[LISTEN] To Halo 4's Soundtrack

Meet Neil Davidge, the Halo franchise's new composer

Bungie no longer owns the rights to the Halo franchise and 343 Industries is the new sheriff in Blood Gulch. You may be wondering what's going to happen to the series' iconic soundtrack, now that Bungie's Martin O'Donnell will no longer be scoring the Master Chief saga.

Filling in for Marty and his liberal use of E Dorian is Neil Davidge, formerly of Massive Attack. He's joined by orchestrator/arranger Matt Dunkely, of Inception, Black Swan and The Dark Knight. Davidge says their direction for Halo 4's soundtrack is less of a "revolution" and more of an "evolution."

Read on for more details on Davidge and have a preliminary listen of one of Halo 4's finished tracks.

Davidge says he, Dunkely and Microsoft all felt it was time to "move on" from Marty's beloved themes but were quick to express their utmost respect for his work:

"Personally, I've loved those games and I've spent a lot of time with them, and gone through each several times. I enjoy them. They can't be bettered, as far as I'm concerned. I didn't sign on to this to improve on what Bungie and Marty have done, but just to take it somewhere else."It's a new journey, it's a new story, it's a new arc, and so I feel like my job is not to revolutionise or reinvent but to continue the evolution, and I have a slightly different voice to those guys,"says Davidge.

According to Edge, Davidge joined Massive Attack in 1996 on their third full-length, Mezzanine. Since then, he's scored blockbusters like Clash of the Titans, Push and Unleashed.

Listening to the sample below, it's hard not to see the Zimmer-ian influence Davidge and Dunkely are going to bring. At the same time, it manages to evoke Tron: Legacy (which was scored by Daft Punk with help from Inception's Hans Zimmer) and Harry Gregson-Williams, of Metal Gear Solid fame.

Hope that doesn't mean Halo 4 is lined up for a generic video game OST.  :-/

Halo 4 was announced at last year's E3 and is set to drop this holiday season. Let OMNIpixel know what you think of Halo's new sound in the comments...

VIA: Joystiq

SOURCE: Edge