Written by Josh Bizeau

To be perfectly honest, when this soundtrack first came out, a few of the songs I picked up off the internet didn't really grab my attention. But, I kept on downloading them and immediately fell in love with "Crossing the Knoll", "Freya's Theme", and the "Ukele le Chocobo". So, as a result, I decided to pick up the soundtrack. I can honestly say, I'm glad I did! 

Let me start by saying the majority of this music is rather old-school. It dwells on a lot of classic styles and melodies that Uematsu has used before. They're very underlined most of the time, and you can't help but wonder, "Where have I heard this before?!" sometimes. Most of the songs remind me of the music from Final Fantasy IV, V, and VIII. The plainness of IV, the strangeness of V, and the upbeat, dramatic nature of VIII. 

Now on to some of my favorite cuts. "Feel My Blade" is a very well done song, with an upbeat rhythm supported by some wild string instruments! "Battle 2" is one of my all-time favorite boss battle themes. Great piano! "Zidane's Theme" may very well surpass "Aeris' Theme" as my favorite FF character theme of all time! It's fast, upbeat, and just plain fun to listen to! "Crossing the Knoll" is a beautiful, contemplative sounding overworld theme. "Hunter Chance" has a great piano section, and just a great, shoe-tapping beat. "Cid's Theme" is a grand, majestic song that has a nostalgic feel to it. The "Hawaii"-style Chocobo themes more than please me. They're cute, and just too fun to listen to. "Tantalus Theme" contains some powerful tenor sax along with an infectious beat. 

Disc 3 is pretty empty in my opinion. It's got some memorable stuff in it, but a lot of it is rather unimpressive. Some of the more memorably tracks are "Black Mage Village," "Slew of Love Letters," and "Gulgur Volcano." But, that's okay, because. . . 

Disc 4 is nothing but greatness! "The Airship Hilda Garde" is my favorite FF airship theme of them all! "Skirmish of the Silver Dragons", combining a sweeping opening, loud timpani, and powerful strings, is probably the best track on the disc, and the last two battle themes ("Dark Messenger" and "Last Battle") really share some of the dark qualities of FF8, with the hard techno style of FF4. The "Prelude" makes its majestic return with an orchestra performance! Undoubtedly, this is probably the coolest of all the Prelude versions; the orchestra performs it flawlessly and the instrumentation is done to perfection! 

While this soundtrack does have its downs, overall, the FFIX soundtrack delivers with a ton of ups! It blew away my expectations completely! Uematsu is not getting worse with age. His age is truly bringing him new musical wisdom! And we can only hope that he continues on with his wonderful composing abilities for a long time to come.