Cyberpunk 2077 – Music, Soundtrack & Sound Design (Explained!)

Today’s Cyberpunk 2077 video includes Cyberpunk 2077’s music composition, soundtrack, sound design, Samurai, Rockerboys, the Fusion of Cyber and Punk, Licensing of artists, Cyberpunk radio and clubs, dynamic music and sound cues as well as Musical inspiration for Cyberpunk 2077 coming from the likes of BladeRunner, Akira and Ghost In The Shell.

First and foremost let’s take a Look at what kind of sounds we will hear in Cyberpunk 2077 and their Music and Soundtrack. CD Projekt Red answered a fan regarding their musical direction In a brief message via Facebook. In this message they mention marrying the Cyber with the punk with cyber referring to sonic texture, and a raw dirty, synthesized sound palette. Punk was all about the attitude of the music and being rebellious, ballsy and impulsive. They promise to make the soundtrack of Cyberpunk as colorful as the world of Night City and that they would be drawing from all genres to create a sound track that first and foremost leads the narrative and adds context to the story.

This means that the lore based classes in the rockerboys will come to life with the punk side of the music direction, and also netrunners and techies will feel at home too with the futuristic sounds reflective of their role and job in night city. From Johnny SIlverhand and his rebellious attitude inspired track Chippin In, to the dirty and dark pounding of the scavengers tunes permeating the gaffittied walls of their lair, This fusion seems apparent. In the same light larger than life celebrities and bands like Lizzy Wizzy and The Metadwarves and Samurai will have a large presence not only in their music, but how that music impacts celebrity worship in the dark future.

Now when it comes down to lead composition of the Soundtrack of Cyberpunk 2077, CD Projekt Red has decided to go with highly established music director Marcin Pryzbylowicz, who composed the epic and emotional Witcher 3 soundtrack, which is arguably the best video game soundtrack of the last decade. Also on the audio and musical direction team they have Bryan Mantia and Melissa reese. Bryan Mantia has worked with band like Guns N Roses and Primus and will be an integral part of the soundtrack. Vocalist and composer Melissa reese is also on the project and whose previous work can be seen in Bloodborne and INfamous second son.

In an interview with Mantia and in regards to Cyberpunk 2077 he claims “This project in particular has been a little challenging because the developers are looking for music that has never been heard before. They’re looking for music that would be made in the year 2077. I’m into it because I really love “white noise” and I figure that’s where music is going to be 60 years from now. Basically, this means every frequency within the range of human hearing from 20 to 20 thousand hertz. He ends with “I’m really digging the experimentation on this project”

This is pretty exciting because the genre is by nature very experimental, and if they pull off some truly unique sounds it could have a big impact on how how we look at the world of cyberpunk and the genre as a whole. Now on the flip side experimentation is also very polarizing and is a risky move.

Now according to CD Projekt Red themselves, the music of the game will be all produced in house meaning they won’t be licensing outside artists. They did this their trailers with Hyper’s song Spoiler being featured in the E3 trailer and Archive’s Bullets being featured In the Teasre trailer. This might mean radios stations, clubs and other areas in night city that are filled with the sounds of cyberpunk may infact be completely unique and made in house. Although there is some debate on whether or not we will see licensed music from other artists for the time being CDPR has stated otherwise.

In addition to all these things, music will be dynamic rather than scripted. If you remember my E3 audio leak video I compared two separate leaks of the gameplay demo and deduced that in the scavenger lair scene, there were in fact distinctly separate tracks running during the assault on the scavenger lair, meaning that there were two audio leaks out there. This also means that the music you can hear on the streets of Night City will be dynamic and will be fluid based on if its night or day, if you are in a specific kind of club, or potentially even your positioning on the map and what you are looking at.

This is further implied by Pryzbylowicz mentioning how the open setting of Cyberpunk allows for them to add sound ques.
He notes an example we’ve seen in the interaction with the Maelstrom. If things go south for you in the interaction and a shootout ensues the music will come to a boiling point and snap as you begin to fir your rounds into your enemies. If the deal goes down without a hitch, the anxiety laced synths die down and more calm music floods back into the background.