Digital Devil Saga OST Commentary by Meguro Shouji

Found this blog post which compiled Meguro’s comments on the DDS Integral Soundtrack. I only translated the ones I found more interesting (they’re not very interesting anyway), since a lot of them just said where the track was used. Please point out mistakes since I’m sure they exist, etc.

The soundtrack is finally on sale!
The complete soundtrack for Digital Devil Saga is finally on sale. I too have been looking forward to this day.
Composing music that would fit this beautifully portrayed world was a fun and worthwhile job.
I used two completely different styles in order to match the contrast between the first and second game and I would like to think that whoever listens to this complete soundtrack will be able to enjoy those differences.

Let’s see, these 4 CDs contain all the 136 songs (quite a lot, if I may say so…) used in DDS, but looking only at the track titles you really can’t understand where they’re played, right?
That is why I would like to give some more detailed explanations, not about all the songs, but the main ones, so maybe the people who weren’t convinced about the soundtrack will read this and decide to buy it?!

7. Muladhara
The field song played in the Embryon base. DDS1 has quite a lot of blues-inspired tracks and I feel that this one is representative for all of them.
The chord progression is pretty elaborate and the guitar sounds pretty good too. (The performance is…so and so?)

8. Svadhisthana
Most of the DDS songs were made with the PS2 internal sound generator in mind, so the capacity for one song is a little under 400KB (makes me want to cry…). Since I was going to do it blues style, I wanted to use guitar samples, but the capacity level was low, so there was nothing to do about it…
It seems I could reach a good compromise with tracks with 4 repeating measures… A lot of them are like that.

10. Sahasrara
The field song for the outside of Karma Temple. It’s reminiscent of Santana’s style, but I wasn’t sure whether to integrate a “sorrowful” melody or not. By the way, did you know that this “sorrowful” melody  will appear all of a sudden when the tune repeats for the tenth time?

11. Junk Yard
Large map theme. A techno remix of Pray’s instrumental background. Not something suitable for DDS1, but once you play DDS2…

23. Operation
The track playing when Gale presents his tactics. I remember that the designer told me the computer-made sound effects weren’t cool… (I was also in charge of the sound effects in DDS1)

26. Steel Coffin
The field song for the passenger ship ruins. This was composed by Tsuchiya-san as well. Tsuchiya-san who was in charge of this track and Point 136, places created by Sera, brought forth the differences that appear in the world setting.

31. Solar Eclipse
The scene where Serph & co are surrounded and attacked by the skeletons. No one could remember where it was from during mastering.

38. Ajna
The beat of the drums is the Colonel’s motif.

DISC 2
1. Pray (a cappella version)
The a cappella version of Sera’s prayer which is played in Embryon’s new base. It’s treated like a field sound effect, so it gets louder when you approach the place Sera sings from and lower if you get away from her.

9. Blade
Field Hunt theme. It’s the theme of Maken’s Sicily stage. Why? Because Serph wielding his blade (hand?) really reminded me of it…

11. Never Ending Rain
The song that appears during the Config menu. If Pray is the theme song of the entirety of DDS, then this song is DDS1’s. A never-ending rain. And yet it does stop.

16. Wolf’s Pride
Lupa’s appearance. Lupa’s theme, therefore it sounds a bit western.

18. Hunting
Normal battle theme. It was actually supposed to be used for boss battles, but the feeling of the drums in the beginning is too abrupt, so it became a normal battle theme. By the way, there are five guitar solo variations in the game.

19. Hunting – Surprise Raid
Surprise attack theme. This was the original song for Hunting.

24. Big Battle – Prelude
Track that plays before boss battles. It was called Boss Introductory Remarks during development.

26. Samsara
Game over song. Certain people will realise that I used a free synthesizer software. The one with the bonzes. The method is obvious, so this is a little embarrassing.

35. Surely Again…
The last scene. As a matter of fact, from the moment I first read the scenario, I decided to use this scene’s theme as a refrain and subtly connect it to the staff roll.

36. The Rain Stopped
The staff roll song. There is no rain that will never stop, the full version of DDS1’s theme that appears at the very end. After the staff roll, Serph appears for a few seconds in Nirvana, but the boundary line between Junkyard – Nirvana appears at the 4:55 mark and turns the track into a tune fitting for DDS2. (the boundary line is just my idea, but…)

DISC 3
1. ALIVE
DDS2’s opening song. Vocals by Momota Kayoko, background vocals by Kawamura Yumi.

2. Om Mani Padme Hm
The song that plays during the first cutscene with Fred and the children. The theme song of DDS2, appears in both the title and Config menus. There’s no actual significance behind the latter menu’s song option, but it was used for the title menu in order to make a lasting impression and also as a tradition inherited from Shin Megami Tensei 3.

6. Amaravati
The occupied underground city theme. As you can see, the music in DDS2 has changed completely from DDS1 into a techno style. Seen from the surface, the Junkyard (DDS1) is techno, while Nirvana in DDS2 is rock, right? That’s what you tend to think, but, after their awakening, the people of Junkyard become very compassionate, while the people from Nirvana are restlessly moving in a sharply controlled society, giving off a feeling of entrapment. I chose this style in order to express those characteristics directly.

14. Meeeeaaaat! Processing Plant
The detention facility field song. Another name is “Human Processing Factory”.

15. Prisoner’s Nightmare
The song that plays while Serph is being chased by the chief of the detention facility! Too scary!
Doesn’t this song make it even scarier than the Dante chase scene from Nocturne Maniacs?
I was really scared during the first test play, so scared that I started laughing. Do people start laughing when they’re really scared?

16. Underground City
I’ll start with a confession, but the melodies with short repeating tunes have decreased in DDS2.
I talked to my superiors about the internal sound generator problem, but nothing changed for DDS2. Then why? Because I asked a great outside source to make them compact for the internal sound generator! In other words, since I’m not the one who’s going to suffer, I’m going to write melodies they way I want to (I’m sorry, Kunishima-san). Let me explain myself a little. Since the use of raw instruments like guitars and so on decreased, the same happened with the frequency of completely sampling phrases and the capacity limit became less of a problem.

31. Mantra
The motif for DDS1’s Mantra was Pray, and I guess the base for DDS2’s Mantra is The Sun [the original track name]? And since The Sun = Nirvana, I used the same tune.

DISC 4
2. Karma
Starting with “The Atonement” and ending on a peak with “ALIVE”, this is a song for Roald, the one who lived in Nirvana.

4.What is it to Live a Life?
DDS1 arrange. Argilla discovers the meaning of life.

6.Battle For Survival
Normal battle theme. The rather sad motif was taken from ALIVE.

15. Brahman
The last boss’s theme. The last song I composed for DDS2. One evening, as I was staggering back home on Tokyo Station’s sixth platform after my tight schedule, a melody suddenly came to mind. And I was finally done with everything.

16. Memory
The recollection scene with Sera, Serph and the others, with Sera’s “That man is scary…”. This was the first song I composed for DDS2. I was still all right back then.

19. Regret
A scene from the past with Gale and Angel, when the ward is in flames. “Pray” didn’t appear in DDS2 at all, but it was actually Gale’s theme.

24. To The Sun
The scene where Serph and Sera fly towards the Sun. Reminded me of Astro Boy…

29. Om Mani Padme Hm -Staff roll Arrange
DDS2’s ending, and as a song that concludes DDS as a whole, I gave the feel of DDS1’s Pray to DDS2’s main theme.

Source.