Title: AIR Original Soundtrack
Original Creator: Key/Visual Art's
Release Date: 9/27/02
Catalog No.: KSLA-0004~5
Rating: 4/4

This soundtrack, in particular the theme song, will lead to my going deaf. Ever since I got the CD a few days ago, I've been playing it non-stop. During the time I was playing the game, I grew to appreciate the song. By the time I was done, I would have an urge to fire up the Playstation just to listen to the song. As it got progressively worse, I decided to just buy the soundtrack.

In the game, it only has the first verse which I had already enjoyed immensely. The CD comes with the full version of the song and the second verse along with the rest of the song is even better! It sounds awesome when piped through DPLII or Neo:6 and in fact, I would say that it's the only way to fully enjoy the rich atmospheric feel and nostalgic mood that the song evokes. It's currently the only song that I keep in lossless format in iTunes/AirTunes so that my receiver has ALL the sound frequencies to perform the surround sound algorithm.

I love the song a lot. As I said previously, the song has a very rich atmospheric feel to it driven by a strong bass. The first verse is good, but when the song changes key at the beginning of the second verse...musical heaven. At first, I wondered why the song was about a bird, but the lyrics make a lot more sense once I finished the last chapter "Air" in the game.

The rest of the soundtrack is very good. Out of the instrumentals, my favorites are the piano solo that plays during the intro and near the end as well as Minagi's theme. The tune that plays during summer, Kanna's theme (?), is good along with tracks 19/22 and of course, the orgel version of the theme song. I'm not really a fan of the two other vocals. It's not that I don't like them, rather, they're heavily overshadowed by the intro theme.

There are a total of two CDs in this album. Since the original game came with the soundtrack, they probably had to put some extra stuff. It comes with a few songs that they didn't use in the game, short versions of the intro/ending as well as the karaoke. The liner notes have the lyrics, musical score for the three vocal songs, and a blurb from the composers for each of the tracks.

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