tejozaszaszas: This is my favourite Michiel van den Bos´s work, even over Deus Ex.
It's technically impossible to disagree with this statement, and I'm certainly not going to attempt the impossible. Musical taste is extremely personal, and I think Michiel is happy that he did such great work throughout his career that virtually all of his soundtracks are people's favorites. It's awesome that his first-ever professional work is so loved even today, which is a bit like a musician's first album being widely regarded as the popular favorite, despite the artist continuing to evolve and improve their work over time. Though in that case, it's because the artist squeezed their entire life into one album, with little more to say upon achieving success. And that's really where soundtrack composition differs, as a soundtrack is never entirely about the artist's life in the first place.
For his part, Michiel seems to believe that his remakes of these
Age of Wonders tracks in the yet-to-be-released
Age of Wonders III is his best music ever. Yet I've heard much of the new soundtrack, and while I can't disagree that they're much-"improved" versions, I still prefer the originals - something I imagine many here will feel.
So while some of the tracks in the original
Age of Wonders will remain personal favorites for myself and others, there's no denying that from a composition standpoint, Michiel evolved, improved, and honed his craft in his later work, and
Deus Ex was certainly the apex of his achievement with tracker music, as he was more able than ever to focus on what he wanted to say, musically, to reconcile that with what he
needed to say to the player, and to communicate that message to perfection in his own unique musical voice.
Most
Age of Wonders tracks - both the originals and the remakes - reveal strong influence from great composers such as Maurice Jarre and Jerry Goldsmith (the
Medicine Man soundtrack in particular), but the soundtrack for
Deus Ex seems to pull most from Michiel's own previous work - such as
Age of Wonders and
Unreal Tournament - likely making it the most outstandingly original, "pure" work from his own internal voice that he has yet to produce. That doesn't mean it's going to be everyone's favorite, and the world would be pretty boring if it were.
For my part, I love both soundtracks - and the
Unreal Tournament soundtrack - but each for very different reasons. And I could say the same thing about each track among them, too.
