10 MORE of My Favourite Persona Songs
You probably saw this coming…
This blog is a continuation of a series of blogs that explores and celebrates the music of the ‘Persona’ games, in anticipation for the upcoming release of ‘Persona 5: Royal’ (in Japan). To see the first blog, see the link below.
For this list, I have some rules I wish to establish.
- For this blog to be properly appreciated, one must understand the definition of a song. All songs are pieces of music, but not all pieces of music are songs. Songs are pieces of music where the melody (the bit you would hum or sing to) has to be sung, usually with lyrics. This means this list WILL NOT be containing instrumentals. Such instrumentals will have a list of their own.
- I won’t be limiting one song per instalment, because that would make this a very short blog.
- I will not be covering any arrangements found in the dancing games or arrangement albums. Those will have their own lists.
- This list will not be ranked in any shape or form.
- There will be snippets of music theory littered throughout this blog.
- At the time of typing, I have not finished playing both ‘Persona 2’ instalments, so I can’t comment on how the songs fair in those games. Similarly, I have not played the spinoffs and won’t cover them either.
- I also won’t be reviewing any songs composed for the films and animes.
And with the rules in place, I am comfortable with proceeding with waffling about some MORE of my favourite Persona songs.
1. Last Surprise (Persona 5)
Being a young person who occasionally pretends to be hip and cool, I’d thought I would start off with a song that has become a popular meme within the ‘Persona’ fanbase.
Many of the more modern standard ‘Persona’ battle cues are songs, which makes you feel like you are playing the best adaptation of your favourite shonen anime, which in turn, heightens the player’s adrenaline, meaning that each fight never feels old and repetitive.
The latest of these battle is no exception, as you carefully plan decisions and take out Shadows with this D minor vamp, filled syncopated string passages and a super-busy bass line. It is one of many examples of the gorgeously infectious Acid Jazz that populates the game’s soundtrack, something I will try to not mention too much throughout the blog.
2. A Way of Life (Persona 3 Portable)
Other than offering players the means of taking ‘Persona 3’ on the go with them, there is very little I like about the portable version, as it adds and takes many elements that undermine what made the original ‘Persona 3’ so fantastic. But I won’t go into that here, as I’ve gone into great detail elsewhere.
The song is played when the female protagonist (an option added into ‘Persona 3 Portable’) travels around Tatsumi Port Island, the game’s fictional setting. It is rather upbeat and happy, which contrasts greatly with the game’s dark and gloomy setting. The ‘wandering-around-the-town’ cues of ‘Persona 3’ and ‘Persona 3 FES’ are just as confident, all three of them do a great job at not making the player feel terribly depressed.
It is a rather catchy little ditty, again in D minor. Despite its seemingly happy nature, it has rather melancholic lyrics, as is the case with many ‘Persona’ songs. It is an earworm in the truest sense, one that will burrow its way into your soul, whether you want it to or not.
3. Sign of Love (Persona 4/Persona 4 The GOLDEN)
Another ‘wandering-around-the-town’ cue, this time in the fictional town of Inaba, found in ‘Persona 4’ (and ‘Persona 4 GOLDEN’).
This cue only plays when the protagonist is exploring the Dojima residence (the home of your uncle and cousin) in which you stay for the academic year. The other condition is it is not raining outside or there is a special event going on, one that is usually connected to plot progression or social link.
‘Signs of Love’ have us embrace the key of Bb (B-flat, for you non-musos) minor, which I consider being one of the more darker dark key signatures. Its lyrics aren’t the jolliest either.
Again, it is the arrangement that disguises said darkness as sustained strings and electric organ exchange and pass around extended harmonies, the funky electric guitar and drums forces everyone to their feet and dance. There is a piano present, but its only role is to support the more interesting parts with block chords. This is fine, as not every part needs to be rhythmically engaging. If it were, the energy and punch of everything else would be lost!
4. Dream of Butterfly (Persona (PSP Version))
The first three Persona games (1, 2.1 & 2.2) were very different in presentation and tone to the latest three (3–5) and are all interesting relics, which I would only recommend to those who call themselves die-hard Persona fans.
