" as a start.

Dark, ambient, industrial, instrumental and epic tracks (and any combination) are almost always a sure choice. For example:

-Immediate Music

-X-ray Dog

-E.S. Posthumus

-Midnight Syndicate

-Nine Inch Nails

-Triarii

-Apocalyptica

-Dargaard

-Summoning

-Lustmord

-Prototype Soundtrack (my recent find)

-Call of Cthulu: Dark Corners of the Earth Soundtrack (another recent would-be addition, on which I was pointed by Varneus Tybalt)

-Deus Ex Soundtrack

-Gears of War 1 and 2 soundtracj

-Supreme Commander Soundtrack

-Age of Conan Soundtrack

-Dawn of War (WA, DC, SS, 2 and Inquisition Daemonhunt mod) Soundtrackä

-Chaos Gate soundtrack

-Mark of Chaos Soundtrack

-Traitor General Soundtrack

-Matrix Soundtrack

-Damnatus Soundtrack

-Equilibrium Soundtrack...

Have yet to use any music in my Dh games but if i did then I'd probably just pick something that fitted the scene. I don't think I'd rely on classical or metal stuff. In a universe which can be as diverse as it likes maybe different planets could have different tastes. Maybe Sibellus loves rocking out to Michael Jackson, and Malfi can't get enough of Def leopard lengua.gif

But for background music/sounds I'd probably stick to:

dark nasty dubstep, techno or industrial metal for, well, industrial settings.

Choral, classical etc for formal/religious settings.

Something tribally, celtic or hippyish for those feral worlds.

I really love the old school music soundtracks for Bioshock and Fallout. I'm not suggesting using Al bowlly or Bing Crosby, but I think these soundtracks work because they fit the location and the situation.

Gregorian chant would be good especially in a temple setting.

It's been done near to death but "O Fortuna" has a grand epic feel and to me never gets old.

For crazy scenes with cults and things that should not be check out death metal band Nile. Some of the instrumental intros to their songs are done with middle eastern instruments and they range from grand epic to creepy wierd. Definately has a feel of Chaos gods to it.

Edit: Metallica's instrumental Call of Ktulu is great as well.

The imperium is a huge place with lots of cultural variation so I'm sure you could make just about anything fit somehow.

We prefer The Sword, Tool, or setting Pandora to a Hawkwind channel.

I spent the last couple of days researching the process for extracting the music from my installed Dawn of War games.....if you OWN these games, you can legally extract these files for personal use (Do Not Host them). These tracks make perfect backdrops for most scenes I can think of in a DH or RT game session.

Most of my gaming groups use music of some sort to set the tone/mood of the scenes we are experiencing. There are several smaller pieces which could be looped for general travel/social scenes and some of the army themes make great fight music or can add drama to a main NPC introduction or NPC /plot event which the characters are observers.

You can also download for free (just do a google search) the Dawn of War 2 soundtrack. This is beautiful music and has a very Inquisition feel to it.

I can't recommend these pieces enough.....

I also would suggest using the scores from movies in the horror/sci-fi arena, especially where they meet, like Aliens, Predator or Underworld....I have always used the Alien 3 soundtrack (don't laugh) for sci-fi games, it has a couple of pieces which are AWESOME for chase scenes or xenos encounters.

Enjoy.

I always use the Ghostbusters theme tune.

Lightbringer said:

I always use the Ghostbusters theme tune.

"Who you gonna call" "A-co-lytes!" :P

The 300 soundtrack is perfect for almost any situation.

If you need something more mellow the I would suggest the "I, Robot" soundtrack. It's good for dark tones when not in combat.

The "Serenity" soundtrack has a futuristic/industrial feel that would be good for grungy scenes.

Joe_momma's suggestion of Gregorian chants is very good. I would suggest "Chant-Music for the soul".

Ultimately, though, if you can get your hands on a copy of the Icewind Dale soundtrack that would be best. There is music for any situation in there.

I´m wondering if there´ll be any Gears of War 3, becouse soundtracks from 1 and 2 are becoming almost essential for my DH games, realy, they are more grimdark and suitable than even original 40k games OSTs.