Additional album Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness MIDI Demos released by legacy composer Peter Connelly

The Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness MIDI Demos is released by composer Peter Connelly today, being the fifth (5th!) album within the Dark Angel Symphony project. MIDI Demos contains an eclectic mix of musical instrument digital interface versions of previously released material, demos for ultimately unused cues, plus previously unreleased electronic in-game score. The collection is also hot off the heels of the Tomb Raider Suite: Synth Mixes, published by Nathan McCree last month, which instead aimed to embody the Playstation-era timbre with authentic sound reciprocation of the original titles.

While the Synth Mixes approach doesn't exactly apply here, at first glance, the MIDI Demos may not strictly entail exact soundtrack material from the franchise's sixth entry. Perhaps this is for good reason, as this is advertised as an album of demos. But, most importantly, this rare collection does indeed contain unprecedented representations of material from particular stages of Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness (2003). Levels such as Le Serpent Rouge ("Le Serpent Rouge"), Storm Drains/Louvre Galleries ("Sewage Pollutant") & Strahov Fortress ("Prague Metropolis") were accompanied by electronically mixed tracks in-game. Both the pity and consolation here is that the applicable final-use cues incorporated the real-instrumentation of the Abbey Road Studios recordings, however, these "demos" are nearly indistinguishable (albeit the infamous "Le Serpent Rouge" bass doesn't quite 'slap' the same in its extended form). The electronic/orchestral mixes were strangely and entirely omitted from Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness Remastered (2019), and the MIDI Demos release begs the question - have they actually now seen the light of day?

The Dark Angel Symphony store sadly closed earlier this year, but the digital-only publication of MIDI Demos is available via all good music retailers, including streaming services and digital music stores. The crowd-funded production and historical release of the Tomb Raider: Dark Angel Symphony marked the first standalone, commercially available music by legacy Tomb Raider composer Peter Connelly. The Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness MIDI Demos joins MoTR's commercial discography catalogue and the ever-growing collection of officially sanctioned franchise albums. Full track-listing after the jump below.

Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony documentary published to accompany Peter Connelly's legacy project

Following the successful re-launch of the Kickstarter-based Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony project, legacy composer Peter Connelly (The Last Revelation, Chronicles & Angel of Darkness) has published a 2-part video documentary (helmed by fellow fansite Tomb of Ash). 

Connelly describes his time at Core Design and working on the original scores to the 4th, 5th & 6th main entries to the video game franchise. The composer suffered from Bell's Palsy subsequent of the stress brought on by the ups and downs of the album production. 

The final crowdfunded release ultimately came to fruition in December 2019, not only featuring orchestral re-recordings and rearrangements of highlights from the composer's Tomb Raider career but also, for the first time, remastered releases of the original soundtrack albums for each title. More info at Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony.

Peter Connelly releases Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony digitally (including Tomb Raider 4/5/6 Remastered)

The Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony Kickstarter comes to fruition with the package of albums being released digitally first - today for backers and the weekend for the public via the project's "Renne's Pawnshop" online store. The crowd-funded production and historical release of the music to Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (1999), Chronicles (2000) & Angel of Darkness (2003) marks the first standalone, commercially available soundtracks by legacy Tomb Raider composer Peter Connelly.

The albums include Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony, a re-imagining of Connelly's music from across each game, as well as the original soundtracks Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation Remastered, Tomb Raider: Chronicles Remastered & Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness Remastered. The latter include previously unreleased material. The albums hit music streaming services on February 14th, 2020, and physical versions are still in production within the Kickstarter campaign.

The Dark Angel Symphony joins Nathan McCree's The Tomb Raider Suite, cataloguing music from Tomb Raiders 1 through 6, in MoTR's commercial discography. Full album track-listings after the jump below.

Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel launches on Kickstarter with £180,000 target; TWO albums announced with pledge rewards

Peter Connelly's Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel crowd-funding campaign has arrived on Kickstarter! The project follows in the footsteps of The Tomb Raider Suite by requiring an all-or-nothing backing of £180,000 by November 1st, 2018. One unfortunate aspect of 2016's The Tomb Raider Suite project is that following the fundraising, the album has yet to be released to the backers - the same pool of Tomb Raider fans will need some buttering up in order to support The Dark Angel. The successfully funded project will spawn two albums: 1) Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony & 2) Tomb Raider: Remastered.

"The core of Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony is a suite of two albums: one recorded by an 82-piece orchestra at the prestigious Air Lyndhurst Studios, London, and produced by a world-class professional team led by Dr. Richard Niles (an world-renowned orchestrator for Paul McCartney, the Pet Shop Boys, Trevor Horn and more), for the most beautiful and moving Tomb Raider sound you will ever hear. The second is for an album of Peter Connelly’s original Tomb Raider scores remastered for the highest-possible sound quality."

The primary album will consist of the re-orchestrated music from Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (1999), Tomb Raider: Chronicles (2000) & Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness (2003), while the second forms the re-mastered original soundtracks of the games - their first commercially available form in the history of the franchise. Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness is also set to be released in 5.1 surround sound (as an upper tier pledge reward). Other extras up for grabs include "vinyls, the full score, posters, studio attendance, rare memorabilia, and limited-edition fan-produced items like jewellery and statuettes". Support the Kickstarter here. Full reward tiers tabulated after the jump below.

Peter Connelly announces Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel

In the same vein as Nathan McCree's The Tomb Raider Suite, the Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel project aims to re-record legacy franchise composer Peter Connelly's soundtracks to Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (1999), Tomb Raider: Chronicles (2000) & Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness (2003). The project has been in development for over two years and is being slated for funding via Kickstarter, following The Tomb Raider Suite's success in reaching 121% of its goal.

"The album will not be a direct copy of the original Tomb Raider games’ scores, although it will remain faithful to those classic soundtracks. The music will be transformed and rearranged using techniques and personnel that were simply not available or within reach 15–20 years ago. Connelly intends to bring the musical compositions and recordings up to date and provide the listener, not only a sense of nostalgia, but with a whole new experience of this familiar and much-loved Tomb Raider music." - Press release

It should be noted that "The original versions of Connelly’s pieces will also be made available, properly remastered and beautifully presented, to tie-in with the new orchestral album so that fans can enjoy the original scores in the best possible quality" - something The Tomb Raider Suite project is yet to offer for the still unreleased soundtracks to Tomb Raider I, II & III (1996-1998) in over 20 years of the franchise.

Despite the soundtrack to Angel of Darkness having been recorded at Abbey Road Studios with the London Symphony Orchestra in 2002, Connelly promises that "all of the music, TR6 included, will be re-arranged in the same way that TR4 and TR5 will be re-mastered so they're all part of the same "family". The Last Revelation & Chronicles will benefit immensely as their soundtracks were limited by the software-instrumentation technology of the times. Personnel includes masters in their field - Dr Richard Niles, Isobel Griffiths & Tomb Raider alumnus Martin Iveson.

The Kickstarter campaign launches on October 1st, and the studio album is set to be recorded and produced at the state-of-the-art Air Lyndhurst Studios in London. Formats, distribution & pledge tiers are yet to be announced, but for upcoming information please visit the Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel website.