But seriously, how did the Falcouner soundtrack even make it to air?

[Fionordequester]

See, I just don't get this. The people who nostalgia so hard over Toonami-era Dragon Ball and who insist the music needed to be changed because of how supposedly dated it was and how it didn't sound like other cartoons from that era...

For what it's worth, I'm not one of those people. I mean, I'm GLAD they DID change it; because Team Faulconer's score is literally the very reason I want to learn how to compose music one day...but I'm not so opinionated as to believe Dragon Ball Z wouldn't have done with Kikuchi's score. I'd...certainly have made fun of it for some of it's more peculiar quirks, but I still would've enjoyed the series. And I'm positive that DBZ would've done just fine with Kikuchi; just as it's done just fine in almost every other country...

...I just wouldn't have enjoyed it AS much as I ended up enjoying it; and I say that as someone who came into the series as a mid-teenager (and even then, only through the video games at first; with all their original scores intact). I fell in love with the Team Faulconer soundtrack the instant I heard them in Legacy of Goku II and Buu's Fury; and was awe-struck when I found out that 16-bit tunes like this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTe8K6LUyUU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtbACzBwshc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BncM16tslI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uq7EQo6Fdu4

Actually had high(er) quality versions of themselves playing throughout the whole show! And from some of the comments I've seen on one of Scott Morgan's vids...

I'm happy to learn all this history about Dragon ball's american music. Being a musician myself, I worshiped all those scores and it really shaped the entire series for me. There can never be enough new Morgan-Style-DBZ compositions as far as I'm concerned. I'm praying to hear more... Maybe even hypothetical DB Super music. Beerus themes and stuff. Thanks though for all of it! Eternally loved sounds.

This was amazing/surreal to watch. I'm sure you've heard it 1,000,000 times, but you guys' music had a profound influence on me. A day hasn't gone by that I haven't hummed or thought about a song from that dub of DBZ, and It even helped inspire me to get into making my own music (that I may upload to the internet some day). I think it would be kind of cool if you guys just had some fun and made a mock score to a Dragonball Super scene/episode, though I'm not sure how the legality of that works with uploading... Anywho, thanks for sharing this with us!

Also I'd like to personally thank you, without you knowing, the joy your music has brought me over the years is more than I can ever repay you for. Dragonball Z has been a part of my life since the age of 7, the Funimation dub is the dub I grew up with, your music made me feel connected in a way that nothing has ever done. I felt there, I felt like I WAS Gohan, Goku, Piccolo, Vegeta. Your music has made me have Goosebumps, Made me feel dread, elation, suspense- every range of human emotion. What might have just been a job for you at the time has affected my life and thousands of others in ways you can't imagine. My interest in music and my guitar playing was directly inspired by you. The Destruction theme in particular, one of the most badass things I have ever heard. It changed my life for the better. So from the bottom of my heart, thank you.

Nice to hear from you again! I'm surprised I missed this for as long as I have, but it's good to see you getting back on the wagon in a way. It's also humbling to hear your story and what you've all gone through. I can certainly sympathize with the typecasting sort of deal you went through with the Z style music, but I am pleased that you found that pleasing your fans was something you really wanted to do rather than simply pleasing yourself. In that end, you could very well do what Enigma did. Divide yourself among two separate styles. Work on what you want to work on for some time, and then switch gears and pump out Z style music. Here's to seeing more from you in the future. Continue in excellence, man! You're still a driving inspiration for the music I make, so take great pleasure in that!

I'm not the only one who fell head-over-heels for it ...

[Kokonoe]

See, I just don't get this. The people who nostalgia so hard over Toonami-era Dragon Ball and who insist the music needed to be changed because of how supposedly dated it was and how it didn't sound like other cartoons from that era...

For what it's worth, I'm not one of those people. I mean, I'm GLAD they DID change it; because Team Faulconer's score is literally the very reason I want to learn how to compose music one day...but I'm not so opinionated as to believe Dragon Ball Z wouldn't have done with Kikuchi's score. I'd...certainly have made fun of it for some of it's more peculiar quirks, but I still would've enjoyed the series. And I'm positive that DBZ would've done just fine with Kikuchi; just as it's done just fine in almost every other country...

...I just wouldn't have enjoyed it AS much as I ended up enjoying it; and I say that as someone who came into the series as a mid-teenager (and even then, only through the video games at first; with all their original scores intact). I fell in love with the Team Faulconer soundtrack the instant I heard them in Legacy of Goku II and Buu's Fury; and was awe-struck when I found out that 16-bit tunes like this...

