Well, those soundtracks are ok, nothing about them really makes me go OMG, plus they are like 14 years old. I would rather hear what the guy has composed recently.
You can't blame a company if they already have enough members on their team. Just like any field, you just have to keep plugging away until you find an opening somewhere.
I always wonder what happened to the Rare composers. I was just thinking about it like 2 days ago, in fact!!
Though this guy is great, he didn't do the music for DKC, right?
And what of the Blast Corps composer? Rare had so many amazing composers....not to mention how amazing that studio was in general... Their output was ridiculous. Quality and quantity wise...
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Edit: It was only recently when I really discovered how underrated the music was in Goldeneye. I Listen to it on my iPhone all the time, though I sorta had it mainly for novelty's sake. Then one day I really payed attention to Bunker 2, Surface 2, Control (which I used to hate til this recent epiphany), and realized how awesome the music was. Though I always loved Aztec, Frigate, etc.
Who cares how old they are. I'd hire them in a second if I had a company. A painter doesn't become less valuable just because someone likes their older stuff. It's an example of their talent, and hell, this guy has talent. Perhaps you never got hooked into these OSTs GW but man, the Rare games that were the prime of rare were so in significant part to their soundtracks as well as their gameplay. The BK soundtrack in particular is a gaming classic.
Do you know for certain that he did the music for both of those titles? If so, he is amazing. You should have the satellite station music (exterior). That was the most memorable theme from the whole game, as far as I'm concerned.
He absolutely did the music for both of those games, although I actually may be wrong about him doing those specific tracks (though I believe he did).
His latest games include Banjo=Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts and Kingdoms of Amular (with someone else). I haven't heard any music from KoA, but this is pretty sweet, even if it's just remixed:
Man, just put him on Smash Bros. detail or something.
@Anand I think if there was any DKC where Kirkhope had a major impact on, it may have been the third game, but I think that game was primarily composed be a female, while he had some sort of contribution. The first two games were primarily composed by Dave Wise.
The first thing I think of when I think of Rare is their musical prowess. Well, the first thing I really think of is Nintendo, then GoldenEye, then music. So, to learn of a failed chance to have one of the Rare music greats under Nintendo's second party wing is indeed a truly saddening fact to behold. I used to play through their games just to listen to the credit sequences - especially Perfect Dark's, which is a game this guy appears to have worked on. Hopefully Nintendo will scoop him up in time, though I know they won't. And while they're at it (though not really at it), maybe they can woo the Rare talent away from wherever that worked on one of the most amazing sounding games of all time, Jet Force Gemini. Ah... Rare. How amazing was your sound.
Eveline Fischer (or now, Eveline Novakovic) did a good number of the songs in the first DKC, and almost all of the main music in DKC3. David Wise's only solo effort with the DKC trilogy was the second game. Also Robin Beanland did at least one song for the first DKC; the Funky's Flights music.
Why is this news? Tons of big-name composers get turned down all the time. Studios either have someone on-staff and would only contract out small bits of stuff here and there or they solely contract out music--meaning a LOT of people get turned down because they only pick a few at max.