Whereas a lot of the soundtrack are redone/remastered versions of the PS1’s original soundtrack, ‘Dream of Butterfly’ is found only on the PSP version, serving as the game’s main theme. Whilst ‘Persona 1’ is very different from the more popular Persona games, this song has a sense of familiar nostalgia to it, like another song discussed in the previous blog in this series (see above link), which is mostly down to the use of the major seventh chords in the chorus.
‘Dream of Butterfly’ is one of the shorter main themes, with only one verse and chorus. I also find it to be one of the most unusual cues as it throws all caution to the wind, going to a different key for a different section of the song, the backing vocals (in what I’m calling the ‘link’ section that occurs before the pre-chorus and after the verse) using a very interesting harmonised triplet idea, something that has started to become very popular in more modern pop songs.
Both of these create the musical impression that you will not be safe for very long in the game, with danger lurking all over the place. It was this theme that kept pulling me back to the PSP remake of ‘Persona’, as it was not as enjoyable as Personas 3–5, for a variety of different reasons.
5. Our Moment (Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight)
Just like in the previous blog, I will waffle about an original song found in one of the three Persona dancing games.
Players will be very surprised when booting the game up for the first time and hearing this, as the sound of this cue is very different to what one may expect from anything tied to the ‘Persona 3’ name, as this is very much a modern dance number, in C minor (a classic Disco key signature) with fantastic synth samples. Those cheesy dated brass punches are still present though, as are long-time contributors to the ‘Persona’ sound, Yumi Kawamura and Lotus Juice, so it won’t be too alien for ‘Persona’ fans.
Much to the annoyance of many (myself included), it is impossible to legally obtain the soundtrack to the dancing spin-offs to ‘Persona 3’ and ‘Persona 5’ for a decent price, not bundled with some limited edition version of the game. In addition to this, you cannot listen to the full version of the song outside of the game itself (other through YouTube, but that’s a given). Honestly, I do not have a problem with this, as I feel the arrangement doesn’t sustain interest in the full version.
6. Reach Out To The Truth — First Battle (Persona 4/Persona The GOLDEN)
There are three versions of this song, one is an instrumental, whilst the other two are essentially the same, but start in a different place. The one players will hear most is the standard ‘Reach Out To The Truth’, which begins with the loud punchy chorus in the glorious key of D major, which is the most popular key when writing pop songs. This follows by the slightly aggressive verse, delivered in a rap style, being pushed along by the distorted electric guitar in B minor, each repetition of the riff/ostinato ending on a C, a semitone higher than B, a common trick employed by Shoji Meguro to create tension.
The version I prefer is the ‘First Battle’ version, which starts with the verse, which works better in my opinion as a piece of battle music, especially when it is first introduced, which is during the very early stages when the player is being shown the battle mechanics (ie, the First Battle).
Whereas ‘Persona 5’ is a soundtrack mostly consisting of Acid Jazz, much of the soundtrack to ‘Persona 4’ is a strangely compelling combination of Rock and J-Pop (I am unsure if there is such spelling for ‘J-Rock’), with this song, being a perfect example of this. If there was ever a decision to nominate a song for The Weeaboo International Anthem, I am fairly certain this song would be in the top 10, with the various yellows and rainbow splats hideously decorating the flag for this weird union of people.
7. When The Moon Reaches For The Stars (Persona 3/Persona 3 FES)
Mere minutes after publishing the previous blog in this series, I remembered this song existed and felt terrible for forgetting about it, as this is one of my personal favourites in all of the ‘Persona’ games.
This is the ‘wandering-around-the-town’ cue in ‘Persona 3’ and ‘Persona 3 FES’ and I am in awe in this rather strange arrangement. It is incredibly energetic, all because of the Drum & Bass rhythms on the drums, complemented by the detached double bass motifs and the syncopated electric piano Bb minor chords.
I feel that it shouldn’t work well as much as it does in this game, given how this stands out like a sore thumb when comparing it to the rest of the soundtrack, which is more of a dirty hip-hop sound. I suppose what makes it so effective as the subtle implications that the protagonist is listening to this as he’s running around the map with his hands in his pockets, blotting out the miserable world with his tunes, an ethos I can relate too, especially in my mid-teens.
