Final Fantasy VII Advent Children Soundtrack - Black Water

With every new Final Fantasy VII spin off release thats come out in the last several years, each time I have been bracing myself for disappointment, specifically in regards to the music. FFVII, while primitive by today's standard of music composition, is a masterpiece of a score. Period. Nobuo Uematsu is a master of his craft. That being said, although he did not compose the music to this game, it still came out to be pretty damn good.

For those who don't know, Crisis Core is basically the prequel to the FFVII story, with the main character being Zack, the mysterious SOLDIER from Cloud's foggy past. Anyway, as far as the music goes, Takeharu Ishimoto doesn't just plunge the listener into a mass of newly composed peices we may or may not like. Instead, he eases us into it by using familiar tracks from previous FFVII installments (FFVII game, Advent Children and Last Order respectively). In fact, the first three tracks seem to be lifted right from the original game and given a little update, but by no means do I consider that to be a bad thing.

While there are a good many familiar songs on here that are nicely "remixed", there are plenty of new songs that came out to be very good. The thing that stands out the most about these new songs is that they feel a bit different from what we're used to hearing from a Final Fantasy game, especially those done by Uematsu. Some of Crisis Core's original pieces have a sort of.. hip hop-ish/pop-ish instrumental vibe to them, while others are very heavy metal. I've seen a few reviews that site these unconventional tracks as the weaker part of the soundtrack because they dont fit with the whole FFVII experience. To some extent they're right, because it doesn't fit with what FFVII fans are used to. But I personally think that these tracks are a bold attempt to change with the ever evolving world that is FFVII. If you've heard to music from Advent Children, which Uematsu did, it is a prime example of evolution. He does the same thing (mostly) that is done on this soundtrack. The point is that while some FFVII die hards will nitpick at this, its generally very good music in many respect