Pretty much how I feel. It would've done fine, but it certainly made the show far more enjoyable to people like you and me. To this day the Faulconer Productions OST remains my favorite anime soundtrack.

[ABED]

ANd I really wish people would stop looking down on advertising and corporations, as if they don't understand that getting someone emotionally is among the most effective ways to attract customers.

oh no these poor tumors on human civilization

I'm not sure what this does as an argument for not looking down on advertising and corporations. It's no shocking revelation that they'll use mass psychological manipulation techniques to make an extra buck. I don't see how entities who literally go by the book to trick gargantuan groups of people into wasting money on fleetingly emotionally-appealing schlock could ever get enough shit for it.

It is literally no different than when an artist does it. The companies can't make you buy their product. Newsflash, writers try to manipulate your emotions. And please stop using such loaded terms as trick or manipulation as though they are all snake oil salesmen, especially since that would make you a giant hypocrite given how much your life is made possible or simply better off. They aren't tumors on civilization, there is no civilization as we know it without them. The internet as you know it which you are using to talk negatively about businesses, was the result of people looking for ways to make a profit.

Mass psychological manipulation techniques? Tugging on your heartstrings is SO evil. How awful of them. Kikuchi and Faulconer were doing the same thing, but I don't hear that same sort of animus towards them.

This could be its own topic, but I felt compelled to respond here on this issue as I find it misguided and ignorant yet far too prevalent. It's the last I'll say on this specific topic in this thread.

For what it's worth, I'm not one of those people. I mean, I'm GLAD they DID change it; because Team Faulconer's score is literally the very reason I want to learn how to compose music one day...

Then surely one of the first things a composer must do is understand what he's composing. Faulconer's score clearly doesn't.

[Fionordequester]

Then surely one of the first things a composer must do is understand what he's composing. Faulconer's score clearly doesn't.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by that. Could you please clarify?

[ABED]

Then surely one of the first things a composer must do is understand what he's composing. Faulconer's score clearly doesn't.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by that. Could you please clarify?

He doesn't understand the tone or the world he's writing music for. There's a disconnect between the music and the story. Instead of conveying the quirkiness of the world and the Wuxia influences, it's "ACTION! EXTREME ACTION!"

[Bardo117]

The soundtrack is good and enjoyable to some of us. And that will by no means be compromised by those who claim the BGM is subpar by whatever list of criteria they came up with.

[Fionordequester]

He doesn't understand the tone or the world he's writing music for. There's a disconnect between the music and the story. Instead of conveying the quirkiness of the world and the Wuxia influences, it's "ACTION! EXTREME ACTION!"

Even the eight pieces I shared on page 9? I mean, I guess one of those that could be considered "EXTREME ACTION!", but...that doesn't like an accurate description of the other seven...

[ABED]

The soundtrack is good and enjoyable to some of us. And that will by no means be compromised by those who claim the BGM is subpar by whatever list of criteria they came up with.

And I think those that like it think those of us that don't think we aren't okay with that. What we object to is it replacing the original score and not fitting the story.

Even the eight pieces I shared on page 9? I mean, I guess one of those that could be considered "EXTREME ACTION!", but...that doesn't like an accurate description of the other seven...

I'm not going to go bit by bit and explain why I don't like them. Point is that the music doesn't tonally fit the show. It's a story that wears its eastern influences on its sleeves. Maybe some of you don't like that the Kikuchi score sounds like it's from old Hong Kong action movies, but that's the story. Even with all the ki spamming and sci-fi elements (which were there since the beginning), it's still heavily based on those types of shows and movies. Not only that, but moments like Goku's first SSJ transformation was about being foreboding, not "This moment is bitchin'!"

[Bardo117]

The soundtrack is good and enjoyable to some of us. And that will by no means be compromised by those who claim the BGM is subpar by whatever list of criteria they came up with.

And I think those that like it think those of us that don't think we aren't okay with that. What we object to is it replacing the original score and not fitting the story.

And what I object back is that it DOES fit the story. Personally I didn't feel the radical differences you guys are referring to when I watched it with the Falcouner music. It DID feel different, but it wasn't off or wrong at all. In fact, the change seemed very fitting. The change felt so natural and fit the picture just fine, at that specific time.

[funrush]

Maybe because Falcouner's score was how I was first introduced to the dub, I may have rose-tinted goggles when I say this, but Falcouner's score best fits the tone I think the dub was going for. The Kikuchi score is dark and soulful, yet sometimes light and whimsical. Falcouner's score, is more geared towards being badass, and I get like a sci-fi action movie vibe from it. I get the impression it would resonate with American kids better, and maybe sell toys better too?

