Mood Music for Mage
Editor's Note: This piece may have been written by Anders Sandberg.
The Technocracy
Kraftwerk is the obvious choice. Cold, efficient music without excess emotion, praising(?) technology. Some useful songs are:
Spacelab — Void Engineers
Metropolis — When the players have entered Autochthonia or another Technocracy realm, or just for depressing cityscapes.
Homecomputer — Virtual Adepts ("I program my homecomputer. Beam myself into the Future")
The Model — The Syndicate
Man-Machine, The Robots — Iteration X
Computer world — Virtual Adepts/ New World Order
Radioactivity — When the players meet the Wyrm
Other useful music
Eurythmics, 1984
"Doubleplusgood" and "Ministry of Love" — perfect for the New World Order
Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark
Genetic Engineering — Progenitors or Sons of Ether. Slightly wacky
Jean Michel Jarre
Equinoxe 6 — Iteration X, Autochthonia, Digital Web or Virtual Adepts. Played in a loop it will give the impression of an ever-quickening electronic process. Tends to either stress or exhilarate players.
Revolutions — The fight between the Technocracy and Traditions. Includes chants in Arabic, pipes and a electronic voice chanting the Technocracy part. Very suggestive.
The Traditions
Carmina Burana, Carl Orrf
Very mageish. Cult of Ecstasy. ("O Fortuna, Imperatrix Mundi" is perfect when people are using coincidental magick or Entropy).
Händel, The Messiah
Celestial Chorus
Verdi, Requiem
The "Dies Ire" section is quite good for dramatic scenes of total destruction, appearances of Nephandi lords etc. "Tuba Mirum" for similar dramatic appearances of Oracles, the Avatar or Ascension. Otherwise, lots of material for Celestial Chorus
Bach
Order of Hermes, Virtual Adepts
Holst, the planet suite
Theme music for the different realms/planets. Uranus, the Magician, is perfect for big rituals.
Soul Manager by Front 242
Very Euthanatos!
Beethoven's 9th
The Ode to Joy choir is about the Ascension.
Music from "A Clockwork Orange"
Very mageish. "Timesteps" for the Umbra. The transposed Beethoven's 9th is very much the Virtual Adept/Technomancer Ascension. "Country Lane" seems to symbolize Mage, clockworks, gregorian chants, rain and much other...
Di Leva "Naked Number One"
Odd mixture of most of the philosophies of the Traditions in a New Age form. Useful for a amusing and slightly malkavian view on them. "Everyone is Jesus" is perfect music for the young, born again Celestial Chorists, and "Starseed" manages to express a lot of the flavor of the philosophy of magick.
Chess by Björn Ulvaeus
A musical, generally not very mageish except two songs. "The Opening Ceremony" is quite Technocratic, with parts fitting different fractions of the Syndicate. "Nobody's on Nobodys Side" is a good introduction of how to stay alive in the WoD. Very recomended for young mages and vampire neonates.