Metal Gear Solid Main Theme
From the Metal Gear Wiki
The Metal Gear Solid Main Theme is a musical piece synonymous with the Metal Gear Solid series. It is made up of two musical themes. The first "motif" was written by Tappy Iwase who was requested to write the theme by Hideo Kojima and appeared in Metal Gear Solid and was remixed by Harry Gregson-Williams for MGS2 and 3. The second theme was written by Harry Gregson-Williams and appeared in MGS 3 and 4.
Akihiro Honda & Kazuma Jinnouchi made a different theme for Portable Ops which originally included the first "motif", but was later removed due to allegations of plagarism.
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[edit] Appearances
The first "motif" has appeared in every main MGS game in some form or another. In Metal Gear Solid, it appeared in the early trailers for the game, and if the player was playing on his third play-through, they would be rewarded with the theme playing in place of The Best Is Yet To Come. In Sons Of Liberty it appeared in early trailers and played during the game's opening title sequence, during the tracks Comradeship and Freedom To Decide (from The Other Side Soundtrack CD).
In Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance, the piece was re-done as a "skater-punk" song for the Skateboarding mini-game which was featured in the American and European versions of the game. Also, for the remake of Metal Gear Solid (The Twin Snakes) the piece was once again used in early E3 trailers and was used in-game during certain alert themes, and during the ending chase sequence between Solid Snake and Liquid Snake. However, due to the absence of an official soundtrack for The Twin Snakes, these tracks are un-named (several fan-rips are currently circulating the Internet).
In Snake Eater the second theme was introduced, but the first "motif" appeared at the end of the new piece. The motif appeared in early trailers once again, and appeared during the tracks "Fortress Sneaking", "Debriefing" during the end credits after Starsailor's "Way To Fall" and in the song "Old Metal Gear" re-done as a lounge piece (which played at the beginning of the cut-scene with Granin.)
Listen to the Main Theme from the MGS3 OST.
[edit] Controversy
Shortly before the release of Portable Ops, someone on the Internet discovered a song by Classical Russian composer Georgy Vasilevich Sviridov, named The Winter Road. The Metal Gear community was in an up-roar at how similar the song was to the Metal Gear Solid Main Theme, and requested the song be shown to Hideo Kojima. Eventually, a YouTube video emerged of a group of people showing the song to Hideo, with Hideo giving a very surprised reaction See Here.
The motif was removed from the Snake Eater Version of the theme on the Metal Gear 20th Anniversary Music Collection (it was replaced with "The World Needs Only One Big Boss!" from Metal Gear Solid 2).
Code extracted from Super Smash Bros. Brawl showed that this theme was originally supposed to be among the My Music tracks, but was later removed, possibly as a result of the aforementioned controversy.
[edit] Show Time
After the controversy the First Motif was removed from the Portable Ops Main theme. The original, with the Motif, appeared in an E3 Trailer, and the version with no Motif played after Calling To The Night during the games ending credits, and appears on the Portable Ops OST as the track "Show Time".
[edit] Metal Gear Saga
After the controversy involving Sviridov's piece, the first motif was retired. The second theme was later composed by Harry Gregson-Williams and adopted its place in Guns Of The Patriots carrying the title Metal Gear Saga.
[edit] Soundtrack Appearances
- Metal Gear Solid Soundtrack
- Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons Of Liberty OST
- Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater OST
Categories: Songs | Music
