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Next up in the line of medleys is the music from a game that until recently I saw as a tad overrated, possibly because I didn't grow up with it like I did with the "main" trio of Sonic 1, 2, and 3&K. Personally I played Sonic CD a very limited number of times as a kid because no one I knew owned a SEGA CD, so I don't have much connection with it. Only within the past year have I got my hands on the game again and am I understanding its great appeal. Fortunately the Japanese soundtrack was part of the Sonic 3 & Knuckles collection for the PC, so I'm fairly familiar with it.

Which brings up the main schism of the Sonic CD fanbase. Being on the SEGA CD, Sonic CD utilized CD quality music with the use of Red Book technology that cartridge based systems simply couldn't do. Since the technology was fairly new in use for the realm of video games, the music in Sonic CD and other games wouldn't loop continuously like on a cartridge. When the game was brought to America, the newly founded SEGA of America music department decided to put Spencer Nilsen to work by composing an original soundtrack for the American audience. The game infamously received a lower score in GameFan magazine than the "perfect" Japanese/European version solely based on the soundtrack alone.

While I grew up with the JP/EU soundtrack myself, I decided to give the American soundtrack a thorough listen since rediscovering this game and found myself enjoying it in the same way I enjoyed the original. While the JP/EU soundtrack focuses on hard hitting, bouncy and vivid melodies, the American soundtrack takes a more subtle approach at depicting this games' themes of courage in ones self and care for the environment.

Oh yeah, this game had themes. "You Can Do Anything", "Cosmic Eternity", and "Sonic Boom", vocal themes from both versions of the game, do well their job in encouraging the player that anything is possible, while the Good and Bad futures of this game make the series' original intended environmental message very apparent: human interference can either work with or against the rest of nature. No other entry in the series has come close to stressing this emphasis.

But enough about all that, this medley is a mix of all of the Present timeline themes from both the US and JP/EU versions of the game. From the house beats to the vocal funk, Naofumi Hataya and Spencer Nilsen's tracks flow fairly well together. Problems this time around included getting the US versions of Metallic Madness and Quartz Quadrant in there, but otherwise it was relatively smooth after I got a good feel for the US soundtrack.

I'm still unsure when or if I'll get to the Good/Bad Future mixes, but the Past should be fairly easy considering the major flaw of the US soundtrack: it had no original Past themes as they were in PCM audio instead of the new Red Book format, and thus were harder to remove and replace. Anyway, enjoy!