“And that was the end of everything. But it was also a beginning.”

December 27, 2017 5:00 PM

Four Years Later, Destiny's Music Of The Spheres Has Leaked [Kotaku] “Composed by O’Donnell, his partner Michael Salvatori, and former Beatle Paul McCartney, Music of the Spheres was envisioned as a musical companion to Bungie’s ambitious Destiny. But Bungie and O’Donnell spent nearly a year battling over, among other things, publisher Activision’s failure to use O’Donnell’s music in a trailer at E3 2013. In April 2014, Bungie fired O’Donnell, and despite O’Donnell’s hopes, the company indefinitely shelved Music of the Spheres. He has made several public comments on the work since, and last month, he implicitly encouraged people to share it. “Years ago, when I was Audio Director at Bungie, I gave away nearly 100 copies of Music of the Spheres,” O’Donnell tweeted on November 30, 2017. “I don’t have the authority to give you permission to share MotS. However, no one in the world can prevent me from giving you my blessing.””

• Lost Destiny symphonic album, complete with Paul McCartney, has totally leaked [Ars Technica]

“The original symphonic treatment for the game Destiny was long thought lost, thanks to it being shelved after a major staffing shake-up at developer Bungie. But Destiny fans received quite the Christmas miracle—albeit a legally dubious one—when fans discovered and posted an apparent rip of the album in question, titled Destiny: Music of the Spheres. The 8-track, 48-minute album leak, which is live as of press time at more than a few mirrors, was quickly confirmed as legitimate by two major contributors to the project: former Bungie composer Marty O'Donnell and former Bungie Creative Director Joe Staten. O'Donnell offered a "I think this is it" on Monday via Twitter, followed by an emphatic post of "Finally! #NeverForgotMotS." Staten followed up with acknowledgement that Sir Paul McCartney himself sang a lyric Staten had suggested, then added, "Glad #MOTS is finally out for all to hear."”

• The teen who spent over a year piecing together Destiny's unreleased music [Eurogamer]

“When Marty O'Donnell's court case with Bungie ended in a settlement, Owen sifted through the 59-page document that was placed into the public domain. In the document is a paragraph that reveals 40 minutes of the 48-minute suite is included in the Destiny game and its official soundtrack. This sparked a thought. "I saw an entire section about Bungie using snippets of the work before and how most of it was out there and I thought, hey, I could compile this," Owen remembers. Owen set to work, an internet detective with a Destiny obsession and a passion for music composition. His ultimate goal was to release a Definitive Edition of Music of the Spheres so fans could listen to as close an approximation of the album as possible. "Basically Bungie won't publish the work so I thought I'd try," he says.”

posted by Fizz (4 comments total)

Man, I wish the story had lived up to this music. I wonder what people imagine the story to be, if they hear the music but not the game.

(It did live up to that awful Paul McCartney song, though. In quality if not exactly in content... *cough*)
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 6:23 PM on December 27, 2017

The music in question can be found at SoundCloud (and presumably many other places, too).
posted by ElKevbo at 6:35 PM on December 27, 2017

July 2013 was when Sirvana happened. I believe this is a partial explanation.
posted by mwhybark at 6:52 PM on December 27, 2017

The music can also be found on YouTube.
posted by frodisaur at 6:59 PM on December 27, 2017