[ABED]

But that's not the show. It's not just badass.

And what I object back is that it DOES fit the story. Personally I didn't feel the radical differences you guys are referring to when I watched it with the Falcouner music. It DID feel different, but it wasn't off or wrong at all. In fact, the change seemed very fitting. The change felt so natural and fit the picture just fine, at that specific time.

But it was because it's not the show. Goku isn't a superhero. They aren't out to save the world. The characterizations are off and the dialog isn't in the same ballpark. The music fits those changes, but those changes aren't DB. DB and DBZ aren't radically different series.

[Forte224]

Maybe because Falcouner's score was how I was first introduced to the dub, I may have rose-tinted goggles when I say this, but Falcouner's score best fits the tone I think the dub was going for. The Kikuchi score is dark and soulful, yet sometimes light and whimsical. Falcouner's score, is more geared towards being badass, and I get like a sci-fi action movie vibe from it. I get the impression it would resonate with American kids better, and maybe sell toys better too?

It's how I was introduced too, though I no longer like it even from a nostalgia standpoint and I used to defend it vehemently. Well, technically the Levy score is how I was introduced which I also don't like anymore but here's my take. The Faulconer score fits the original dub, but in my view they sort of complement each other in being bad. Neither fit the original show, and that's why Faulconer sounds really really out of place when edited in to Kai and/or the OG Japanese version (which there are clips of believe it or not: https://youtu.be/Vi9ywKbnCaA)

That said, I don't have an issue with people liking it. I have an issue with:
1. Funimation using it in the first place instead of using the original score
2. How rabid fans can get while defending it. Japanese/Kai fans generally don't seek out English dub+Faulconer videos and hate on them, but tons of dub+Faulconer fans go and hate on standalone Kai and OG Japanese videos for no reason. It's like, there's Faulconer clips all over the web, go watch them if that's what you like. If Funimation didn't include the US Broadcast music in their DBZ releases maybe I could understand but as things stand it's easily available

[Bardo117]

But that's not the show. It's not just badass.

And what I object back is that it DOES fit the story. Personally I didn't feel the radical differences you guys are referring to when I watched it with the Falcouner music. It DID feel different, but it wasn't off or wrong at all. In fact, the change seemed very fitting. The change felt so natural and fit the picture just fine, at that specific time.

But it was because it's not the show. Goku isn't a superhero. They aren't out to save the world. The characterizations are off and the dialog isn't in the same ballpark. The music fits those changes, but those changes aren't DB. DB and DBZ aren't radically different series.

Have you ever been to a Gym? You've seen the amount of people wearing Goku shirts on a daily basis is pretty high for a show that isn't 'badass'


The show was presented as a badass action show and it fit the show perfectly.

[ABED]

I didn't say that. I said it's not JUST badass. And the idea that because something is bad ass that you have to shout it over a loudspeaker is ridiculous because that's what Faulconer's score effectively does.

The show was presented as a badass action show and it fit the show perfectly.

It is, but that's not all it is. If it's all you saw, I don't know what you are looking at.

[DragonBallKing]

Maybe because Falcouner's score was how I was first introduced to the dub, I may have rose-tinted goggles when I say this, but Falcouner's score best fits the tone I think the dub was going for. The Kikuchi score is dark and soulful, yet sometimes light and whimsical. Falcouner's score, is more geared towards being badass, and I get like a sci-fi action movie vibe from it. I get the impression it would resonate with American kids better, and maybe sell toys better too?

It's how I was introduced too, though I no longer like it even from a nostalgia standpoint and I used to defend it vehemently. Well, technically the Levy score is how I was introduced which I also don't like anymore but here's my take. The Faulconer score fits the original dub, but in my view they sort of complement each other in being bad. Neither fit the original show, and that's why Faulconer sounds really really out of place when edited in to Kai and/or the OG Japanese version (which there are clips of believe it or not: https://youtu.be/Vi9ywKbnCaA)

That said, I don't have an issue with people liking it. I have an issue with:
1. Funimation using it in the first place instead of using the original score
2. How rabid fans can get while defending it. Japanese/Kai fans generally don't seek out English dub+Faulconer videos and hate on them, but tons of dub+Faulconer fans go and hate on standalone Kai and OG Japanese videos for no reason. It's like, there's Faulconer clips all over the web, go watch them if that's what you like. If Funimation didn't include the US Broadcast music in their DBZ releases maybe I could understand but as things stand it's easily available

I did this for a while after being frustrated at all the hate kai was receiving, thankfully I'm past that now.

