Music of the Katamari Damacy series

Five of the games' soundtracks have been released as albums. Katamari Fortissimo Damacy, a soundtrack album for the original game, was released by

Both the soundtracks and their associated albums have been well received by reviewers, who have cited the "catchiness" and "quirkiness" of the music as their most notable features. The soundtrack to Katamari Damacy won both IGN's and GameSpot's "Soundtrack of the Year 2004" awards, while the theme song to We Love Katamari was awarded Best Original Vocal/Pop Song at the 4th Annual Game Audio Network Guild awards in 2006. None of the other soundtracks have been nominated for any awards. They were still well received by reviewers, with the music of the PlayStation Portable game Me & My Katamari receiving the weakest reviews due to its extensive reuse of songs from previous games in the series.

Katamari Damacy

Katamari Fortissimo Damacy
Soundtrack album by Yuu Miyake et al.
Released	May 19, 2004
Recorded	2001-2004
Studio	Bunkamura Studio studio Fine
Genre	Shibuya-kei video game music
Length	1:15:14
Label	Columbia Music Entertainment
Producer	Hirokuni Maeyama Yuu Miyake

"Katamari Nah-Nah" sample

Short sample of "Katamari Nah-Nah", featuring the iconic "na-na-na-na" of the series' music — 726 KB

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Katamari Damacy is a third-person puzzle-action video game that was published and developed by Namco for the PlayStation 2 in 2004. The music in the game was widely hailed as imaginative and original and was considered one of its top-selling points. Its eclectic composition featured elements of traditional electronic video game music, as well as heavy jazz and samba influences. The tracks were composed by multiple composers, with Yuu Miyake composing the most at seven and acting as the sound director; other composers for the game were Asuka Sakai, Akitaka Tohyama, Yoshihito Yano, Yuri Misumi, and Hideki Tobeta. Many of the tracks feature vocals from popular J-pop singers such as Yui Asaka and anime voice actors such as Nobue Matsubara and Ado Mizumori.^[1] Miyake has stated that they chose the artists by looking for "Japanese singers who were well-known in Japan but nobody had heard from in awhile [sic] for whatever reason".^[2] Miyake wanted to use vocal songs because he felt that they were necessary "to make music that only Katamari Damacy could do, really fun music".^[3] He has said that game director Keita Takahashi did not give detailed directions on the sound design of the game, allowing Miyake and his team to instead create whatever they felt would fit best.^[4]

The artists were chosen after the lyrics were written, and were selected based on how well Miyake and Takahashi felt they would "gel with the world of Katamari Damacy and the content of the song lyrics".^[3] They were also chosen to create a "pretty silly, goofy selection of singers" that would appeal to "a broad spectrum of people from different generations". Once the lyrics and singers had been chosen, the music was written specifically for each artist with the intention of creating songs that were "familiar" but not "trendy" so that they would not seem dated in the future. The "humming" in the opening song, described by Miyake as "na-na-na-na-na-na-na-Katamari", was included as an experiment by Miyake to try to create a "memorable" theme associated with the game, in response to criticisms that modern game music was not as memorable as that of older games.^[5] Miyake says that "Cherry Tree Times" is his favorite piece from the series.^[4]

Katamari Fortissimo Damacy (塊フォルテッシモ魂, Katamari Forutesshimo Damashii, lit. "Clump Fortissimo Spirit") is the soundtrack album to the game. It includes all of the tracks featured in the game, as well as an additional track, "Katamari March Damacy", a bonus song that was not included in the game. The album has 21 tracks that span a duration of 1:15:13. It was released on May 19, 2004, by Columbia Music Entertainment with the catalog number COCX-32760.^[1]