The original soundtrack version is rather short, something that I love and get upset about, as future ‘wandering-around-the-town’ ‘Persona’ cues would feature (slightly) longer cues. Fortunately, if you love the song as much as I do, the arrangement album version does include an additional verse, as does the version found in ‘Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight’, which remains truer to the original song’s arrangement and deliverance.
8. Life Will Change (Persona 5)
You hear this cue constantly throughout ‘Persona 5’, be it the instrumental version, when you about to steal the treasure found at the heart of a Palace, which is a tone higher than this version (G#minor for the instrumental, F minor for sung version) or the sung version, which (to my memory) is heard twice at key points in the narrative.
Whilst the rhythmic noir-inspired string ostinato comes to tease the listener in the pre-choruses and chorus, it mostly the traditional rock instruments that role the roost in this song, grabbing most of the attention of the listener, particularly the seriously snappy guitar rhythm at the beginning, establishing the key of F minor, but ending each repetition on F#, similarly to an earlier song on this list. Like with previously mentioned ‘Persona 4’ song, a lot of tension is created with just one note change, as that kick drum establishing the fast four-to-the-floor rhythm and shaker-esque hi-hat pattern.
With this arrangement, it creates an aural vision that you are on the run from the cops or some bad guys in a highspeed chase…to me at least anyway.
Music theory and tone poems aside, what I love about this song, like so many others in the ‘Persona 5’ soundtrack is the more mature sound and production. The ATLUS Sound Team must have upgraded a lot of their gear sometime between working on ‘Persona 4’, as this is far more modern sounding in its production than all the others. That, or they outsourced producers and mixers.
9. P3 FES (Persona 3 FES)
I very nearly didn’t want to put this in here, for this is technically cheating, but given that there are different lyrics and harmonies, I think I will be allowed to get away with the inclusion for the theme for the expanded version of ‘Persona 3’.
This is essentially a shortened and altered version of the first verse and second chorus of ‘Memories of You’ but with slightly different harmonies, a faster hip-hop tempo and arrangement, with dirty, gritty drums and those crappy brass stabs, with Lotus Juice rapping over the top of most of the song, and I am perfectly fine with that. This was the main theme I heard first before discovering ‘Burn My Dread’, which was the main theme in vanilla ‘Persona 3’, which I felt I couldn’t include in this blog, as it is the arrangement album version I listen to, which is the full song, not the minute teaser you are greeted with on the soundtrack and game.
10. Beneath the Mask (Persona 5)
The final song in this list is one of my favourite ‘wandering-around-the-town(s/cities)’ songs found in the ‘Persona’ franchise.
There are a total of four versions of this cue scattered across the game. Two of them have vocals, whilst the other two have the melody replaced by an electric organ. One version (vocals & instrumental) feature the full band, whilst the other version plays when it is raining, which is far more sparse and open, letting the rain hitting against the windows of your home for the academic year (the attic of Cafe LeBlanc) adding to the chilled ambience.
‘Beneath the Mask’ leans far more into lounge-jazz than most of the ‘Persona’ cues, and as a lover of jazz who plays jazz extensively for a living, you can bet that I would occasionally sneak this into sessions.
It is a very simple arrangement, with the drums keeping a very steady beat. The electric piano teeters back and forth with the two-part harmony, with the key of G minor, established in the moving bass part, which allows the melody to reign supreme. This sort of seesaw rhythm is almost rocking the player to sleep, so there is no need for Morgana to tell the player to go to bed…
Coda
If you have been listening to the various songs in this blog as you’ve been reading (or know the music well enough not to listen to them), you should begin to appreciate that the music found in the various Persona games are incredibly varied. I have barely scratched the surface!
With so many Persona game songs I wish to celebrate, I refuse to leave this series here. So, I have decided to carry on with this series in next week’s blog as I explore how a particular cue found in all of the Persona games has evolved and listing which version is my favourite.
If you have enjoyed this blog, come back next week for more Persona music appreciation! I also plan to explore the arrangement albums in an upcoming blog, so hover around on my Twitter page for when that hits the airwaves!
If this is your first time reading a Daniel Mayfair blog, thank you very much for reaching the end of the blog. If you wish to read more Persona related blogs to keep you busy, I will leave links to all the Persona games I have reviewed below.
What is your favourite Persona song and why? Let’s start a conversation, people!