[Kunzait_83]

I may have rose-tinted goggles when I say this, but Falcouner's score best fits the tone I think the dub was going for.

It does suit the tone the dub was going for just fine. Thing is, that tone the dub was going for isn't at all even remotely the same tone the actual show itself was made to be going for. This is what some fans like myself are always talking about when we say that dub fans and sub fans are literally watching two completely different shows. The basic-most skeleton of the barebones plot beats are the same, but very little else. Tone DOES matter THAT much in most cases.

The dub took a fantasy martial arts anime that is very heavily inundated with core themes and visuals from Chinese myths and turned it into as generic a superhero action cartoon as it possibly could, gearing it towards American children who clearly knew nothing whatsoever about martial arts fiction, nor had the least slightest bit of exposure to very much or any of it. Character motivations, development, and underlying thematics are HUGELY key elements of ANY story, and the dub's changes went so far as to completely gut and replace ALL of these things with something COMPLETELY mismatched with the original material.

No one is slagging anyone who personally likes or even prefers the FUNimation-altered version of the series: this isn't about personal preference. The issue is when fans of it are so fanatically loyal and devoted to it, that they often deny the DEGREES to just how different it is and make the case that those differences are negligible (which they are not at all, hardly) and that they were somehow NECESSARY for the show to have worked or succeeded with American audiences (they were not at all in the least; they were an exercise in total pointlessness).

The score is one of (and hardly the only) the central issues to this. Because both scores, Faulconer and Kikuchi, are very, very specifically geared to two RADICALLY opposingly different kinds of shows: Western superhero sci fi action cartoon vs Chinese-flavored martial arts fantasy. And no, the sci fi elements that the Z-era brought more to the fore (and were ALWAYS there since the very beginning of the series from Pilaf on down anyway) in NO way detract from it being primarily Chinese martial arts fantasy-themed in the original and are in NO way an excuse for FUNimation to have done what they did.

Wuxia and sci fi (and plenty of other genres) have a MUCH longer history of being blended together than just with DBZ, and I outlined this exhaustively in the thread linked to in my sig. Toriyama was hardly the first, nor last, person to do this. Dragon Ball was riding a MUCH larger cultural wave of kung fu fantasy works all across Asia blending Wuxia with other, more contemporary genres, a trend that was reaching its fevered peak at the very same time that DBZ was underway in Japan.

Yes, the Faulconer score fits in PERFECTLY with a G.I. Joe-esque 'Murican "pew pew!" Saturday morning action cartoon. This right here is essentially what FUNimation wanted the show to be more like when they commissioned the Faulconer score's creation for it. The issue at hand is that this is a FAR cry from what the show was actually originally CREATED to be, and how its presented literally EVERYWHERE ELSE IN THE WORLD EXCEPT HERE.

The Kikuchi score goes directly hand in hand with the kind of story Dragon Ball, in its Japanese original incarnation, actually is throughout. If you know the Kikuchi music well enough, compare it to something like this. THIS is the essence of what kind of story and presentation of said story Dragon Ball was always intended to embody: a classically Chinese-flavored martial arts high fantasy epic with doses of modern elements like sci fi flourishes and moreover Toriyama's own particular brand of self-aware, irreverently quirky sense of humor and whimsy.

The thing that always gets me the most is this: the Faulconer score on the one hand was made as part of a larger effort to make Dragon Ball Z conform as much as possible into a style and genre of action cartoons that American children were already well familiar with. Yet at the same exact time, but FUNimation themselves AND their fans that they've cultivated over the years are only all too happy to wax on how dramatically different and like nothing else on TV Dragon Ball is.

I mean... which one is it? Was Dragon Ball SO radically different from what American kids are used to that it HAD to be radically altered in order to conform to what they already knew and were acquainted with elsewhere? OR was it so successful because of how tremendously unique and set apart it was from everything else on U.S. kids' TV that U.S. kids were already used to?

I mean... pick ONE. You CANNOT have this both ways.

The Kikuchi score is dark and soulful, yet sometimes light and whimsical.

Some people might call that "range". Maybe even "depth".

Falcouner's score, is more geared towards being badass, and I get like a sci-fi action movie vibe from it. I get the impression it would resonate with American kids better, and maybe sell toys better too?

