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Crush 40

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Crush 40

Crush 40 is a Japanese American rock band originally known as Sons of Angels[1] that was made to create music for the Sega arcade racing game NASCAR Arcade (also known as NASCAR Rubbin' Racing outside of America). The core of the group is the hard rock guitarist and video game composer Jun Senoue and vocalist Johnny Gioeli, who is also the vocalist for the bands Hardline and Axel Rudi Pell.

Due to the reunion of the Norwegian band Sons of Angels, the band changed their name to Crush 40. The band also released their second album under this name. Crush 40 has also contributed music to game soundtracks for Wave Master Entertainment.

Since the band's formation, Crush 40 has released two studio albums, Thrill of the Feel and Crush 40. The band has also performed music for several game soundtracks, including the Sonic the Hedgehog series. Most of their contributions are songs for the various games in this series, making their name a recognizable part of the video games.

History

Formation and Thrill of the Feel

Crush 40's origin began with guitarist Jun Senoue and his employment with Sega. Once he had graduated from college in 1993, Jun Senoue got a job with Sega as a music composer for video games. As a video game composer, his first project was creating two songs for the game Sonic the Hedgehog 3.[2] Later, he would end up working on other games such as Dark Wizard, Sonic 3D Blast (Sega Mega Drive version), Sega Rally 2, and Daytona USA: Championship Circuit Edition.[2]

In 1998, Senoue contacted the singer from Hardline, Johnny Gioeli. Together, they recorded their very first song as a group, "Open Your Heart".[3] Even after making that track, which would later be on the video game Sonic Adventure,[1] the two stayed in contact. Eventually from this relationship spawned a project band to make the soundtrack for another game Senoue worked on, NASCAR Arcade.[1] The band was formed under the name "Sons of Angels", with the band name being the exact same as a song that Jun performed with Eric Martin on the Daytona USA: Championship Circuit Edition soundtrack.[3]

The original band was Senoue as the guitarist, Gioeli singing, and Naoto Shibata and Hirotsugu Homma from Loudness playing the bass and drums, respectively.[1] In 2000, the album Thrill of the Feel was released[1] by Victor Entertainment.[4] The album contained all of the tracks which they had written for NASCAR Arcade. Thrill of the Feel received warm reviews, with its rock and roll fit for racing and soaring instrumentals coupled with Johnny's unique voice.[1]

Several changes and Crush 40

When Sonic Adventure 2 was being made to commemorate Sonic's 10th anniversary, the band resurfaced. Naoto Shibata and Hirotsugu Homma could not take part because they were performing with Loudness and later Anthem, so Katsuji and Takeshi Taneda were brought in to play the songs for the game.[1] The resulting track was "Live and Learn", the main theme of Sonic Adventure 2.[1]

However, Sons of Angels would not get to keep their name. Because the Norwegian band "Sons of Angels" reunited under this alias that they had before, the band decided to change their name to Crush 40.[5] When Senoue was asked why he picked "Crush 40" as the name, he responded, "When we had to find another good one, we picked up the word we like…“Crush” is one of them, and Johnny added the number on it. Crush is the name of the soda too…that's my favorite!"[6]

Two years later, the album Crush 40, a European cover version of "Thrill of the Feel", was released by Frontiers Records.[7] The album contained essentially the same music as their previous album with the same racing theme of the songs written for NASCAR Arcade,[7] but this time, there were no instrumental tracks. When asked why the instrumental tracks were removed, Senoue responded, "Crush 40 means a project featuring Johnny Gioeli and me, that's the reason I removed the instrumental songs from the album."[8] There were, however, both prior Sons of Angels songs "Open Your Heart" and "Live and Learn", as well as two bonus tracks: "It Doesn't Matter" featuring vocalist Tony Harnell, and "Escape From The City" featuring Ted Poley and Tony Harnell.[1] Senoue's rationale for including these two songs was "I wanted to introduce some of my favorite songs featuring great singers to the new fans."[8]

Continued work with Sega

Since 2003, Crush 40 has not released any additional albums. However, they have performed original music for several video games, particularly of the Sonic the Hedgehog series. The songs that they performed for these games were released on the individual soundtracks for each game, under Sega's Wave Master Entertainment label.[9][10][11]

In 2003, Sega announced their first multiplatform Sonic game, Sonic Heroes. In this game, there were two new Crush 40 songs: the theme tune "Sonic Heroes", a "bright, melodic song",[1] and "What I'm Made Of...", a "distinctly dark hard rock song with metal sensibilities".[1] The music itself is also found on the soundtrack [Sonic Heroes (soundtrack)| Triple Threat: Sonic Heroes Vocal Trax]].[9] In the booklet for Triple Threat: Sonic Heroes Vocal Trax, Katsuji is credited as the drummer for "Sonic Heroes",[12] but Mark Schulman is credited as the drummer for "What I'm Made Of..."[13]