The soundtrack to Katamari Damacy won both

We Love Katamari (みんな大好き塊魂, Minna Daisuki Katamari Damashii, roughly "Everyone Loves Clump Spirit"), is the sequel to Katamari Damacy published by Namco for the PlayStation 2 in 2005. It features music from Namco composers Yuu Miyake, Akitaka Tohyama, Asuka Sakai, Hideki Tobeta, and Katsuro Tajima, all of whom except for Tajima had composed for the previous soundtrack. Like the previous soundtrack, it also features a plethora of Japanese artists, including DOKAKA, Illreme, Arisa, KIRINJI, YOU, Karie Kahimi, Maki Nomiya and Shigeru Matsuzaki.^[13] The music has been described as covering styles ranging from swing and techno to J-pop and "other kooky sounds".^[14] Sound director Yuu Miyake has stated that he wanted to use only non-Japanese musicians in contrast to the first game using only Japanese artists, but was unable due to a "lack of foreign friends and ability to negotiate".^[2] He has stated that his goal for the soundtrack was to take what his team had done for the first game and raise the quality, creating a "more grown-up feeling". He originally wanted to additionally take the music "far beyond imagination" and fans' expectations, but was stymied by a lack of resources.^[5]

Katamari wa Damacy (塊は魂, Katamari wa Damashii) is the official soundtrack album for the game. It does not include all the music from the game, omitting many of the instrumental tracks heard throughout the game. These omissions were later added on the second disc of the soundtrack album of Me & My Katamari. The album was published by Columbia Music Entertainment on July 20, 2005 with the catalog number COCX-33273; its 18 tracks span a duration of 1:19:45.^[13]

We Love Katamari was nominated for the "best audio" award at the 2005 British Academy of Film and Television Arts awards.^[15] While the soundtrack as a whole did not win any awards like its predecessor, "Katamari on the Swing" won the award for Best Original Vocal/Pop Song at the 4th Annual Game Audio Network Guild awards in 2006.^[16] The album reached #100 on the Japanese Oricon charts.^[17] GameSpot's review of the game termed the music "utterly avant-garde" and a "completely off-the-wall soundtrack that has the same key themes as the first game", though "decidedly less focused on catchiness" than that of the first game and more "experimental".^[14] Square Enix Music Online, in their review of the soundtrack album, said that it "pretty much lives up to the original's reputation" and is full of "lots of great original compositions that fit with the concept". While they said that the soundtrack has "more flaws and it's a bit less memorable" than the soundtrack to Katamari Damacy, it was still "just as fun and as quirky as the last".^[18]

Me & My Katamari

Me & My Katamari (僕の私の塊魂, Boku no Watashi no Katamari Damashii, lit. "Our Clump Spirit") is the third game in the series, and was released on the PlayStation Portable by Namco in 2005. Its soundtrack was primarily composed of tracks from the previous two games, and has been described as "ranging from smoky lounge music to bleepy Japanese pop songs".^[19] The new tracks were composed by Yuu Miyake, Yuri Misawa, Hideki Tobeta, Yoshihito Yano, Akitaka Tohyama, and Naoki Tohyama; Misawa and Tohyama were new composers to the series, while Miyake reprised his role from the previous two games as sound director.

Katamari Original Soundtrack Damacy (塊オリジナルサウンドトラック魂, Katamari Orijinaru Saundotorakku Damashii) is the soundtrack album for the game. In addition to the new tracks, it includes previously unreleased tracks from We Love Katamari as tracks 10–17 on the first disc. Its second disc is made up of orchestral arrangements of previous tracks, tracks from other Namco games, three

In their review of the game, GameSpot called the music "catchy and eclectic", though they disapproved of the number of reused tracks from previous Katamari games.[19] IGN was more ambivalent, saying that while they had no complaints about the music, they also saw "nothing to really praise either".^[21] Square Enix Music Online, in their review of the album, said that the album's "lack of humorous vocal tracks and high quality experimental instrumentals" meant that it did not match up to the previous soundtracks in the series. They additionally felt that the second disc did not add much to the album, and that on the whole the new Me & My Katamari tracks were not strong or numerous enough to make the purchase worthwhile.^[22] Unlike the previous two soundtracks in the series, the soundtrack to Me & My Katamari did not win any awards.

Track list

Beautiful Katamari