Again: Dragon Ball Z isn't a sci fi action movie. It has sci fi action movie elements sprinkled into it at times for sure, but those are never really the key focus or theme of the series. They're just window dressing on the core martial arts storylines. You can take all the space travel and aliens out of the Saiya-jin and Freeza arcs as well as the cyborgs and genetic mutants from the Cell arc, and you'd effectively still have everything that makes meat of those stories tick. Stories like those (cruel, oppressive imperial tyrants, revenge, years long arduous training preparing for an upcoming epic duel at a set date, martial arts tournaments held to decide a lifelong grudge, etc.) have been done many, many times in tons of martial arts films and books, with the sci fi and extra-genre stuff just being the kind of superficial flavoring that was trendy and in style to utilize in martial arts films and comics and video games at that time in the 1980s and 90s.

Once more, this is the contradiction at the heart of this entire issue: either DBZ was a success in America because of how unique and unlike other American shows it is, or it needed to be changed to conform with other American shows in order to be successful. Pick one or the other, it cannot be both at the same time.

Maybe because Falcouner's score was how I was first introduced to the dub,

This is basically all that this whole thing boils down to ultimately. Someone at some point (either in this thread or another) even used the words "this was what I imprinted onto as a kid". That's some POWERFUL language right there, and this speaks to some thoroughly primal shit that's at the heart of why some people are so insanely attached to this particular version/incarnation of the series.

[Forte224]

Maybe because Falcouner's score was how I was first introduced to the dub, I may have rose-tinted goggles when I say this, but Falcouner's score best fits the tone I think the dub was going for. The Kikuchi score is dark and soulful, yet sometimes light and whimsical. Falcouner's score, is more geared towards being badass, and I get like a sci-fi action movie vibe from it. I get the impression it would resonate with American kids better, and maybe sell toys better too?

It's how I was introduced too, though I no longer like it even from a nostalgia standpoint and I used to defend it vehemently. Well, technically the Levy score is how I was introduced which I also don't like anymore but here's my take. The Faulconer score fits the original dub, but in my view they sort of complement each other in being bad. Neither fit the original show, and that's why Faulconer sounds really really out of place when edited in to Kai and/or the OG Japanese version (which there are clips of believe it or not: https://youtu.be/Vi9ywKbnCaA)

That said, I don't have an issue with people liking it. I have an issue with:
1. Funimation using it in the first place instead of using the original score
2. How rabid fans can get while defending it. Japanese/Kai fans generally don't seek out English dub+Faulconer videos and hate on them, but tons of dub+Faulconer fans go and hate on standalone Kai and OG Japanese videos for no reason. It's like, there's Faulconer clips all over the web, go watch them if that's what you like. If Funimation didn't include the US Broadcast music in their DBZ releases maybe I could understand but as things stand it's easily available

I did this for a while after being frustrated at all the hate kai was receiving, thankfully I'm past that now.

Haha well I did say "generally" after all. Thankfully it doesn't happen much. But I swear sometimes dub fans have a grudge against OG Japanese/English Kai for even existing

[Kokonoe]

People will comment Wuxia and the like but a lot of the times when I hear the original OST, it just sounds like typical 80's fare. It fits when it fits, but always felt Faulconer OST fit even more. I'll just agree to disagree.

[ABED]

Except that the techno/rock guitar stuff doesn't fit the aesthetic. That isn't the tone of the show. Why do you think it fits what the story is? What about Toriyama's writing and characters lend itself to that?

[dario03]

It's how I was introduced too, though I no longer like it even from a nostalgia standpoint and I used to defend it vehemently. Well, technically the Levy score is how I was introduced which I also don't like anymore but here's my take. The Faulconer score fits the original dub, but in my view they sort of complement each other in being bad. Neither fit the original show, and that's why Faulconer sounds really really out of place when edited in to Kai and/or the OG Japanese version (which there are clips of believe it or not: https://youtu.be/Vi9ywKbnCaA)

That said, I don't have an issue with people liking it. I have an issue with:
1. Funimation using it in the first place instead of using the original score
2. How rabid fans can get while defending it. Japanese/Kai fans generally don't seek out English dub+Faulconer videos and hate on them, but tons of dub+Faulconer fans go and hate on standalone Kai and OG Japanese videos for no reason. It's like, there's Faulconer clips all over the web, go watch them if that's what you like. If Funimation didn't include the US Broadcast music in their DBZ releases maybe I could understand but as things stand it's easily available

I did this for a while after being frustrated at all the hate kai was receiving, thankfully I'm past that now.

Haha well I did say "generally" after all. Thankfully it doesn't happen much. But I swear sometimes dub fans have a grudge against OG Japanese/English Kai for even existing

That goes both ways so much that I would say you can't really say one side does it more than the other. Heck the clip you posted has a bunch of comments hating on the dub. Or just look at some of the comments in this thread.