When Sega announced Shadow the Hedgehog in 2005, Crush 40 returned to perform the game's theme song, "I Am (All of Me)". There is a second song by Crush 40 in the game, the ending theme named "Never Turn Back". Both of these songs also appear on the soundtrack called Lost and Found: Shadow the Hedgehog Vocal Trax.[10] For Crush 40's contributions to this soundtrack, the drumming duties were passed on to Toru Kawamura.[10]

Crush 40 also made contributions to Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. They created their own rendition of "All Hail Shadow", previously performed by Magna-Fi in the game Shadow the Hedgehog. They also recorded a version of "His World", the main theme of Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. The latter of these two did not appear in the game, but both of these songs are on this game's soundtrack, Sonic the Hedgehog Vocal Traxx: Several Wills.[11] Toru Kawamura was credited for the drumming for this soundtrack, as well.[11]

The band also contributed several of their songs, including "Live and Learn", to the video game Super Smash Bros. Brawl.[14]

The album True Blue: The Best of Sonic the Hedgehog was released in Japan on January 23, 2008, and on the album is a Crush 40 cover of the Sonic and the Secret Rings theme "Seven Rings in Hand", originally performed by Steve Conte. Also included on the album are Crush 40 songs "Live and Learn", "What I'm Made Of...", "Sonic Heroes", two versions of "Open Your Heart", two versions of "It Doesn't Matter" (with Tony Harnell), and "Escape From The City" (with Ted Poley and Tony Harnell).[15]

Musical Style

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In a review of their album Crush 40, the band's style was referred to as "melodic hard rock, somewhere between XYZ and Burning Rain" by Bjørnar Bevolden of ProgressiveWorld.net.[16] Among the songs of this album is "Live and Learn", a "cool in your face rocker", according to Michael of RevelationZ Magazine.[7] However, Crush 40 has also experimented with other forms of rock music. For example, "What I'm Made Of..." is a darker song with elements similar to heavy metal.[1]

When interviewed about his style and that of the band, Jun Senoue said, "I know what my style is, and I know what my favourite genres of music are. I listen to a lot of metal music, as well as other genres of music, and my inspiration is always there. The style of the music in the game does change, and it gives a great sense of progression... When we got together to write stuff for Shadow, we found that our fresh ideas were a lot different to the songs we’d written back in 2002 – our sound had changed."[17]

Discography

Crush 40 have released two independent albums, as well as individual tracks for video games.

Thrill of the Feel

Untitled

Thrill of the Feel is Crush 40's first album. It is the only album released under their original name, Sons of Angels. The album contains all of the tracks that the band recorded for NASCAR Arcade and received warm reviews.[1] This album was released by Victor Entertainment and was released for the Japanese market.[4]

Track listing[4]

  1. "The Star Spangled Banner" – 1:22
  2. "Dangerous Ground" – 2:32
  3. "Into the Wind" – 4:28
  4. "Fill It Up" – 2:30
  5. "Revvin' Up" – 4:35
  6. "Rush into the Crazy World" – 0:48
  7. "In the Lead" – 4:03
  8. "Watch Me Fly" – 5:09
  9. "On the Road Again" – 1:40
  10. "Fuel Me" – 2:44
  11. "When the Sun Goes Down" – 1:50
  12. "All the Way" – 4:09
  13. "Open Your Heart" (Bonus Track) – 5:11

Crush 40

Untitled

Crush 40 is the self-titled second album of Crush 40, released in Europe by Frontiers Records.[7] The album contains many of the same tracks as Thrill of the Feel, but it does not contain any instrumental tracks, due to a decision by Senoue.[8] Added to the track listing, however, are "Live and Learn" and the bonus tracks "It Doesn't Matter" featuring Tony Harnell and "Escape from the City" featuring Ted Poley and Tony Harnell.

Track listing[7]

  1. "Live and Learn" – 4:30
  2. "Revvin' Up" – 4:34
  3. "Into the Wind" – 4:28
  4. "In the Lead" – 4:02
  5. "Watch Me Fly" – 5:08
  6. "Fuel Me" – 2:43
  7. "Dangerous Ground" – 2:10
  8. "All the Way" – 4:09
  9. "Open Your Heart" – 5:15
  10. "It Doesn't Matter" (Bonus Track) – 4:27
  11. "Escape from the City" (Bonus Track) – 2:20

Other tracks

Song title Soundtrack Video game Version Year
"Sonic Heroes" Triple Threat: Sonic Heroes Vocal Trax[9] Sonic Heroes Original 2003
"What I'm Made Of..." Triple Threat: Sonic Heroes Vocal Trax[9] Sonic Heroes Original 2003
"I Am (All Of Me)" Lost and Found: Shadow the Hedgehog Vocal Trax[10] Shadow the Hedgehog Original 2005
"Never Turn Back" Lost and Found: Shadow the Hedgehog Vocal Trax[10] Shadow the Hedgehog Original 2005
"All Hail Shadow" Sonic the Hedgehog Vocal Traxx : Several Wills[11] Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 Cover 2006
"His World" Sonic the Hedgehog Vocal Traxx : Several Wills[11] Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 Cover 2006
"Seven Rings In Hand" True Blue: The Best of Sonic the Hedgehog[15] Sonic and the Secret Rings Cover 2008

Gameography

All of Crush 40's songs have been included in numerous video games.

Game Console Developer Year
NASCAR Arcade[1] Arcade Sega-AM3 2000
Sonic Adventure[1] Dreamcast, Nintendo GameCube Sonic Team 1998
Sonic Adventure 2[1] Dreamcast, Nintendo GameCube Sonic Team 2001
Sonic Heroes[1][9] Nintendo GameCube, Xbox, PlayStation 2 Sonic Team 2003
Shadow the Hedgehog[10] Nintendo GameCube, Xbox, PlayStation 2 Sonic Team 2005
Sonic the Hedgehog 2006[11] Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 Sonic Team 2006
Super Smash Bros. Brawl[14] Wii Sora Ltd. 2008

Band members

Current lineup

Previous members

  • Naoto Shibata – bass
  • Hirotsugu Homma – drums
  • Katsuji – drums
  • Mark Schulman – drums

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Parminder Gill (2005-04-10). "Crush 40 History". Retrieved 2008-01-07. Cite error: The named reference "crush40" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  2. ^ a b "Style Factory interview with Jun Senoue". junsenoue.com. Retrieved 2008-01-27. Cite error: The named reference "list" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  3. ^ a b Parminder Gill (2005-04-10). "Jun Senoue's Biography". junsenoue.com. Retrieved 2008-01-09.
  4. ^ a b c "JVC Music/Victor Album Information: Thrill of the Feel" (in Japanese). jvcmusic.co.jp. Retrieved 2008-04-10. {{cite web}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)
  5. ^ Andrea Bertamino (2003-01-31). "Review of "Crush 40"". digilander.libero.it. Retrieved 2008-01-12.
  6. ^ Parminder Gill (2004-02-07). "MelodicRock.com interview with Jun Senoue". junsenoue.com. Retrieved 2008-01-13.
  7. ^ a b c d e Michael (2003-02-23). "RevelationZ's article on Crush 40". revelationz.net. Retrieved 2008-03-05.
  8. ^ a b c Parminder Gill (2004-02-27). "Frequently Asked Questions to Jun Senoue". Retrieved 2008-04-12. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |pubisher= ignored (|publisher= suggested) (help)
  9. ^ a b c d e Lucy Rzeminski. "Disc Information: Triple Threat Sonic Heroes Vocal Trax". chudahs-corner.com. Retrieved 2008-04-08.
  10. ^ a b c d e f Lucy Rzeminski. "Disc Information: Shadow the Hedgehog Vocal Trax". chudahs-corner.com. Retrieved 2008-04-08.
  11. ^ a b c d e f Lucy Rzeminski. "Disc Information: Sonic the Hedgehog Vocal Traxx Several Wills". chudahs-corner.com. Retrieved 2008-04-08.
  12. ^ Triple Threat: Sonic Heroes Vocal Trax booklet. Wave Master Entertainment. p. 3.
  13. ^ Triple Threat: Sonic Heroes Vocal Trax booklet. Wave Master Entertainment. p. 8.
  14. ^ a b Masahiro Sakurai (2007-12-25). "Smash Bros. Dojo Music Update 19". smashbros.com. Retrieved 2008-01-22.
  15. ^ a b Dale Gennard (2008-01-18). "Sonic Stadium's Track List for True Blue". sonicstadium.org. Retrieved 2008-01-24.
  16. ^ Bjørnar Bevolden (2003-04-01). "ProgressiveWorld's article on the album Crush 40". progressiveworld.net. Retrieved 2008-01-12.
  17. ^ Adam Tuff (2006-08-14). "Q&A with Jun Senoue Part 1". junsenoue.com. Retrieved 2006-08-14.
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